Metaio's CTO Peter and Gunnar demonstrate a virtual dragon anchored to a real building using GPS and hybrid tracking. The system combines 3D environmental data with vision and sensors to place and persist virtual objects, with applications in games, movie tie-ins, and their AR browser Junaio.
Who are you?
Hi, I'm Peter. I'm the CTO of Metayo and I'm showing you something we think is really cool. What we call real augmented reality experiences outdoors.
This is the first time I've ever shot while the snow is going.
We're in.
We're in your offices in Munich, Germany. And that's a lot of fun. So what are you showing me? Because this is not a cell phone, but it's a prototype of something kind of prototype. First of all, who are you?
I'm Gunnar. I'm technical pre sales with Matayo here in the headquarters. And we're going to show you prototype of what's possible with future technology.
Okay. And you guys do augmented reality, right? I've seen your stuff before. We were in your San Francisco office and got a look at LEGO kiosks that do all sorts of fun things.
Yeah. And I mean, our job is basically, you know, providing all kinds of augmented reality technology to anyone who wants to build something on top. And the LEGO kiosk is one example. But we're also working to, you know, take augmented reality browsing to a new level.
So what is this going to do?
This is. Yeah, we're going to see. As an example, we're gonna see a dragon attached to that building over there, a virtual dragon. It will be crawling on that building. And the cool thing about is we will be walking towards this back and forth, and it will always be crawling at the same place and very accurately.
The iPad2 is coming soon with camera. Right. And so a kid could point his iPad or something like it at that building and see that. So that's what we're heading.
Exactly, exactly. So really to make outdoor AR gaming really become true fun because you can, you know, truly connect it to the. To the real environment.
So let's see, let's see how this works. All right, all right, let me get over here.
Okay, yeah, let's go over there because.
Okay, I'll just. So what are you loading up here?
Okay, so I'm just loading the scene.
Okay. And so what is this? What is it doing underneath? What's the computer code doing?
Basically, we can work with existing models of the real environment. Actually, this umbrella should be for him.
So.
So, I mean, a lot of people are taking data of the real world. Not just Google Street View, but there's all kinds of companies like Earth Mine and so on who are doing this kind of stuff. So with this kind of data, we can teach the computer a model of how the real world looks like. So you can initialize with your GPS position. Say you're around here, and then you download that data, and then you suddenly snap in and become super accurate.
Okay, so.
So we see there's a dragon attached to the wall. All I can do, I can look around and stays there. And I can also just occlude it and it will come back. And now if you start moving back. That's the interesting part.
Yep. It's hard to see a little bit, but.
Yeah, it's okay.
Yep.
I turned the brightness to the max.
So it's basically supposed to, you know, it's staying where it's supposed to stay. Yeah. Where we put it at the first place.
In other words, it's on the building and it's not. It's not moving around. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
That's cool. And there's not a real one on the real. Right. It's a trick line.
We didn't put. Put. Put one of our guys up there to act like a dragon.
Yeah, that's pretty cool.
Stable. Should we go back more?
No, that's fine.
Okay.
Yeah, we can just get closer, so.
Yeah. So.
What?
So it has a 3D model of the building. You've built a 3D model then?
Of the building? No, no, it does it automatically. We don't have to build it. Okay. We don't have to. Now, see, the closer you get. Yeah. Then it's really.
It blinked on and off.
Sorry.
Yeah, sometimes it, you know, it's losing it. But these things, when you then combine it with the gyro and everything. So when you know you can. You can create a hybrid tracking system easily. Yeah, this is just the demo, you know, only visual video. Of course. You will combine it then with a smartphone with all the existing senses, and then have a seamless, super realistic experience going on.
So you could have games. Like at south by Southwest, you could be having games. You point your camera at a building. Like if you go to the Salt Lake Barbecue, you could point at the front door of the Salt Lake Barbecue, and it could have some virtual scene there that you play with.
Yeah. I mean, if there's a new Spider man movie coming out, you could have Spider man run around south by Southwest, and you just hold up your phone and say, whoa, there's Spider Man. And he will be as realistic as in the movie. And this is what our goal is, you know, to really get there. And maybe in the future, when you. When you went to a movie and you really liked it, you said, oh, man, I want to be in that movie. And then suddenly you download an app and you say, this is a Sherlock Holmes app. And suddenly you become Sherlock Holmes. You wake up, walk around your city and solve crimes, things like that.
Now, is this an SDK that's going to be built into other iPhone apps? Or how are we going to see this come on market? Because right now it's a prototype. It works here in Germany, but doesn't.
Work right now on the PC. It's actually available already, but on mobile it will come inside the SDK. But it will also become part of Junaio Augmented reality browser. Well, cool.
Let's get out of the snow. Where do we learn more about this, by the way?
Sorry?
Where do we learn more?
We will put up some movies and there's research papers, but maybe we should write a blog. Blog post about it.
Or you and it's a genial or. What website would I go to to.
