Qualcomm demos augmented reality and peer-to-peer tech, tries to punch cellular gaming’s block off (video)

It’s just a tablecloth and a piece of paper, until you pull out a Nexus One , at which point it magically becomes an arena where toy robots fire off punches. Augmented reality isn’t anything new, of course, but Qualcomm seems determined to bring it to cell phones in a big way — launching an AR game studio, sponsoring a $200,000 developer challenge, and announcing a free software development kit (which will see open beta this fall) all on the same day. The company partnered with Mattel to build the Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots proof-of-concept you see above using that very SDK, and you’ll find a hilarious video of grown men pretending to have the time of their lives with it right after the break. However, augmented reality is only half of Qualcomm’s mobile gaming plan — a rep told Pocket-li nt games like Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots are only financially viable if they can work across platforms .

Hands-on with TAT’s dual-screen phone concept and augmented reality app

What, you thought Home was the only project in the pipeline for these guys? The mobile UI experts at Sweden’s TAT are in the house at MWC this week showing off a couple other nifty developments that are keeping them busy these days: a dual-screen UI concept utilizing TI’s next-gen hardware, and an app that makes good on a concept it had demoed before. First up, they’ve been using a TI Blaze to demonstrate their vision of a phone with two displays, likely in a slider configuration (in fact, they showed a Droid to represent how they think the form factor could work) with a screen where you’d normally expect they physical QWERTY keyboard to be.

Hands-on with TAT’s dual-screen phone concept and augmented reality app

What, you thought Home was the only project in the pipeline for these guys? The mobile UI experts at Sweden’s TAT are in the house at MWC this week showing off a couple other nifty developments that are keeping them busy these days: a dual-screen UI concept utilizing TI’s next-gen hardware, and an app that makes good on a concept it had demoed before. First up, they’ve been using a TI Blaze to demonstrate their vision of a phone with two displays, likely in a slider configuration (in fact, they showed a Droid to represent how they think the form factor could work) with a screen where you’d normally expect they physical QWERTY keyboard to be. It’s slick and wicked smooth on the brutally powerful OMAP4 core, but realistically, this is something unusual enough so that we’d need to play with a unit for a good, long while before drawing any usability conclusions.

iPhone in iPhone app is useless, but mesmerizing

Here’s the premise: you take a good old fashioned augmented reality setup, the likes of which we’ve seen all over the land , and attach a three-dimensional, rotatable iPhone to it. Not impressed yet, are you? Neither were we, but there’s some secret sauce to this one: you can actually launch apps on the simulated iPhone. That extra layer of interactivity makes the video after the break a lot more fascinating than it has any right to be, though it’s worth pointing out that we don’t think the apps are actually usable — they just give the illusion of launching

Layar 3.0 reunites the Beatles in 3D augmented reality

Layar’s approach to bringing augmented reality to the masses is unique. Instead of writing isolated AR apps, Layar provides a very real augmented reality platform onto which content owners can layer (or layar) their data resulting in a richer experience when viewing the world through your Android or iPhone 3GS camera lens. There are already 294 layers and counting ranging from Google’s ubiquitous local search results to homegrown content listing apartments for rent or tourist hot spots. Today sees the launch of Layar 3.0 with new 3D capabilities, authentication, and plenty more to entice anyone “with basic web development skills” to join the fun.

Augmented reality Twitter 360 app geolocates your friends by their tweets

We’re going to start off by stating unequivocally that we think this is a bad, bad idea. The Twitter 360 app, just launched by Presselite, is an augmented reality app for your iPhone 3GS which enables you to track your friends by the geolocation of their tweets. The app makes use of the iPhone 3GS’s compass to locate the tweeter, then reports back on their location.

Layar goes 3D, reality now more augmented than ever

Filed under: Software , Android The Layar Reality Browser for Android has already managed to stir up quite a bit of interest in its current state, but it looks like the mad geniuses behind it aren’t about to rest on their slightly augmented laurels just yet, and they’ve now announced that they’re adding full 3D capabilities to the app. That, of course, doesn’t mean you’ll have to start wearing goofy glasses every time you walk outside, but you will soon be able to tag real-life objects with 3D text, or place 3D objects in a real-world space (like the Pac-Man fever dream above, for instance). Of course, the potential uses for the upgrade are limited only by the developers working with it, and they’ll have a bit of time to toy around with things before the 3D-enabled version of Layer launches to the public in November. Head on past the break for a quick video, and hit up the link below for a closer look at what’s in store. Continue reading Layar goes 3D, reality now more augmented than ever Layar goes 3D, reality now more augmented than ever originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 03:13:00 EST

Layar augmented reality app now available globally, lets you hunt down tweeps with cold, calculated precision

Filed under: Software , Android Following a Netherlands-exclusive release back in June, SPRXmobile has now taken its so-called Layar “Reality Browser” for Android to the global stage and advanced it to version 2.0 in the process. Perhaps the first commercial augmented reality app to launch on a large scale, Layar’s got a good amount of momentum behind it — the company claims that 100 developers are already hard at work developing reality layers that users can toggle, and an additional 500 developers are being added into the mix with the latest release. Version 2.0 adds favorite layers (because we’re sure you’ll be stalking friends and foes all too often using the Tweetmondo layer), map and list views, and enhanced search capabilities, but the real secret to Layar’s power might ultimately lie in the third-party ecosystem if they can get enough content providers on board. We grabbed Layar off the Market and took it for a quick spin; we’re having trouble getting it to aim correctly, though Google Sky Map is having the same issues, so we’re fairly certain that we’re dealing with a phone or location problem rather than a Layar one. The key thing with an app like this is going to be speed and fluidity, and even on our Magic’s relatively lightweight 528MHz core, it’s plenty usable

CellPhone Latest

• Vodafone flips stake in China Mobile for a cool $6.6B
• App review: Nike+ GPS
• WebOS 2.0 beta screenshot extravaganza
• BlackBerry Style 9670′s UI demoed in leaked official videos
• Cricket launches Samsung Messager Touch
• ZTE intros Agent for MetroPCS — and yes, Uno is built-in
• Zelfy Peel might be the iPhone remote you’ve been looking for
• Samsung Fascinate review
• Sharp’s twin-lens 3D prototype camera isn’t a smartphone, yet (video)
• Official: Samsung Fascinate launching September 9
• Samsung’s Orion is the 1GHz dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 we’ve all been waiting for
• Meizu CEO Jack Wong: Oh hey, the new iPod touch ‘looks a bit like the M9II’
• Samsung i5700 Galaxy Spica hacked for multitouch support
• LG’s C300 Town spotted in the wild, textin’ on the cheap
• Nokia C6 firmware hacked with care onto 5800 and 5530
• MIT app turns your Android phone into a supercomputer… of sorts