Your Augmented Reality's Future: Top 5 Mixed Reality (MR) Applications

"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Albert Einstein

With societies and cultures evolving randomly from a security and privacy perspective, the undeniable powers of Augmented Reality (AR) are creating benefits that are hard to dismiss.

Although the concept of Augmented Reality (AR) was conceptualized in 1930 and Boeing's researcher Tom Caudell first coined the term in 1990, Augmented Reality (AR) is finally poised for mainstream as household tech companies are investing billions in Mixed Reality (MR) (leveraging the intersection of artificial intelligence with the Internet of Things(IoT), the Forensic of Things (FoT)and advanced visualization of Augmented Reality (AR), therefore creating mixed reality.

As Mattel has developed AR Avatar figurines, the next step to Augmented Reality - e.g. Mixed Reality - MR) is much more exciting as it offers practical solutions we can all benefit in all industries and serves as a captivating “social mixer of the future.”

I recall growing up feeling frustrated that tele-transporters and holodecks only existed on Star Trek.  I was ready then (nearly 35 years ago) to be beeped by Scotty to explore different universes daily. Yet, what if one can change its perspective daily through Augmented Reality (AR)?  What if you could gain 200% more information and apply it to your work?  By combining several interactive elements from related disciplines and enabling the visualization of countless new factors, Mixed Reality (MR) finally offers the capability to create new and enhanced realities that may appeal to our sensory-starved minds in an unprecedented decadent manner.

TOP 5 MR APPLICATIONS:

By equipping our imaginations and augmenting our realities with artificial intelligence and factual data from previously un-captured aspects (through the Internet of Things), Augmented Reality (AR) offers the power to control, customize and factually enrich reality so that we can all strive towards a brilliant future with solutions like:

1) PHOTO-REALISM & PHOTO-PROJECTION: Augmented Reality (AR) can blur the line between what is real and what is computer-generated by enhancing what we see, hear, feel and smell. Solutions like the SixthSense Augmented Reality System allow you to project and use digital devices wirelessly. An example of this would be dialing a phone number from a hologram posted onto your hand and interacting with colleagues via a teleconference call -- without removing your phone from your pocket.

In terms of medical applications, phlebotomists are beginning to use Augmented Reality (AR) to visualize and project blood veins as shown below:

2)     FREE-HAND NAVIGATION AND DRAWINGS: Similar to the virtual navigation capabilities shown in movies like The Matrix, Augmented Reality (AR) empowers younger ones to play with virtual dragons...

while parents are working from their augmented server-based computing environment.

With AR computing environments, companies may be able to reduce costs while ensuring that employees get more comprehensive amounts of information on a real-time basis and gain better better data protection practices.

 3)     SUPER-CUSTOM DESIGNING AND SHOPPING: AR-based online shopping is about to explode. Confirmation of this trend can be found in Alibaba investing a whopping $793.5 million in AR contender MagicLeap. Get ready to experiment visualization on steroids as climates, cultures and preferences can all be combined to meet your preferences. Yet, as the technology matures and new generations are born almost digitally-fluent, AR skills are anticipated to become basic requirements to operate in the future – especially when it comes to shopping for anything. 

4) PROMPT RESOLUTION OF LEGAL DISPUTES THROUGH AUGMENTED VISUALIZATION OF CONTEXTUALIZED EVIDENCE: Just imagine... a world where justice is based on the visual correlation and representation of at least 3 independent, integral and relevant pieces of evidence. By using 3-D based Virtual Reality (VR), it is possible to reconstruct past experiences (like creating a film of what happened) based on facts captured and correlated from numerous IoT devices. As one may want to demonstrate the impacts of extreme outcomes, Augmented Reality (AR) can also be used to bring faster resolution through extra-sensorial experiences. Through collection and representation of all available facts, it is finally possible to rapidly reconstruct and understand what happened, how, when, why, etc.  

The world of Augmented Reality (AR) enables us to literally create any environment, whether sensible or unreasonable. Therefore, to avoid dismissal of the created AR environment, Mixed Reality (MR) is emerging as a combination of other technologies, data elements (physical and logical) as well as practices. 

Given the radically slow pace of adoption and recognition of new technologies by courts, transformation of our systems is dependent on newer generations (like the millenials) that depend on communal intelligence and are more experimentally open to innovation. Benefits from combining Augmented Reality (AR) and contextualization can be simply summarized by faster, fairer and more cost-efficient business conflicts and legal dispute resolution.

5) TRANSFORMATION OF THE SECURITY INDUSTRY:  As information and cyber-security/privacy have been slow at deviating from practically equating security to unwanted costs (especially by investors and shareholders), combined with Augmented Reality (AR), artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things (IoT), it offers the opportunity to birth new revenue-generating solutions such as cyber-maintenance and cyber-procurement.

CONCLUSION:

As the US leader’s assistant posts a picture of President Obama walking around the White House with AR glasses stating “never a dull day in the office!”, augmented to mixed realities can definitely improve our lives from mind-fantasy entertainment to faster, better and more efficient living.     

Augmented Reality (AR) is perceived as today’s sensory experiment and Mixed Reality (MR), as tomorrow’s social digital drug-du-jour. The roles of security and privacy for all augmented and mixed realities is going to be critical, evolving as well as pivotal. As part of the five new skills that security professionals should keep on seeking, the best experts will first focusing on acquiring cyber-forensics, IoT and contextualization skills. The next wave of CISOs will no longer focus on post-development solutions like pen testing, SSDLC scans, etc. but, will rather develop layered security packages that sales teams will be able to offer to clients as AR/MAR security and privacy solutions become differentiating tools that will be part of a long-term AR revolutionary wave.

Related LInkedin posts on Augmented Reality (AR) written by the same author include:

• Understanding Your Next Digital Addiction: Augmented Reality (AR) 101
• Solutions to Augmented Reality's (AR) Threats and Critics
• Future of Augmented Reality: 5 MR Applications
• Top 5 Skills of Augmented Reality (AR) Security Experts

For more information, please consult with the author Anyck Turgeon at [email protected] or LInkedin Public profile: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/anyckturgeon.