ScavengAR Christmas

The holidays are all about giving and here at Talking Dog we couldn't agree more. So we're giving our little ScavengARs a Christmas present. For a limited time, until the end of 2010 to be specific, there will be Shiny Ballz waiting to be collected for mucho points in ScavengAR Hunt!

Shiny Ballz sound familiar? Well it should, since it was the super awesome AR decorating project we developed to have a little holiday fun. We were so inspired by our magical Shiny Ballz that we decided to let you search for them in ScavengAR Hunt. Tis the season of sharing and we are more than happy to share our Shiny Ballz with you!

And it seems that you are enjoying playing our little game. We are pleased to see that our numbers are continuing to increase. The last few weeks have shown a burst of gaming in the US, UK, Australia, and France, which has got us tickled pink! So we'd like to take a moment and thank all the ScavengARs out there. Whether you are just trying it out or you've been playing since the start, we appreciate you checking out our game and we are striving to bring you new objects and tricky twists to make the hunt more fun.

On that note, thanks for the love ScavengARs and we hope you enjoy hunting for our Shiny Ballz this Christmas!

It seems like this year has brought some really awesome AR projects and apps. We'd like to give a shout out to all AR developers out there who continue to raise the bar and delve deep into the endless possibilities of AR. Some of our favourites from the year are: Star Wars Tie-Fighters, AR.Drone and most definitely Word Lens! Truly awesome and really showing the world what AR can do!

What else happened this year?

• We had the pleasure of meeting Robert Rice at the 2010 Saskatchewan Interactive Summit.
• Microsoft Kinect came out and the hacker community went to strange new lands of augmented hackery.
• Our Godzilla AR t-shirt created some blogger buzz at comic-con.
• Apple introduced more access to the iPhone camera for exciting new possibilities of augmentation.
• Google introduced us to Google Goggles and whole new way to search the web
• We got into mobile AR with Layar and our ScavengAR Hunt game

We have also frequently tweeted our many numerous other findings over on our Twitter.

As always we are excited to see where this technology goes.

The gang here at Talking Dog wishes you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Happy Holiday Scavenging!

The Talking Dog AR Team

Go Orna-Mental for the Holidays!

With the holiday season right around the corner, we thought we'd give everyone an early present... Shiny Ballz!!!! I know, best present ever!!! And we didn't even see your Wishlist.

Back in the depths of our workshop, the little elves at Talking Dog have developed Shiny Ballz, a fun way for you to decorate AR Christmas ornaments and share pictures of them with your friends on Facebook. Not only can you color these shiny ornaments of awesomeness any way you like, but you can add a special holiday message for your friends and family. Think of it as a cool, new way to thank Nana for those knitted socks she keeps sending every year.

So how does it work? First, make sure your webcam is hooked up, then go to the website. Print off the black & white marker and fold it according to the instructions. Next, click "allow" to activate your webcam and faster than you can say "Pass the Nog" you are ready to start creating some personalized shiny ballz.

Here's a little video to show you how it's done. Notice what's unusual about this: you can create your designs by drawing in the square underneath the various tool buttons. Or you can paint directly onto your Augmented Reality ornament, just like in your old arts and crafts class!

Don't forget to try it out at www.talkingdogstudios.com/ar/shinyballz

Don't the Holidays just make you feel all warm and fuzzy?

Happy DecembAR!

The Talking Dog AR Team

How Big Is the TV?

Our newest project "How Big Is the TV?" allows you to try out TVs of different sizes in your own home. We've selected a number of flat screen TVs for users to test and we plan to expand the selection over time. Be sure to print out the marker and try it out. Once you decide on which TV suits you best, clicking on the "Buy Now" button takes you to a popular page which compares the prices of that particular model from various retailers. And don't forget the "take a picture" button which lets you share the picture of the TV you're interested in with others on facebook, or you can save the picture to your computer.

Here's our demo video:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaGPpgDDrjM

This project is a more practical follow up to our two other projects "How Big Is The Baby?" and "How Big Is A Planet?", we hope you take a look at these other projects and spread the word.

We have been playing with the ideas of scale in augmented reality for some time now, keep an eye out for more projects like this to come.

And as always, if you think we could be of service to you and your company, please contact us at "ar [at] talkingdogstudios [dot] com". And please go to howbigisthetv.com if you're thinking of shopping for a new TV!

Augmentedly yours,

The Talking Dog Team

Augmented Reality Season's Greetings

A direct link to the above video is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozEfHjAbmwE


All the best of the holidays to you and yours! From here in Saskatchewan, Canada, the gang at Talking Dog Studios have created a unique Christmas present for you - an augmented reality page that lets you look into your webcam and see yourself as Santa Claus. There's lots of different Santa faces to choose from, and when you see one you like, just click on the "Take a Picture" icon to save a photo of you as Santa to your computer or to share with your friends on facebook. Check it out!

http://www.talkingdogstudios.com/ar/santa

This AR uses facial recognition, so no tags required. We hope you get lots of laughs from this free web page.

Best wishes,

Talking Dog AR

How Big is a Planet?

Here at Talking Dog Studios, we've been creating Augmented Reality projects for a while now. We've recently put up a couple of free sites for people to play with, both have similar designs but will likely appeal to very different groups.

The one that just went up now is called "How Big is a Planet?". You can go to the website and try it out yourself, it's at howbigisaplanet.com . Here's a video demonstrating how the site works:


A direct link to the above video is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiXhrDLhvRg

We think there's something about actually seeing the scale of related things when you hold them in your hand that sticks in your memory more than just reading about such things. Seeing yourself hold Mars and then seeing yourself hold Jupiter gives you a "mental slap" that makes it more likely to remember this kind of information. The following site is based upon the same principle, but this time we're comparing the relative sizes of a developing baby during its nine months of development in the womb. Here's a video:

A direct link to the above video is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkuEXH1pTCQ

Again, it's one thing to read about how teeny an embryo is only one month after the egg has been fertilized, and it's quite another to hold it in your hand. If you'd like to try it out yourself please go to howbigisthebaby.com . Both of these sites would make great teaching aids, but they're also just fun to play with. One thing to note - once you have the marker showing the baby or the planet in the position you like, you can quickly take the marker out of view and the object remains, useful if you want to see yourself with these planets and babies without having to hold the tag. And when you see something you like, you can click on the "Take a Picture" button and save a picture of yourself to your hard drive, or automatically share it with your friends on facebook.

Is taking a picture of yourself with a baby in front of your tummy a good way to let your family know you're expecting? Well, that's a personal decision. But having watched both kids and adults have a great time playing with these websites, we're hoping that you will enjoy them as well.

If you'd like to know more about Talking Dog Studios and augmented reality, here's a link to our website.

Augmenting the world, one website at a time,

The Talking Dog Team

How Big is the Baby - video

Hey, check out the new movie we've just put up demonstrating How Big is the Baby!


A direct link to the above video is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkuEXH1pTCQ

Pretty cool, huh? Be sure to send us any of your favorite pictures of you with your virtual baby to ar@talkingdogstudios.com

Cheers!

Talking Dog

Pregnancy Flakes?

We've have had our How Big is the Baby project up for a week or two now, just added a feature yesterday which allows people to post pictures of themselves with the baby directly to their facebook page. Hey, wouldn't this be a great way to announce to your parents that you're expecting? Well, maybe...

We noticed in our website stats that yesterday September 30th, we got mentioned on an Isreal news site called ynet. The article can be found here and you may be curious what it says in english...well... a translation of the site can be found here. Our site was linked to under the heading of "Pregnancy Flakes", we suspect something was lost in translation but we're not sure what. It looks like the site was mentioned because of http://twitter.com/ErezAK... thanks! We just saw a big jump in the number of visitors to the site, so we guess that means lots of people from Israel are having fun picturing themselves with a developing baby.

We look forward to seeing what types of pictures start surfacing online and hopefully people have some fun with it. We don't actually record or look at the pictures as you take them (because we respect your privacy and say so in our privacy statement), but if you have a picture you think we might get a kick out of, email it to us at ar@talkingdogstudios.com .

We've also been building up our twitter followers. The twitterverse is a mysterious place and we hope people following our tweets are picking up a thing or two. Thanks to a few mentions on twitter we've also noticed a flow of people coming to check out our site. Also, we picked up a new "slogan" through the retweeting circles. The phrase "Get pregnant without the morning sickness" seemed to replicate all over the place and we were entertained by the idea.

To finish off here is a recent speech by Bruce Sterling talking about the augmented reality industry.

Video: Bruce Sterling's Keynote - At the Dawn of the Augmented Reality Industry from Maarten Lens-FitzGerald on Vimeo.

Have fun in your augmented world!

www.talkingdogstudios.com
1212A Winnipeg St.
Regina, SK Canada
306 790 4008