Apple takes art to city streets

Snap introduces two-camera Spectacles

LONDON, Aug 18, (RTRS): Tech giant Apple is taking art out of the gallery and splashing it on the real world, creating playful, digital skylines with technology that critics fear could become sinister and invasive.

Fans said the Apple augmented reality (AR) tool – active in Paris, New York, London, Tokyo, Hong Kong and San Francisco – improves real life, superimposing digital words and images on old landmarks.

But privacy watchers fear AR could become a tool that makes urban spaces playgrounds for corporations and financial gain.

The interactive art works – colourful words and images that whoosh over skylines and float above buildings – are part of an Apple tour that needs an app and smartphone.

Apple commissioned the art with the New York-based New Museum, creating works by seven poets and performers from Nick Cave to Carsten Hoeller.

A tour with Apple in London revealed frenetic rainbow text leaping over a lion statue in London’s Trafalgar Square while an intricate factory production line rose from the concrete floor of Covent Garden.

Apple says the idea it dubs ‘ T Walk’ is a fun way to bring art to the people and augment big-city life.

But some fear a tech takeover of public space.

Interface

“We’ve got a new interface of the digital world and the actual world ... that throws up questions about property rights,” said Neil McDonnell, researcher at the Centre for the Study of Perceptual Experience at the University of Glasgow.

“We are using it before thinking about it.”

McDonnell said AR could present “huge opportunities” – offering virtual maps or letting officials see through tarmac to visualise broken pipes.

But it also lets firms collect “absolutely millions” of data points, he said, with potentially “terrifying” consequences.

The Apple project is similar to the AR phenomenon ‘Pokemon Go’ that exploded in 2016, unleashing millions of players into streets, offices and parks in search of animated characters.

The viral game blurred the distinction between digital and physical property rights, said experts, with some homeowners suing the game’s makers for unwanted trespass.

Animated

Snap Inc another popular social media app, said this month it would launch a new version of its wearable Spectacles sunglasses that will let users upload images, often with augmented face filters, to the Snapchat platform.

“Delivering dynamically animated art ... sounds exciting, but does it make sense and is it safe?” asked Robert Stone, director of human interface technologies at the University of Birmingham.

“One only has to witness the tunnel vision behaviours of smartphone users, glued to their precious product in dense urban areas, not to mention the injuries such behaviour causes.”

AR could be a boon to city life, aiding navigation, traffic flow, tourism and emergency response, said Jennifer Morrissey of Dentons Smart Cities & Communities Think Tank, which helps cities leverage technology.

“AR can and absolutely should be used in smart cities and communities, and in many instances, it is already being used,” said Morrissey.

AR is becoming rapidly more mainstream, amid innovation and better integration onto mobile devices, with the AR gaming market expected to reach a value of almost $300 billion by 2023, according to Infoholic Research. Either way, it is set to stay. “The potential uses of AR could be extremely sinister but I think the positives are so positive that we’ll find it incredibly hard not to be seduced by them - very much like your mobile phone,” said McDonnell.

Snap is doubling down on trying to make its Snapchat-enabled Spectacles camera sunglasses a high-end social-media status symbol.

On Tuesday, the company announced Spectacles 3, the third generation of its wearable cameras designed to capture 3D video and photos and seamlessly upload them to Snapchat. The latest models include two HD cameras, designed to capture three-dimensional images that will let users apply new augmented-reality effects.

Spectacles 3 are priced at $380 – 2.5 times the starting $150 price point of the current generation. The new glasses are slated to ship this fall and are available to pre-order now at spectacles.com.

Why is the money-losing company, which has sold far fewer Spectacles than it initially expected, continuing to invest in hardware? The answer seems to be that Snap, which calls itself a “camera company,” sees a strategic need to have a foothold in the content-capture business.

Snap clearly is positioning Spectacles 3 as a fashion accessory – note that it gave a first-look to

Rajesh Naidu, artist-in-residence at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, recreates a scene along Ohio Street with canvas and oils

as part of his residency on Aug 8 in Terre Haute, Ind. (AP)

Vogue for its September issue. Even if the Snapchat specs never achieve mass-market adoption, Snap would appear to be hoping Spectacles 3 will be coveted by influencers and power users to produce cool AR posts for the Snapchat app.

And Snap isn’t planning to produce a slew of Spectacles 3. The new generation will be a limitededition product, according to the company, with a production run that is only a fraction of the roughly 200,000 first-gen Spectacles it had sold as of last April to date. Note that in the third quarter of 2017, Snap took a write-off of nearly $40 million related to Spectacles for unsold inventory and excess purchasing commitments.

To record video, users tap either button (up to 60 seconds continuously) or press and hold for a photo. The Spectacles 3 devices also include a four-microphone array and LED indicator lights to notify people when a user is recording. The glasses also include a 3D viewer for watching Snaps captured by the Spectacles.

Video and photos captured by Spectacles 3 transfer into the Snapchat’s Memories section, where users can add new lighting, landscapes, and other AR effects to an entire scene. The Snaps also can be exported to the camera roll in circular, horizontal, square and virtualreality formats.

Spectacles 3 come in two colors: carbon, described as a “monochromatic black with a semi-matte finish and high-gloss details”; and mineral, “inspired by cosmetic hues with a hint-of-gold frame.” The glasses also include a full-grain leather charging case equipped with a standard USB-C charging cable.

The company had reportedly been aiming to release a two-camera version of Spectacles by the end of 2018, suggesting the product faced delays.

Snap continues to bleed red ink, and recently raised $1.265 billion in debt financing to provide working capital and potentially fund acquisitions. But the company has managed to return to user growth in recent quarters, after a poorly received Snapchat app redesign in 2018, and in the second quarter of 2019 posted the fifth consecutive quarter yearover-year improvement in adjusted EBITDA.