Introducing our first Sponsored Project: Inside Confucius

If you’ve followed Layar over the years then you know that we have a long record of promoting artistic and educational content on our platform. Dozens of layers have been published over the years for various purposes, including museum exhibitions and the products of augmented reality design classes.

We’re big supporters of using technology - especially augmented reality - to forge new frontiers for improving education, culture and society, but not everyone has the resources to bring great ideas to life. We want to make sure that ideas conceived around augmented reality and interactive print have a chance to become a reality, so today we’re introducing Layar Sponsored Pages.

Layar Sponsored Pages makes it easy for artists, students, teachers, charities and other groups and individuals to apply for free Layar Creator pages. To get things started, we’re also introducing our first sponsored project: Inside Confucius from Western iMedia at Western Kentucky University’s School of Journalism and Broadcasting.

Western iMedia has launched a Kickstarter project to help fund the group’s goal of creating an innovative editorial study of the Confucius Institute, a worldwide cultural program run by the Chinese government. Layar has sponsored the project with not only free Layar Creator pages, but also with $2,000 in rewards for Kickstarter donors.

Kerry Northrup, Director of Western iMedia, has been interested in using augmented reality as a journalistic tool, and had students test and research the best platform.

“They researched and tested out a few augmented reality service providers and none seemed to work as they had hoped. Kerry came across some of Layar’s work this past summer and it seemed bullet proof to him,” says Western iMedia’s Mckenzi Loid. “It was easy to use and it seemed to be a perfect fit for our project.”

The group then produced a trial project to see how the use of augmented reality might change their content and workflow. “Through that trial project, we were certain that Layar was a great provider to work with as journalists and we could be confident using it for our Confucius Institute project,” says Loid.

The Western iMedia project is indeed a unique one, touching on both the educational and cultural aspects of what we look for in Layar Sponsored Pages applicants. If you want to apply for free Layar Creator pages, visit the Layar Sponsored Pages information page and fill out the application form!

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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Yesterday we told you about an interactive scavenger hunt going on in Dublin, Ireland that is using Layar to help players find treasures and win prizes. These types of hunts fit nicely into the realm of Augmented Reality whether the players are searching for digital tokens or for actual educational information.

“Expeditie Deventer” (Expedition Deventer) is an interesting new project that uses Layar to focus on the latter of these two examples - helping people, namely high school students, learn more about the city of Deventer. The game was commissioned by the Public Library Deventer to teach students about the past, present and future of the city and to establish the library as the city’s information center.

The game is played by a group of students split into two teams - one which stays inside at the library and another which roams the streets of Deventer hunting down clues. The students use Layar on their smartphones to complete tasks, earn points, communicate and - most importantly - discover the city in a new way.

3D objects, images and videos can be found in various places throughout the city to help the students solve the questions and assignments. The inside team takes the clues discovered outside and researches them at the library using the Internet or other library resources.

The Expeditie Deventer project was recently awarded the prize for best online education application at the 2010 Dutch Digitaal Erfgoed (Digital Heritage) conference - a testament to the educational value that can be produced through Augmented Reality. Layar is a powerful platform for creating unique educational experiences, and its accessibility on smartphones adds an extra level of appeal to the youth in this case.

To learn more about Expeditie Deventer, check out the project’s homepage, the case study by developers Fabrique and watch the video below!

Layer: Expeditie Deventer
Location: Deventer, The Netherlands
Required: iPhone or Android device
More info: Expeditie Deventer Homepage
Developer: Fabrique