Dallas Innovates: ICYMI: What’s New in Augmented Reality

Originally appeared on dallasinnovates.com – https://dallasinnovates.com/icymi-whats-new-with-augmented-reality-social-impact-making-headlines-women-in-tech-and-what-were-reading/

From awards and accolades (Locavore, Health Wildcatters) to our weekly Top 10 (a tour of Facebook’s Fort Worth data center) to our favorite read (ShangriLlama), here’s your briefing on innovation, ideas, and impact in North Texas.

Interested in augmented reality at scale? Head downtown and check out the Dallas Mavericks installation on the back of the Downtown YMCA at 601 N. Akard.

The 68’ x 193’ mural, created by Groove Jones, featuring Dennis Smith Jr. was put up last Saturday for the Mavs home opener, and is visible from the Field Street/Ross Avenue intersection. While the mural itself is pretty cool, for the full AR experience, you have to visit Mavs.com/AR to access a Facebook filter that will animate Smith completing a larger-than-life slam dunk. The wallscape will be active through December and the Mavs are encouraging fans to share their AR experiences on social media using the #mavsAR hashtag.

“We want our fans to be proud that we’re the first team to do something this big with augmented reality,” said Jerome Elenez, Mavs CMO, in a team website post.

In AR-related Facebook news, TechCrunch reported that the social media giant’s Building 8 hardware lab is most likely planning on (and maybe already is) developing AR glasses. To quote Facebook head of augmented reality, Ficus Kirkpatrick, “We’re building hardware products. We’re going forward on this … We want to see those glasses come into reality, and I think we want to play our part in helping to bring them there.” Facebook already has a patent application for AR glasses.

So, this recent news really begs the question: How will augmented reality continue to shape our world?