Credits : http://www.theppc.com/

This experience based on Total Immersion’s Technology features unique functions like Face Tracking, Movement Detection and possibility to capture the video stream with sharing options through social networks.

This engaging experience allows you to turn yourself into Iron Man and try out the HUD (Heads Up Display) used by Marvel’s hero.

Three of the fourth quarter’s biggest DVD and Blu-ray Disc releases featured a bonus that can’t be found on the discs, but only on the packaging. And the company behind it is hoping they won’t be the last in home entertainment to try it.

All owners of Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, Star Trek and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen need is a Web cam. Visit a Web site tied into the specific release (such as www.weareautobots.com for Transformers), slide your box art in front of the webcam and watch as you activate an interactive 3D image of Optimus Prime. For Star Trek, users take a self-guided tour of the U.S.S. Enterprise, and for Battle of the Smithsonian, Rex the Dinosaur, a giant squid and Amelia Earhart’s plane pop off the box, right in front of the consumer.

“It was just a really interesting idea in terms of home entertainment,” said Bruno Uzzan, CEO and co-founder of Total Immersion, the company behind the software, dubbed “augmented reality.” “Our goal is hyper-realism, giving consumers something more and something new that they haven’t seen before.”

Augmented reality works by the webcam and Web site recognizing the specific cover art and popping up a 3D image that consumers can move around on-screen in real time. While all three earned high praise from both the studio partners, Paramount and Fox, Uzzan said he was partial to the Transformers experience, since “it really connected with consumers.” more

LOS ANGELES (January 20, 2010) – In what may herald a new benchmark in entertainment marketing, augmented reality is beginning to transform the way key brand assets of hot film and music properties – performers, characters, scenes, and more – migrate from the original medium to the consumer’s world.

The just-concluded holiday season affirms the trend.  With the DVD launch an increasingly important coda to tentpole titles, Total Immersion (www.t-immersion.com) has infused augmented reality (AR) into three of this season’s hottest home entertainment packages – for Paramount’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and Star Trek (designed by Picture Production Company), and Fox’s Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian.

At the same time, the company has executed its first campaign for the music industry, for Universal Music TV/All Around The World artists N-Dubz.   As part of its latest release, the platinum-selling band interacts with viewers – and performs in AR.

Total Immersion’s latest applications reveal an evolution in marketing that merges multiple channels and uses the latest in AR technology to engage consumers in the brand experience as never before.  The company supplied AR applications to Paramount and Fox to promote the theatrical release of all three titles.

Among this past holiday season’s biggest movers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen “went AR” in two-disc Blu-ray and DVD sets.   Fans can give life to an augmented reality incarnation of robotic character Optimus Prime by simply displaying DVD or Blu-ray boxes before a webcam.  Viewers can also access a special website, which asks that they assemble the Matrix of Leadership to bring Optimus Prime back to life, fix his armor and calibrate his weapons by controlling his aim during target practice.

Paramount Home Entertainment’s DVD and Blu-ray Disc releases of Star Trek deploy AR to take consumers on a self-guided tour of the U.S.S. Enterprise.  Showing the disc box to a webcam triggers an AR journey of five cabins on the Enterprise — and even enables consumers to fire on foes from the ship’s deck.

20^th Century Fox’s Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian likewise enables consumers to enter the movie experience. Just as museum wonders come to life in the film, so the DVD and Blu-ray Disc packaging (abetted by a webcam) unleashes Rex the Dinosaur, the giant squid and Amelia Earhart’s plane, among other snippets.  All seemingly pop off the box — and put the consumer at the center of the action.

N-Dubz’ new album, Against All Odds – released on Universal Music TV/All Around the World — features an augmented reality performance by the band, triggered from data embedded within the album artwork.  When displayed before a webcam, the artwork reveals 3-D images of the band chatting with the viewer and then giving an impromptu performance of the hit new single, “I Need You” — all within the palm of the viewer’s hand.  Consumers can turn the sleeve artwork around to view the band from alternative angles.   Band members move as fluidly as they would if they were physically standing on the paper held aloft.

“We’re helping home entertainment marketers engage their audiences on an entirely new level, with experiences from each film crossing from cinematic ‘reality’ to theirs, ” said Bruno Uzzan, CEO and co-founder, Total Immersion.  “After more than a decade in development, augmented reality has moved into prime-time.  Some of the world’s largest brands are using AR to enhance both brand loyalty and the customer experience, by propelling consumers into a unique 3D interaction with their film.   Hollywood is embracing the opportunity to enable fans to explore their handiwork through a process that blends the physical and digital worlds.

“AR is a major technical achievement,” Uzzan said.  “But it’s just as compelling a marketing milestone.  Through AR, we’re taking the equity of the franchise – key assets like characters and scenes – and giving them to consumers.  AR adds value by enabling consumers to explore and experience what amounts to a new entertainment ecosystem.  And this is just the beginning.”

About Total Immersion

Total Immersion (www.t-immersion.com) is the global leader in augmented reality. Through its patented D’Fusion® technology, Total Immersion blurs the line between the virtual world and the real world by integrating real time interactive 3D graphics into a live video stream. Leading the augmented reality category since 1999, the company maintains offices in Europe (France and the UK), Asia and in the U.S., and supports a network of more than 50 partners worldwide.  Find the latest news concerning Total Immersion projects at: http://augmented-reality-news.com.

Total Immersion has been awarded by Augmented Planet Readers Choices Awards as Best Web Based Augmented Reality Demo for “We are Autobots” created for the Transformers movie with PPC.

Mobilizy won Best augmented reality mobile browser and Accrossair Best augmented reality mobile application

Lester Madden, the founder of Augmented Planet says; “Since creating Augmented Planet we have seen a lot of augmented reality innovation. Six months ago the emphasis was on web based applications, however we have seen a signification increase in the number of augmented reality applications available for mobile devices, particularly applications that are location aware. This shift has been made possible by new sensor technology such as the introduction of the digital compass in the latest mobile phones.”

Users were invited to vote for their favorite augmented reality applications of 2009. Results have shown that 56% of users who answered the survey have tried an online web based augmented reality demo using their web browser and webcam.

In 2009, Augmented Planet saw some excellent examples of how augmented reality can be used as a marketing tool to promote Hollywood movies (District 9 and Avatar), we predict that 2010 will bring us even more examples of how augmented reality can be used as a marketing tool.

Credit : PPC Group

Have a look to the video trailer here.

Experience here. (DVD is required)

AR experience has been developed by PCC Group with technology powered by Total Immersion.

The figures, compiled from AR website campaigns for Paramount Picture films Star Trek and  Transformers, show that the experiences generated ‘hundreds of thousands of visitors’ during the first launch week alone, with an average viewing time of four minutes.

According to Total Immersion’s COO, Eric Gehl, the statistics demonstrate a growing consumer appetite for augmented reality, which marketers cannot afford to ignore.

“This technology is only just starting to take hold in the UK, so we are delighted to be generating these types of user numbers this early on,” Gehl explains.  “The length of time people are staying on our clients’ websites is a key indicator of the influence that augmented reality is having already.  This is also reflected in the number of YouTube hits that both campaigns have generated, which totalled more than 90,000 in the first launch week,” he adds.

Other high profile campaigns for Total Immersion this year have included the opening of the UK’s first augmented reality exhibition at Nokia’s flagship Regent Street store in London to launch the new N97 and the eagerly awaited Mattel range of AR toys for James Cameron’s new film, Avatar.

The firm’s patented markerless technology will also feature in the new Michael Jackson Opus book, due to be published in December. In France, an augmented reality book published with the famous French editor, Nathan, dedicated to 8 to 12-year-olds, was out of print in only three days.

“Total Immersion and its network of 50 partners has delivered more than 150 projects to the marketplace in the first nine months of this year and 75% of these have been for marketing campaigns,” Eric said.

“It is one of the fastest growing areas of our business and this looks set to continue in the future, especially with the growth of our mobile phone technology, which now works on Symbian and Windows mobile, with Android and the iPhone soon to follow,” he explains.

“Only with the ability to access AR on the move will the technology really start to come of age, or become accepted in our daily lives as a typical media type .  Taking into account the success of recent campaigns, we anticipate that AR will be widespread on the high street and in outdoor advertising as early as late 2010,” Eric continues.

“Everyone has seen the ‘Star Wars’ holograms scene in the movie blockbuster.  This will be reality, Augmented reality in 2013, where the need for video processing will be redundant,” he states.

“Beyond that, there is the potential for the technology to be built into glasses and for new forms of mass communication using personal AR projector systems…this technology has the potential to literally transform the way we live.”

Video here !

Experience here !

Source

Please find an extract from this blog article : We Are Autobots Best Augmented Reality so far

“The facial recognition software is so powerful that it recognizes print faces LOL, early today I was with my COO exploring the site and it occurred to him try to make the software detect a printed face we have an Electronic Arts calendar that has a Harry Potter photograph, so we put it in front of the web cam and it was recognized! Here is a screen capture!”