Christmas is coming!! Sneak peak of an Augmented Reality Christmas Tree
This is something I've been doing at work and at home as a sort of cross over project. It's not the end product but a proof of concept really.
Looking forward to getting round a table with the movers and shakers of Coolpink to thrash out where we want to take this!
This is my first effort using the excellent FLARManager (http://words.transmote.com/wp/flarmanager/), but not my first time messing around with the FLARToolKit (http://www.flartoolkitdocs.org/) and Papervision3D (http://www.papervision3d.org). FLARManager is excellent and really takes the hard work out of getting started with Augmented Reality and the FLARTookKit but still requires a good understanding of what's going on underneath the hood.
If you're interested in working with FLARManager, I'd recommend reading the excellent article on Inside RIA written by Eric Socolofsky (the guy who created FLARManager) as it provides a really good overview of the project and how it all works (http://www.insideria.com/2009/07/flartoolkit-and-flarmanager.html). />
For the 3D modelling part of this project I've been working with Blender (http://www.blender.org) which is an Open Source 3D modelling/animation/etc. program in the vein of 3D Studio Max, Maya, etc. I have to be honest, it's possibly the hardest piece of software to get started with, the interface is crazy, but there are plenty of great tutorials on the web and I'm sure most people are prepared to work a bit harder to learn something when it's completely free!
