The Web community started getting excited about Augmented Reality, or AR, around two years ago, when GE’s “Plug Into the Smart Grid” demo hit, although the technology has been around in various capacities for a couple of decades. Most people probably first got exposed to AR with the “yellow line” that shows the first down marker in televised football games. But in the last two or three years, AR has been popping up in a variety of new ways, and has really hit a new level of innovation with applications running on mobile phones. But it’s still not really a mainstream technology outside of football and hockey (puck tracers).

Part of the barrier to mass adoption is probably the kitschy factor of many of the early commercial implementations. Printing out a QR code and holding it up to your web cam was pretty cool the first couple of times you did it, but really, what’s the point? And the thing with the box at the Lego store was pretty neat. And, wait, now I can scan the little codes with my phone and see a dancing turtle? Neat. Next!

But the reality of, um, augmented reality, is that it is not only neat, but now we are also seeing increasingly practical applications of the technology. Across all of your major interactive viewports, including TVs, desktops and laptops, tablets, and especially phones, you can get an informative additional layer of content added on to what’s going on around you. Smart companies are realizing that the opportunity to essentially show two things at once (the real world, with an interactive canvas on top) opens up avenues that go way beyond just advertising and entertainment. Not that we don’t all love a good dancing turtle.

Marker vs. Markerless

For now, the software that leading AR companies like Metaio, Layar, and Total Immersion are putting out requires that something in the real world be “recognized” before the real world can be augmented with the additional layer of content. QR codes were the first wave of “markers” that would alert the AR software that new-stuff-goes-here. There are proprietary versions of them as well, like Microsoft Tag or AT&T Mobile Barcodes, and you’re seeing QR codes pop up everywhere from business cards and the sides of buildings to t-shirts and even tattoos (seriously). All of them can be used to anchor an AR experience.

But the software is getting sophisticated enough that “markerless” recognition is possible. Now you don’t have to limit AR to QR. Images are a natural extension, and now an ad in a magazine or a painting in a museum can trigger an AR overlay with sales price information or the artist’s inspiration. But where things get really interesting is 3D object recognition. Total Immersion has implemented facial recognition, so that you can “try on” different eyeglasses to see what they look like on your face. You can pull out your phone and point it at a printer, to see an x-ray view of where those sneaky little levers are that let you unjam a page or change the ink cartridge. Maybe that’ll end that “PC Load Letter” error.

Walking ARound

We’re also starting to see the potential for AR as part of your everyday life. Since we don’t have to rely on markers anymore, the potential is there for everything to have an invisible layer of content that comes to light with AR. Once incredibly practical example is Word Lens, the iPhone app that got a lot of attention recently. Providing real-time translation of printed content, Word Lens lets you see a sign in Spanish, for example, translated to English on your phone. “Beach Closed by Jellyfish” comes to mind. Yelp lets you spin your phone around to see where the highest rated restaurants or coffee shops are nearby, mapped right on top of your camera feed. Going even bigger, Metaio just released the Augmented Reality City concept. Now I can look through my phone at a building downtown and see which offices are available for lease, and on which floors. That one on the corner of the 8th floor looks like it has a nice view.

Gaming

Although the innovative AR stuff has been hitting phones a lot, you’re seeing augmented reality in other capacities as well. Sony has an AR platform out that chances are you’ll be seeing in your next Playstation, and Microsoft’s Xbox Kinect is already fueling new ways of gaming, but the technology is also being hacked into shopping for outfits or studying anatomy – all through AR. And Vuzix and others are putting out augmented reality glasses, bringing AR deeper into product prototypes and demonstrations, heads-up displays for gaming, and even the military. Think Terminator or Iron Man, and you’re on the right track.

Where is it going next?

The potential for the second view of anything is limitless. AR is coming to your car, to the mall, and to the grocery store. But eventually it’s just going to be part of everything. What’s in that Big Mac (you don’t want to know), what else has that book’s author written, where can I find those shoes on sale? Or not even where. Point your phone at your friend’s shoes, see the pricing and information about them, and add them to your cart. From the beach.