Inglobe Technologies, an Italian company focussed on providing Augmented Reality solutions, has recently released the Augmented Reality Plugin for Google SketchUp. We asked Graziano Terenzi, CEO at Inglobe for an interview with “The Daily CatchUp” on their ARmedia Plugin.

TDC: Graziano, what is ARmedia?

Graziano: ARmedia is the Augmented Reality Brand by Inglobe Technologies as well as Inglobe’s platform for developing Augmented Reality (AR) applications. It is the framework that allows us to deploy a variety of AR solutions that can be easily integrated with other software platforms. The engine of our Augmented Reality Plugin is based on it.

TDC: Graziano, What does  “Augmented Reality” mean, please explain more?

Graziano: Simply stated, Augmented Reality is the superposition of virtual content, such as 3D computer graphics and animations, onto a real world scene in real-time. AR is implemented by means of an ever growing set of emerging technologies that will innovate and improve enormously the workflow within many different applicative domains. I believe that Design practitioners will be positively affected by Augmented Reality.

TDC: Graziano, when I saw the Augmented Reality plug for the first time I thought it filled a huge gap the the digital designer’s toolkit as it allowed the designer to produce a nearly tangible virtual model for the client. Was this your intention and how did this idea come about?

Graziano: Thank you very much for the question.  Yes, I think that this is exactly the point here. Digital designers today have a lot of tools that provide them with incredible functionalities for accomplishing complex visualization tasks.  All these tools are incredibly useful and add value to the designers workflow.  Nonetheless they still suffer a structural limitation: they only function and “live” inside the machine, i.e. inside the computer.  But there is a whole new world, that we are starting to explore within our development activity, which makes us believe that many designer’s tasks can be better accomplished by bringing Building Information and Digital Content to the real world rather than only relegating it to their digital sphere of existence.  Augmented Reality, we believe, is the means that will make this possible.  Our main goal with the ARplugin was to provide as many practitioners as possible with an innovative tool for examining, analysing and visualizing their 3D projects, by means of a “tangible” Augmented Reality Interface.  The basic visualization capability of the ARplugin can be appreciated by taking a look at this video, since according to a dear friend of mine, an Augmented Reality picture in action is worth a thousand words…

Of course the AR plugin is a first step towards a deeper integration of Augmented Reality with SketchUp as well as with other beautiful plugins.

TDC: Who do you see using AR now and in what markets would you see it used in the future?

Graziano: There are a lot of people who are using the ARmedia plugin in a wide variety of markets. For example, the plugin is employed by construction companies worldwide.  Architecture and Design Firms (and professionals) are using the plugin both as a presentation tool and as a design aid.  Content Creators and companies in the Media industry are employing it in their projects.  But besides these predictable uses, we observed that curiously also many other people are using the plugin.  For example, university researchers, school teachers and students from many different disciplines (Mathematics, Archaeology, Architecture and Urbanism, Engineering, History,  just to mention some) are starting to use the plugin as an aid to their activity.
I believe that as a consequence of the future release of planned upgrades, there will be a sensible growth in every market where the plugin already got positioned, especially in the Media and Advertising, Architecture, Design and Content Creation.

TDC: Please tell us about the equipment that is needed to operate / use AR?, also the costs involved and the OS that are available.

Graziano: The ARplugin is not much demanding in terms of Hardware requirements. You can run it on a standard PC, 1GHz Processor, 512 MB Ram, 100% compliant OpenGL Video Card with 128 MB Ram, 50 MB of available Hard Disk space, and a simple USB 2.0 Webcam. Of course, the better the webcam, the better the visualization quality, as bad webcams almost always entail a not perfect performance.  In other words, with a standard PC, with a $ 50 webcam and with ARplugin you will have an excellent tool for presenting your ideas to your clients using Augmented Reality.

Besides this basic configuration, we can also make the plugin work with more sophisticated hardware, like Firewire and HD cameras, Head Mounted Displays and other Virtual Reality devices. But generally this is not needed for a standard use of the plugin.

With reference to the other part of the question, currently, we have released both a PC Windows and a MAC OS 10.5 version of the ARmedia Plugin. Professional, Educational and Student licenses are also available. Every interested reader can find the details here.

TDC: Can you tell us about your plans for the further development of AR and any associated applications.

Graziano: AR is going through a very fast development stage. We are constantly expanding our platform capabilities and are already capable of providing our partners with very complex AR solutions. With regards to the future development of the ARplugin, we are working to extend it with a lot of functionalities. A couple of interesting upgrades are already on the way.

One important upgrade will be the combo ARmedia Exporter plus ARmedia Player. The Exporter will allow users to create and publish augmented reality files. These files can be viewed using the ARmedia Player, a free player that can be downloaded from our website and that we are starting to distribute these days. This upgrade has been developed to make it easier to publish and visualize AR content using the ARplugin.  With the ARmedia Exporter and Player users will be able to visualize AR models created with Google SketchUp without launching SketchUp or having it installed on their computer. This I think will take the use of the Plugin a step further, opening a wide range of new possibilities in many different sectors.

Another important upgrade will be the ARmedia FL Player. We have already concluded the development of a Flash based Augmented Reality Player which will allow users to make their SketchUp 3D models accessible directly on a webpage. The ARmedia FL Player works independently of the ARplugin, and it can also treat models made with other modelling software. This is a very useful tool as it takes the power of the AR with SketchUp another step further, letting users access AR content more easily without dealing with physical or geographical limitations.

TDC: Can you tell us a little about yourself and your company?

Graziano: Yes of course. I am founder and CEO at Inglobe Technologies. I have a background in researching Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Science, Science of Design and Systems Science, i.e. all subjects that, I believe, are strictly related. From the day I first met Augmented Reality, I fell in love with it. So I decided to create, together with my brother Alessandro (who left IBM to endorse this endeavour) and my friend Francesco, Inglobe Technologies, a company focused on providing Augmented Reality solutions. Now the company is starting to gain a good reputation worldwide and ARmedia is perceived as one important AR brand all over the world.

TDC: Thank you Graziano for enlightening us on the intricacies of AR and this useful and very interesting technology that you have brought to SketchUp users.  We look forward to seeing you further develop ARmedia.