Throughout the summer, we’ve covered some of the highlights of Bruce Sterling’s Layar-sponsored AR design class at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.

As all good things must come to an end, so has this class, but not without some impressive final student projects! Over the next couple of weeks, we’ll be sharing videos of these projects as well as footage from last week’s class presentations with Layar strategist Gene Becker making a guest appearance to offer comments and feedback. You can read all of our posts about the AR Design class here.

This first video is for a concept called “enlitenar”, and it features students Ryan D’Orazi and Jennifer Rosetto (as well as a cameo from Bruce Sterling and his wife, author and filmmaker Jasmina Tešanović), who use Augmented Reality to cross over to the spiritual dimension.

In addition to this otherworldly concept video, the students created an enlitenar layer (currently still in testing) with Hoppala that uses audio and visual elements to facilitate a connection between physical reality and the invisible forces that influence everyday life.

If that sounds a bit heavy for you, we’ll leave it at this: if you’ve ever wanted to see Bruce Sterling perform an initiation ceremony dressed as a cyberpunk cult leader (goodness knows WE have), watch this video!

enlitenar: augmented spirituality reality from RYAN DORAZI on Vimeo.

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Layar’s favorite science fiction author and “Guardian Seer of Augmented Reality” Bruce Sterling has just crossed over into the Layar developer realm.

As “Visionary in Residence” at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, Bruce felt the best way to inspire his students to create immersive AR experiences was to create one himself because, as he said, “Sometimes it’s easiest to teach by doing.”

Obviously an Augmented Reality visionary like Bruce Sterling wasn’t going to make a layer to find ATMs or restaurants, but little did we know his finished project would augment an underground, offline media network perfectly aligned with the tenets of AR!

Last week Bruce revealed the Dead Drops layer to the world through his blog, which enabled a new wave of discovery for Berlin-based media artist Aram Bartholl‘s Dead Drops project.

Dead drops are USB flash drives embedded into walls, buildings and curbs that are accessible to everyone and located in public space. Anyone can add to and take from a dead drop, or create their own and add its location to the website. The result of this project is an anonymous, offline peer-to-peer file sharing network.

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Ever since we released the Layar Vision Beta less than two weeks ago, we’ve been waiting patiently for real-life examples to surface. Sydney, Australia-based digital artist Yiying Lu, best known for designing what later became the famous Twitter Fail Whale, ended the wait today with her Walls 360 layer video!

Lu worked with Layar Partner Rob Manson and his third-party Layar tool BuildAR to create an interactive Augmented Reality experience that you can launch from the custom wall decals that her successful Walls 360 company makes.

A select few of these wall decals will come with pre-defined AR content that you can also add your own content to through a web-based interface.

The project got some attention from The Next Web today, so they’re off to a fantastic start. We can’t wait to try it out!

Yiying Lu announces AR wall art project from buildAR on Vimeo.

If you’ve created an immersive Augmented Reality experience using the Layar Vision beta and want us to share it, let us know! You can send photos or video links via our Twitter or Facebook, or email them to content[at]layar[dot]com. 

We also encourage you to submit your awesome Layar Vision content to our Creation Challenge for a chance to win a piece of the $55,000!

As a special exhibition for Australia’s 2011 National Science Week, (August 13-21) some talented folks are bringing dinosaurs back from extinction; and it doesn’t require frog DNA or Jeff Goldblum.

The Jurassic Science Week layer features 3D models of old favorites like Stegosaurus and Tyrannosaurus Rex, as well as some lesser-known species like Chungkingosaurus and Parasaurolophus, all of whom are happy to pose for a screenshot photo with you.

In fact, taking screenshots with the AR dinosaurs could pay off in more ways than just enviable new Twitter/Facebook photos (c’mon, we know you’re just as big of a dinosaur geek as we are), because iiNet is hosting a competition for the best human/dino screenshot. The winner of iiNet’s Photographasaurus Competition will receive a year’s worth of free internet with iiNet service! 

The Jurassic Science Week layer is a collaboration between the creatives at Scitech, the stellar development skills of Valance Phua at iiNet, and the Australian government’s Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research.

For those of you who can’t make it to Australia next week, here’s a sneak peek at a few of Jurassic Science Week’s 3D dinos:

Near the end of World War II, the Polish Home Army fought for its capital’s freedom in the 63-day (August 1 - October 2, 1944) battle against Nazi Germany occupation known as the Warsaw Uprising.

The conflict did not end in the Polish Home Army’s favor, however, and it cost many Polish soldiers and civilians their lives. In the aftermath, Nazi soldiers and collaborators orchestrated massive looting efforts and set fire to the capital, leaving Warsaw utterly devastated.

The Warsaw Uprising Museum hosts a comprehensive collection of photographs, film, personal recounts and other historical information from the Uprising, which serves as a memorial to the soldiers and families killed during the conflict.

Starting this week, the 67th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising, you can use the Warszawa’44 layer to access historical images and information linking the geographic connections between modern Warsaw and the war-torn capital in 1944.

The Warszawa’44 layer was created by the Warsaw Uprising Museum and Polish Augmented Reality company Adv.pl.

Check out the video they made to show off the layer (it’s in Polish but you still get the idea).