AR Studio | Hacker News Reader

AR Studio

developers.facebook.com

126 pointsmilen47 comments

Yet another example of how the tv show, Silicon Valley, hits the nail on the head [1].

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAEAbqrE5Zw

Wow they nailed it 100%.

I can think of two "useful" applications of this tech... 1) see what you look like with cosmetic surgery / tattoo / etc before permanently modifying your body. 2) Try on clothes before shopping online.

But both still don't solve the underlying issue I have with this tech. Even the "useful" ideas for it boil down to satisfying people's vanity. It solves no problem, it provides no useful benefit to humanity. It's the same with Valve making hats for TF2 and skins for CS:Go instead of focusing on making great new games with story and content and adventure. This AR tech is the equivalent of serving a poopie diaper in a 5-star restaurant and calling it "Powerful Foods to inspire the imagination." And people are eating it all up.

Is this what we are moving toward?

If you consider an AR future where the tech is small and integrated into your visual field via something like a contact lense then there are more applications.

- Look at items and see metadata around the item itself (or ability to pull that data up, like someone's name)

- Interact with objects across the room by looking at them

- See things like GPS way points in real space

I think an AR like this could solve real problems by merging the information available via the internet and what exists in our real world space, but the tech necessary to do it well isn't here yet (and there are still some unsolved problems: http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/abrash/why-you-wont-see-hard-...)

I've seen Dr Ken Perlin give some very convincing arguments for how networked AR has the potential to completely change human language. When the fundamental nature of what we see is completely arbitrary, and we can elect to share that with other people in situ, then we basically become magicians.

Looking at the ubiquity of emoji, info graphics, photo filters and gifs it's pretty clear the answer is yes.

I think we've been moving that way for a long time.

However, I can think of some useful AR applications that could be useful for surgery.

>> But both still don't solve the underlying issue I have with this tech. Even the "useful" ideas for it boil down to satisfying people's vanity. It solves no problem, it provides no useful benefit to humanity.

The same was said when myspace came up.

The same was said when facebook came up.

The same was said when twitter came up.

The same was said when instagram came up.

The same was said when snapchat came up.

Here's a dirty secret about American style consumerism. Crap sells!

Sometimes society surprise you. Other times, it surprises you how predictable everything can be.

This is Facebook, a company worth billions of dollars, showcasing their last, earth shaking tech that is going to change mankind forever. Add silly hats and stars to your selfies! How could we live for so long without it!

I hate to sound like I'm defending facebook, because on instinct I'd agree with you. But I always have to be careful to remind myself not to underestimate the power of play as a driver of discovery. Feynman spinning plates and whatnot.

Great video on the power of play as a driver of innovation/invention:

https://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2017/04/13/how-play-is-at-the...

But this isn't play you are speaking of, this is just a "play" on vanity to boost personal data collection by a soulless corporation.

Perhaps the underlying technology is ground breaking, but I agree with you that the application of these technology is rather "first world problem".

Adding this layer of snapchat style facial alteration doesn't solve FB's biggest problem, which is a race to the bottom for trivial mediocrity. I have pretty much given up looking at FB this year.

I wouldn't underestimate the need to associate positive emotion with AR in the early stages. Technophobia is a natural reaction when technology can alter our relationship with our environment. The opposite of silly can be unsettling. The Facebook social network is primarily a consumer product. Focusing first on applications with more societal value but narrower appeal (therapy for example) would be a business mistake. The stakes are also lower. No one gets hurt if a hat is misplaced on your shoulder.

It is a misallocation of effort if maximizing social value is the goal. But it's not. Profit is an imperfect proxy.

A perfect example of this would be the reception of Google Glass vs. Snapchat's Spectacles.

No the goal is to commoditize Snapchat AR filters.

Why does technology have to move from Serious to Frivolous (or Enterprise to Consumer if you prefer?). Think the other way: consumers will be more tolerant of bugs or functionality gaps and can build ubiquity and experience, then it can branch out.

E.g. if the googly-eyes don't track right it's no big deal, but when that has been more robustified then pilots can trust real time overlays of weather radar predictions through their cockpit windows.

I hope technological progress in avionics is grounded in something a little more solid than "Facebook googly-eyes work good enough".

Why? I used the example quasi-humorously but I meant it seriously.

The iPhone has given rise to all sorts of ubiquitous technologies and applications -- so ubiquitous we don't notice them. Accelerometers weren't invented by Apple, but their pervasive use in high volume has driven the price down which has given rise to all sorts of other applications, many with the phone as bed.

Security is much better than it would be if only banks and the military cared.

Etc

So much cynicism here! Facebook knows they have to appeal to teenagers and so they are working on features that do (c.f. success of Snapchat). Yes, perhaps it would be better if teenagers spent their time reading Kant instead of sharing silly pictures! :)

The cynicism is well justified.

Facebook hires top talent, its sad that the top talent want to work on such problems for making profit instead of something else.

The pioneers of internet like J. C. R. Licklider had grand visions, sad that the large part of current intellect pool only want to sell out personal data and make money.

I agree that it's a shame our society doesn't place more importance on these 'grand visions'. That being said, I think the reason so many people are learning programming and studying computing is because there are big companies like FB where they can make a good living. So it's not like corporations are 'stealing' the talent away from academia, etc.

If you're interested in the app, there's a tutorial of how to build an effect with 3D Objects [1].

[1] https://developers.facebook.com/docs/camera-effects/tutorial...

I think this has good potential to overtake Snapchat in popularity. The Snapchat masks/filters are very same-y and this would allow for a much larger variety to choose from.

Will be interested to see how Facebook can both show more "filters" and not crowd the screen or have a hard to use marketplace.

This is a very smart move by Facebook, assuming they can walk the UGC line. They are in pole position to do that, too, because of the social graph data they have (e.g., only promote filters trending among friends or friends-of-friends).

If there was any doubt that Snapchat was what kept Zuck up at night, banish it.

I was hoping they were open sourcing tools to aid in building AR applications, too bad.

This is just a tool for marketers essentially. It's actually a rather smart move for Facebook in competing with Snapchat. Snapchat was building these camera effects for brands and charging a premium for it. Facebook has taken this a step further, now allowing brands to build their own effects for Facebook's platform, thereby taking a bite from one of Snapchat's business models.

For those complaining about this being a waste of effort, realize that others use these type of features in camera apps a lot, therefore there's a proven market for it. Sure, this might not advance society much perhaps, but it makes plenty of sense business-wise. Direct your anger towards those who like taking selfies with cat faces.

A promising technology/concept with several potential applications used to produce ugly/weird effects on dumb videos. This is, IMHO, very depressing.

I've seen the future and the future is dumb. It's depressing how much energy is spent on ads and dumb stuff like this. OTOH, I suppose it drives research into useful but niche stuff. Hopefully.

amazing how quickly facebook can copy snap's features, but this seems way more scalable for facebook -- crowd source all the best AR ideas

This is sad. How many billions of $ and millions of hours go into stupid sh*t like that.. Some of you may not know but there are more pressing, more exciting and more challenging tasks that wait for manpower and resources. Wake the fuck up people!

Not everyone can work on projects that change the course of humanity. Some work is done for just shit and giggles. And who knows what kind of possibilities these humble beginnings can lead to? There's a lot of potential in AR and I think this is a good way to introduce consumers and developers to it.

It's not about the work, it's about how much resources are dedicated to entertainment (sports, games, music) when other important fields get virtually no love.

This is just entertainment - hardly anything to get depressed about. What's so terrible about giving people a bit of joy and fun?

There is already so much entertainment in the world that even if we stopped producing it, people would still have to spend few centuries to enjoy it all.

Is this what the brilliant people at Facebook are busy building to make the world better?

So, is this tied to posting and live broadcasting to Facebook or is it just there to be used for whatever you want?

Also, which platforms does it run on?

It doesn't seem like an open beta. It seems like a developer beta with the sole purpose of crowd sourcing the effects before it goes public. And applying for the beta subscribes you to, what it seems, three different newsletters from Facebook.

> Also, which platforms does it run on?

It currently runs on macOS.

You can only develop effects for the Facebook camera. Not for your own app. AR Studio, used to create the effects, runs on MacOS.

wow, fox masks....the killer app for AR, can't wait!!

Lots of people commenting in the lines of "this isn't a breakthrough worth of a company like facebook or how useful for humanity". I agree this is silly, but it seems like an easy hedge agains't snapchat, nothing more.

The pioneers of tech like J. C. R. Licklider had grand vision of making the internet a human intelligence augmenting super power.

Its sad that the intellectual people in these tech companies only want to use it to sell personal data by playing on people's emotions.

I think we are going to see a lot of interesting artistic applications of AR. There is a lot about FB that I don't like but this here is a good thing.

"one small step for man one giant leap for mankind"

Our agency has signed up for the beta. I hope we'll get a chance to play with this. It's social, fun, shareable, brands love that!

Cool, I was thinking an integrated Fitbit filter would be nice to have on Snapchat. It looks like FB is making it easier for advanced integrations.

What the hell..

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