The Augmented Reality (AR) – a new Digital
Immersion Service
No no, no Doctor
Who in his TARDIS (Image 1) and Timey-wimey-stuff here… But a new way to experience tourism thanks to Augmented Reality (AR) and its ability to procure a time
travelling experience to visitors.
Last 17th
and 18th of March 2014 have been held in Deauville the second Numeric Tourism
forum. Tourism is nowadays increasingly adapting itself to new technologies and
when the fancy Google Glass is making the headlines, the whole Augmented Reality
(AR) topic has also been brought back to actuality. Once used as experiments,
this technic is starting to be gradually used by more cultural and touristic
institutions. Abroad with cities such as Rio de Janeiro or in France with Lille, Versailles, Cherbourg, Cluny and many other
cities or cultural attractions, numerous AR projects have been launched those
last years.
But what is this new technology and
what does it implies for cultural institutions?
Definition:
The augmented reality we are going to talk about now is the one easy to access for any tourist, which use only and directly customers' own device(s). We are not going to talk about the other systems existing to use AR (e.g. binoculars, Google glasses, etc.) or about its use in Events (another article written by Kate Sampara and Laetitia Vartanian in this blog already dealt with this part last January).
The augmented reality, also called virtual reality in the
80’s, is not really new. First experimentations have been undertaken in USA in the
60’s by Ivan Sutherland. Yet, it is during the 90’s that its use increased
significantly in the medical industry. It is now a technology in rapid
expansion and reaching numerous industries such as the tourism one.
The
AR is then the superposition of a virtual 2D or 3D reality layer – done thanks
to a prior 2D or 3D modelisation of the area – on real pictures/movies taken by
a device‘s integrated camera. To ensure a perfect blend between real images and
virtual ones, the device positioning needs to be known via geo-localisation.
To do so, users need a device with an integrated
camera, internet connection, GPS and an AR software previously downloaded: in
short, a smartphone or tablet. However, as described in the Echo Touristique's article “tourisme numérique: les défis de la réalité augmentée” of the 26th of march 2013, the camera's sensors are not every time necessary. It is the case for instance of the “fake AR” which only uses the geo-localisation
of the device. Then, customers doesn’t need any integrated camera but just to
position their device where the AR movie has been filmed and an internet access
to visualize the reconstitution, like in the case of the Abbey of Cluny (Image 2).
The
AR allows mobile or tablet users to experience past centuries as if they were
part of it. The Coliseum in Roma, Berlin’s wall, Versailles ‘gardens etc. are
all attractions using AR applications bringing back to life ancient time just
by pointing equipped devices towards the monuments.
At the opposite of the google glass
where the augmented reality is seen through the glasses the user here need to
download one of the numerous applications available on smartphone and/or tablet
to get access to a specific AR.
Tourism and AR:
- Individual and personalized city
tour/ cities as if you were in a museum: new interpretations of attractions
First users of the AR are the tourism
industry and the advertising industry mostly linked to the tourism one (such as
“Meet the NSW locals” for Destination NSW, Australia. See the video's link below).
Thanks to the increasing number of
mobile or tablet applications offering AR tools, the customer is now able to
discover a city or a museum by only using its phone/tablet.
For instance, a guided tour in the
heart of the city of Lille is available to any smartphone or tablet user
willing to download the application Urbik.
This one then offers visitors to discover the city on their own and get information
about the monuments they are pointing at with their devices. Like in a museum,
a label appears then on the screen to let him/her discover the history of the
monument and to suggest him/her other parts of the city to discover.
- Bring back to life disappeared monuments/ a new kind of tourism: time travel
But this technic is not only
available for ruins of existing monument. Not known for its fortification
sites, Cherbourg (Image 3) has, thanks to the
AR, brought back to life a disappeared part of
its heritage and then developed a new kind of touristic attraction within its
old city.
Born from a partnership between the
video company Biplan and the History
department of the University of Picardie, value added has been brought to the
historic part of the city since it is now possible to discover Cherbourg back
300 years ago, with its fortified castle. Unknown even by its citizen, the city
can now promote with the AR a time travel through a very important part of its
heritage gone and forgotten for centuries. And Cherbourg is not the only city
or touristic place to use this technology. Biplan
is also working on a “D-Day Landing beaches” AR project bringing to life an
important part of our contemporary history.
More than just offering a new support
to do touristic discoveries, AR is about customer involvement. With a personal
and unique experience which raises interest and motivation to self-education,
AR provides added value through visually enhanced time travels.
Easy to use and downloadable 24/7, it
is no wonder that cities and museum followed closely the AR development to
promote their cultural and historical heritage.
- A
clever electronic touristic guide
Finally the AR is also used to help
customers to compare or get information about touristic attractions or
restaurants. For instance, once in front of three restaurants, pointing your
device on them will help you to make your choice thanks to internet connection
transmitting directly to your device their main characteristics; prices, menu,
internet users’ rate, expositions’ catalogues, history, and so on. In 2011 the
application CultureClic already
“augmented” 1350 museums and monuments in partnership with la Réunion des musées nationaux and Gallica’s archives from the Bibliotheque
Nationale de France.
Costs:
This
technology involves different stages and processes. The more you spend time on
different stages, the more the project costs. Still in its online article of the 26th of
march 2013, l’Echo Touristique mentioned that a project only based on a 3
minutes long reconstruction-movie by AR will cost around €10 000 to €30 000
(like Cluny’s project). Yet, a more complex project like the one undertaken in
Cherbourg will cost around €100 000 due to the elaborate 3D modelisation required,
extra historical research and partnerships done with university and AR’s
researchers. It means a rather
substantial investment that has to be taken into account seriously in order to
maximize its benefits afterwards.
Critics:
Of course
this is an application with a program and the innovations are still limited and
need to be improved. It is obviously not possible to point at any kind of monument
that you would like to get information about, but with the participative
characteristic of the web 2.0, added content is likely to increase
exponentially. For now this is a good way for a traveller to learn and get
information easily about the main monuments and other heritage taking part in
the history of a visited place/city.
It also enhances the personal
experience from the traveller point of view. Indeed, the involvement of the
tourist in the discovery process through these downloadable applications is a
new playful and entertaining way to discover differently a touristic area. It
increases or improves the added value of a city tour.
Finally, customers don’t have to buy
new devices or other audio-visual services to do the visit since they only have
to download the application on their own device. Easy to access the service is also easy to use.
From the
businesses side, it is also a good and new way to promote and communicate about
a destination since the informations are easily broadcasted on the customer
devices and through the AR applications. Tourism businesses can then take
advantage of their designing power on the application to sponsor and push the
user to go to specific places and then gain extra revenue out of this kind of
promotion through sponsorships.
This is a way not only to attract history
lovers, but also tech-savvy people, keen to play with their device. It is also
called as a “gamification” of tourism thanks to this new
way to explore places (as mentioned in an article from TourismLink.eu).
Despite a very attractive marketing
done through those, most of the time free of charge AR applications (e.g. Versailles’
garden, etc.), some of them still remain available only on Apple devices (e.g.
OnSpot). Yet, it is known that almost 75% of the smartphone and 63% of the global
tablet markets in 2013 were held by Android (as mentioned in the articles from JDN.com and ZDNET.fr websites). It then
limits the impact and the revenue the touristic institution implementing the
application could have earned from it.
Interesting for business aiming to
get data from customers thanks to personal information required and retained by
the applications, this tool can also become dangerous for customers life: for
privacy reason first, but also for safety reason since the customer is isolated
in its virtual world while wandering in the city to discover it from new
“eyes”. Then not totally aware of the real world interactions, accidents could
quickly happen.
Finally, this subject is also
bringing new concern in the tourism industry since tour guides are afraid to
see their roles decrease in the close future due to these new technology tools.
Written by Samantha Pinet &
Marisol Bustos Otero.
Sources :
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