Tag: Wikitude SDK

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Dev to Dev

Migrating from Moodstocks: here’s how to keep your app online

The augmented reality industry is on fire these past weeks:

  • Snapchat has quietly introduced a whole new world of augmented reality right in our hands
  • Pokémon Go’s AR game added $7.5 billion to Nintendo’s market value
  • and just last week Moodstocks, French image recognition startup, was bought by Google

As pioneers in the field, Wikitude couldn’t be more excited with all the attention (and actual usage) augmented reality has gotten in the past week. In fact, there was an increase of 417% on Google searches for the term “augmented reality” in the past week.

Google 'augmented reality' search results

About 1 year ago, the industry experienced a similar hype when Apple bought Metaio. Back then, our team helped hundreds of developers and agencies to migrate their apps to Wikitude. This time around, it won’t be different: we’re here to help Moodstocks-based apps to keep running smoothly and make a switch in just a few steps!

Image Recognition and Tracking, Geo-based AR, Cloud Recognition Services and content management system: Wikitude offer a full stack of products to build incredible AR apps in no time! 

Wikitude SDK

The Wikitude SDK is the core of our augmented reality solution set. It provides developers with a powerful SLAM rendering engine for mobile apps and smart glasses.

The latest version of the Wikitude SDK includes all the features (and more) to keep your Moodstocks app amazing your users. Here’s a list of all features:

  • Geo-based AR
  • Image recognition and tracking
  • Object recognition and tracking
  • Instant tracking
  • Extended image tracking
  • 3D modeling and presentation layers
  • 3D tracking for Unity SDK

This means you can overlay digital content on 2D images on planar (magazines, catalogues, billboard, TV/computer screens) and non-planar surfaces (product packaging, images places on objects, etc), stick the augmentation on the user’s screen and even include location-based AR (just like the Pokémon Go app does).

Why Wikitude?

  • You can build your own white-label app from scratch or include the SDK in an existing app.
  • We have a sample app which you can use for base of your project and to test all features included in the SDK.
  • Our set up guides are quick and easy!
  • Choose among several development platforms and programming languages to build your app, such as JavaScript, Unity, Xamarin, PhoneGap, Titanium, JavaScript, native iOS and Android.
  • With Wikitude you have the freedom to choose between On-Device Recognition (offline, aka client recognition), Cloud Image Recognition (online) or a ‘hybrid’(online-offline) alternative.
  • Using the Wikitude Cloud recognition will allow you to add, replace or remove images without republishing your app.
  • Manage your AR content with the Wikitude Studio/Target manager.

And a few more things:

  • Stable technology: we are pioneers in the AR industry, first launching our AR SDK in 2009;
  • 100% in-house API: our technology is robust, fast and precise, fully developed by our highly qualified R&D team;
  • Fast and scalable: recognize 2D targets in less than a second (current speed: 0,5 secs). You can upload up to 50,000 images in our cloud, but if you need more, just let us know;
  • Trusted by global brands: Wikitude is the largest independent AR SDK provider in the market. MasterCard, Johnson & Johnson, Volkswagen, Cisco, SAP, Konica Minolta, 20 Fox Century are some of the hundreds of Global brands using our technology;
  • Smart glasses: our SDK is optimized for the industries top AR smart glasses for hands-free experiences;
  • Best support team: we hear this every day and are proud of it! We’re here for you.

How to migrate from Moodstocks to Wikitude:

Don’t be shy, if you have any questions or need help, reach out to info@wikitude.com anytime!

Download Free Trial

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Dev to Dev

Build the next Pokémon Go with Wikitude’s SDK 5.2

Wikitude SDK 5.2 - build the next Pokemon Go

Update (August 2017): Object recognition, multi-target tracking and SLAM: Track the world with SDK 7

Are you working on building the next Pokémon Go? Wikitude can help make that a whole lot easier! Geo location, image recognition, and on-screen interactives – all right here for the taking. The next version of our industry-leading augmented reality SDK is out – and it’s got a few upgrades we think developers need to know about.

So if you’ve got the next smash-hit app for AR, hop on board – we’ve got the tools you need to build them.

Build your own Pokémon Go!

The Wikitude app was the first publicly available app that used a location-based approach to augmented reality, already in 2008. If you are ready to build the next Pokémon Go app, all you have to do is check out our Geo-based AR feature included in the Wikitude SDK.

pokemon-go-nick_statt-screenshots-1.0

Image credits: The Verge

With a few lines of code you can build awesome AR games that will not only augment Snorlax, Bulbasaur and Pikachu, but any 3D model of your favorite creature, along with videos, augmented buttons, html widgets and more! 

Here’s how to build an app like Pokémon Go with Wikitude:

(Don’t be shy, if you have any questions or need help, reach out to info@wikitude.com anytime!)

New “Camera control feature” (Input Plugins)

This new feature (Camera Input Plugins) allows developers to feed the Wikitude SDK with their own input images and manage the camera stream on their own, making the SDK more flexible where it receives camera images from.
It’s an extension of our existing Plugins API feature, introduced in the SDK 5. The SDK comes with an extensive sample “Custom Camera” that demonstrates the feature with a custom rendered camera image using a shader for a scanning effect.

Camera Input Plugins

This new camera input feature also not only lets the user to provide input from different cameras to the SDK, but it doesn’t “occupy” the camera while the SDK is running, letting you multitask while other things while the SDK is running.

Making Unity better (and easier)

Our most popular plugin was updated to make product visualization even better!

We made some essential changes to the camera prefab (set up), which has been simplified in its structure. The hierarchy it previously had is now a single GameObject, making it easier to combine the prefab with other Unity objects and features, like physics engine. Most of all, your 3D content will no longer stand alone in your AR experiences!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VEkSZEO-jU

You will be able to insert shadows, change texture on 3D models, make objects interact with each other and drag and drop several objects in the AR experience.

So whether you are building interactive augmented reality catalogues, like IKEA’s, or awesome AR games, get started today with our updated Unity extension.

Download SDK 7.0

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Dev to Dev

Wikitude Cloud Recognition: Scalable and 10% Faster

In the past days we silently rolled out an upgrade to our cloud services for all customers. The update focused on bringing the components and infrastructure we are using in our Cloud Services up to the latest versions. The database infrastructure used in our Cloud Services played a crucial role, where we upgraded to the latest MongoDB version.

This upgrade, beside all the security and stability fixes you get out of it, also resulted in an performance improvement of average 10%, meaning the cloud services can handle more parallel requests and traffic.

Additionally we fixed a few UI glitches and bugs – particularly when uploading a higher number of images at the same time (>300). The new Wikitude Studio updated its duplicate check for better recognition in case you are uploading an identical image.

Generating WTC files

Wikitude Studio is the easiest and fastest way to generate wtc files, the file format recognized by the Wikitude SDK. Whether you are working with you own CMS or with a large amount of images directly in the cloud, you can use this service to automatize the generation of wtc files in just a few clicks.

If you still haven’t tried the Wikitude Studio including Cloud Recognition and the web-based Editor, get a free trial today at your developer license page. For optimal performance, Wikitude has distributed servers across the planet: Europe, Americas and China. To learn more check out our documentation section.

 

Get Free Trial

 

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Dev to Dev

From Retail to Real Estate: Wikitude Helps Devs Bring AR to Life

Augmented reality is no longer a technology of the future. In fact, since a few years it has been helping marketers to tell more engaging stories, real state agents to provide location-based home search, engineers to follow hands-free instructions guides, retailers to provide augmented reality sales assistants in stores and many more.

The latest blog post from Appcelerator features the diversity of use cases augmented reality offers nowadays and how companies are using Wikitude’s technology to increase productivity, customer engagement and revenues.

Read the full article at our partner’s blog and get started today with the Wikitude extension for Titanium! We offer free trial, quick set up guides and a sample app to get your Titanium-based app running in no time!

Need inspiration? Check out Manor’s augmented reality catalogue showcase, developed with the Wikitude Titanium extension!

[responsive_vid]

A big thank you to Jon Bailey and our partner’s at Appcelerator for featuring Wikitude!

Download Titanium Extension

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News

Augmented World Expo 2016 was the biggest and best AR event ever – and here’s why

Couldn’t make it to Santa Clara for AWE 2016? Take five minutes to find out what you missed.

The biggest Augmented Reality event in the world has come and gone for 2016 – and there’s a whole lot to talk about for anyone interested in seeing the future. Wikitude was onsite to demonstrate its latest technology advancements– and of course, see what everyone else in the AR/VR/wearable industry was up to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16KPWVPcDi0&feature=youtu.be

Show me the money

The first thing you noticed? Money. Not literally – but lurking quietly below the surface. Booths were bigger, presentations were slicker, and everything and everyone was more professional. It’s a sign that people in the know are putting investments on the line – with full expectations of real returns. We’ve had our first glimpses of the future – and it’s one full of possibilities for the AR world. Of course, that was also reflected in another metric – people. Says Wikitude’s Phillipp Nagele: “There was just so much more happening this year! I think the show must have doubled in size since last year.”

Interactivity is evolving

The layman thinks of AR as a new way to consume content or information about the world – but what some of the visionaries in the field are most excited about it how it will change the ways we interface with computers. The computer has always required a tactile interaction. Keyboards and mice have evolved to touch screens, but what’s next? The answer: nothing. Augmented reality devices will let our fingers, hands and eyes interact with digital images in ways never seen before. Check out ODG’s R-7 smartglasses – for which we’ve designed an optimized version of the Wikitude SDK. It will help you make sure AR scenarios now work flawlessly on the ODG hardware. Read the official ODG / Wikitude partnership announcement.

We made a scene at the Auggies

The Oscars to the film industry is what the Auggies are to the AR industry. Not only was Wikitude a finalist in the Best AR Tool category, WIkitude also stole the show by augmenting the Auggie this year – yep, we augmented the Auggie. After all, it makes sense, right? Watch Ori Inbar, Founder and CEO of Augmented World Expo live on stage during the keynote and Auggie Awards ceremony.

See what we had to show off

For the people that work behind the scene on AR apps, Wikitude had plenty to offer from CTO Philipp Nagele – most importantly, technical insight and an in-depth tutorial on our SDK, plus an exploration of the various complimentary and powerful tools WIkitude offers including Studio, Cloud Recognition and the plugins API, which let’s the Wikitude SDK work with other libraries to create powerful, custom-built apps with features like QR and barcode recognition as well as OCR.

CEO Martin Herdina discussed one of the most important issues for everyone in the AR space: 3D recognition and tracking of objects, rooms, spaces, and structures. With the discipline still very much in its infancy, Herdina offered rare bits of real-word experience on best practices with devices already in the market.

And, in the parlance of the film industry – that’s a wrap. AWE 2016 was an incredible event highly indicative of an incredible future. What will be talking about next year? Whatever it is, it’s surely going to be even more exciting. See you in the new future!

Categories
News

Wikitude and Mosquito combine 3D ‘vision’ with 3D ‘audio’

London, 15th March: It’s the not-so-hidden secret of Hollywood: one of the most important parts of creating an immersive experience isn’t mind-blowing visuals on a massive screen – it’s incredibly intricate, highly nuanced sound design. It’s the second-most important human sense, and indispensable to the way we move, communicate, and think. That’s why, today at the Wearable Technology Show in London, Wikitude introduces the first 3D audio enabled augmented reality experience, adding one more incredibly useful tool to its powerful Wikitude AR SDK.

In partnership with Mosquito Engine, a leading developer of high quality 3D audio tools, the two companies have developed a 3D audio plugin that empowers AR experiences and concepts with something never seen (and more importantly, never heard) before. And if you’re in London for the Wearable Technology Show, you can try it at the Wikitude booth #258.

The 3D audio engine automatically follows virtual objects, making it possible to play audio that indicates the position of the object(s) in the 3D augmented environment. The engine manages proper audio positioning, volume, and all other audio cues that make up for a true immersive experience. It’s the most immersive, enriched augmented reality experience there is.

Daniel Talma CEO from Mosquito Engine describes it as follows: “The Wikitude SDK is boundless in its versatility. It was super easy for us to integrate our 3D audio engine, and the results are simply stunning.”

Philipp Nagele, Wikitude’s CTO believes that “3D audio in augmented reality highly enhances the sense of immersion since your eyes believe what your ears hear. We need partners to deliver powerful sound toolkits to accomplish this, and Mosquito delivers exactly that!”

Want to see it in action? Check out  “Skeeto” – a simple AR game with 3D audio integration. Gameplay is the modern, mobile equivalent of the arcade classic ‘Whac-a-mole’ – but in Skeeto, the bug lives on your phone, tablet or AR glasses, and you need to get it before it gets you. Your only way to do that? Listen. Find Skeeto on the Appstore.

Also keep an eye out for the soon-to-be available template demo app called Wikiwings, designed specifically by Wikitude and Mosquito Engine for developers who are interested in building their own AR apps with 3D sound. Or, drop by to see us at Wikitude booth #258 at WTS in London.

About Wikitude:

Wikitude GmbH is the world’s leading mobile augmented reality (AR) technology provider for smartphones, tablets and digital eyewear. Its fully in-house developed AR technology is available through its SDK, Cloud Recognition and Studio products enabling brands, agencies and developers to achieve their AR goals. With 100,000+ registered developer accounts, Wikitude has grown to be the world’s leading independent AR platform. The Wikitude SDK is an integral part of more than 10,000 apps run by both small enterprises as well as many Fortune 100 companies across multiple industries. Wikitude’s latest product addition is 3D Tracking, allowing apps to see in rooms, spaces and environments.

About Mosquito Engine:

Mosquito Engine is a Dutch company that develops high quality 3D audio tools for virtual and augmented reality applications. Mosquito Engine has many years of experience in both the film and music industry. The recently-launched Mosquito 3D Engine provides real 3D immersive sound for any kind of game or app. The Mosquito 3D Engine allows real time movement and rotation of both the listener and multiple sound sources, fully enhancing the sense of immersion.

Download Wikitude SDK

 

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Dev to Dev

Using Unity to boost your AR apps

Unity and Wikitude logo image

There’s a reason mobile developers love to integrate Unity in their apps: it’s portable, agile and in some cases, it’s free.

While known mostly as a gaming engine, Unity is also frequently employed by anyone looking to model a virtual and now augmented three-dimensional space. The finer visual details, like texture or reflection mapping on 3D virtual objects, make Unity-based apps some of the most immersive experiences available.

For the millions of developers using Unity, Wikitude’s Unity plugin is exciting – because it allows them to combine detailed, textured virtual worlds with real ones. The plugin integrates Wikitude’s computer vision engine into anything you build with Unity, which allows you to augment interactive 3D content in real time on your mobile device.

Unity is all about supporting the growing Virtual and Augmented Reality markets! The company has invested in a number of specific features out of the box, such as head tracking and an appropriate field of view, to ease the development of VR/AR apps. 

d01d5adc-68b8-42e1-9634-3c71c44b0141

“With the increasing demand for augmented reality technology among our Unity app developer community, we are excited to see Wikitude offering a free plugin to connect our technology platforms.” 

JC Cimetiere, Sr. Director Product Marketing of Unity.

If you want to see the Wikitude SDK + Unity plugin in action, you’ve got the perfect chance to do so at the Vision VR/AR Summit in Los Angeles next week, 10-11 February. Wikitude CMO Andy Gstoll will be on hand to check out the keynote presentation from Alex McDowell, designer, storyteller, and creative director behind Unity’s new 5D Global Studio.

Download Unity SDK

So what can you build with Wikitude and Unity? Find out by downloading the Wikitude SDK and free Unity plugin – both free as trial. The possibilities are endless and we can’t wait to see your apps!

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Dev to Dev

3D Tracking for large-scale scenes

Update (August 2017): Object recognition, multi-target tracking and SLAM: Track the world with SDK 7

As part of our mission to keep augmenting the world around us, our tech team has been extending the capabilities of our 3D tracking. We started simple with the first public beta version of this feature a few months back, recognizing and tracking small-scale spaces. As things progress very quickly, Wikitude’s computer vision team is taking a step forward to track and map bigger environments or “large-scale” scenes as we like to call it.

In this post we will provide an insight on Wikitude’s 3D tracking technology, share our next move on the 3D tracking road and provide a hands on demo of our large scale feature, the WikiWings app for Android.

The Wikitude cross-platform 3D Tracking technology

Tracking objects and environments in 3D is a complex task. Particularly if this is done without depth sensors and by using just a single front facing the camera as found in the majority of smartphones out there today. We, humans, are actually at an advantage as we are equipped with two eyes (cameras) for sensing depth and understanding the third dimension.

The Wikitude team has been working tirelessly in the past three years with the aim to create a common base for recognizing and tracking three-dimensional objects, structures, and spaces. The market requirements range from being able to recognize objects of a few centimeters in size up to positioning a device in a sequence of rooms and corridors stretching several 100s of meters. There is no “one” computer vision algorithm out there that can support this broad set of requirements and use cases – yet. As the pioneer in the mobile augmented reality industry with a razor sharp focus on technology only, we will continue to address the demand for varying “flavours” of 3D recognition and tracking. The result of this approach is a strong common core for 3D tracking, which serves as the common base for a number of use cases.

151127_WT_Infografik_3D_Engine_02
The Wikitude 3D Tracking engine

In the past weeks, another building block of our 3D tracking has evolved, and today we are excited to share with you the second part of our journey to map and track the world around us.

From “small-scale” to “large-scale”

Wikitude’s first 3D tracking beta released a couple of months ago was the initial public release for mapping and tracking objects and environments on a small scale, such as an office desk for example, as previously described in our blog. We have gathered feedback from our developer community in the past weeks and worked on an updated version of our small-scale 3D tracking. Interested developers can request our updated (December 1st, 2015) version of the beta on our 3D tracking page feature page.

As a next step, we are preparing our next public releases for tracking and mapping larger indoor spaces to navigate users, display augmentations in rooms or show points of interest inside buildings.

To demonstrate the basics of our large scale 3D tracking feature already, our development team took the Wikitude office as an initial test environment. The video below is a first hands-on example of the current capabilities of our SLAM based 3D tracking applied to indoor navigation and localization.

The first step of the above demo is to identify objects and physical structures of the room that will provide key feature points to be tracked. As the user moves around, feature points are captured and become the base for the forming map on the device, see the box in the bottom right corner on the device in the video above. Once the algorithm has tracked key features of our office, it’s time to augment the scene! In the technical demo, we demonstrate a simple augmentation of an animated 3D model using our Native iOS SDK.

Large scale in action: use cases with the Wikitude 3D tracking

The demand for technology that “understands” and enhances the larger spaces around us inside of shopping malls, public buildings, airports, train stations etc. is tremendous. Often times we wonder what’s the shortest way to a departure gate inside of airports and train stations, where we can get the best deals in large shopping malls or find the nearest Starbucks, or locate a piece of machinery on complex industrial sites, even indoor gaming is frequently being requested for. Here are some of the many use cases where the Wikitude 3D tracking can be applied.

Gaming
Mockup 3D Tracking LivingRoom

One of the coolest applications of our large scale 3D tracking is the ability to make rooms highly interactive. This feature allows users to hunt for flying dragons in your living room, fight living creatures in your kitchen or follow an alien in a shopping mall. Any room can become the scene of your game!

 



Architecture151028_WT_Mockup_3D_Tracking_Facade_03_v4

What if we could see a design idea of a building structure in real time? Or plan industrial spaces before a single brick is being moved? Architects can use Wikitude’s large scale 3D tracking to display their plans on their client’s tablet, helping them easily visualise what things will look like upon completion of the project.

 



Indoor navigation (proof of concept)Indoor navigation - augmented reality app

Tracking and mapping indoor spaces enables powerful indoor navigation. Locating deals in the maze of big shopping centers, leading passengers to their boarding gates inside of airports are only the beginning.

 

 

Check out WikiWings, Wikitude’s large-scale demo app

The Wikitude large-scale capabilities will be available in our SDK soon, however, you can get an early taste of it already by downloading the WikiWings demo app for Android.

wikiwings logo

Screenshot 3d tracking app

(We have already shot quite a number of dragons at our office ;)

Update (August 2017): Start developing with Wikitude SDK 7

Getting started with SDK 7 has never been easier! Here’s how:

Help us spread the news on Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin using the hashtag #Wikitude.

Categories
AR features

Wikitude 3D Tracking (Instant Tracking)

2020 Update: Wikitude SDK now supports 3D tracking, Object tracking and 3D Model as input method (CAD). Learn more.

With this post, we are opening a new chapter on Wikitude’s journey towards augmenting the world! We are happy to share today the first version of the all new Wikitude 3D tracking technology. For our team, augmenting rooms, spaces, and objects around us is a natural progress after mastering augmentations on 2D surfaces. Clearly, tracking in 3D is a much more complex task as algorithms must be optimized for a variety of use cases and different conditions. With this release of our 3D tracking technology, developers will be able to map areas and objects of a rather small scale and place 3D content into the scene.

This is the first step of a sequence of releases Wikitude will roll out as our SLAM based 3D recognition and tracking technology evolves. The 3D tracking (instant tracking) feature is now available as a free trial and packaged in our SDK PRO products. This feature is currently available for the SDK 5 Native APIs only.

How does Wikitude 3D tracking work?

The Wikitude SDK tracks 3D scenes by identifying feature points of objects and environments. By identifying feature-rich environments, the SDK will map the scene by displaying a point cloud over the different feature points.
As an example of how the Wikitude 3D tracking works in a small scene, we will use the scenario of an office table. The richer the scene is equipped with feature points, the better the mapping and tracking will be.

151012_WT_SDK5_Infografiken_3DTracking_01_v1

In order to track and map the scene the following steps should be taken:

  1. Launch the Wikitude sample app, which is included in the Native SDK (iOS and Android) download package
  2. Record a tracking map by slowly moving the device from one side to the other of the scene, covering the whole area
  3. 3D point clouds will appear on the screen capturing key feature points of the scenario
  4. Save the tracking map
  5. Load the map in your augmented reality experience to relocalize the scene and visualize the augmentation in real time.

    Download 3D Tracking Trial!

The video below demonstrates the above described steps.

https://youtu.be/GWs2KK-Pv0Q

Important note: It is not possible to use both 2D and 3D tracking within one experience. If you use 3D tracking, recognition, and tracking of 2D markers will not be launched.

Developers can now try the Wikitude 3D tracking together with the SDK 5 free trial. A trial key that has been generated on Oct 15 2015 or later is required. License keys prior to that will show a warning Unlicensed feature when you try to use 3D tracking. If you generated a license key earlier than October 15th, just revisit the license page and a new key will be automatically generated.

The Wikitude 3D Tracking is included in the Native SDK download packages for iOS and Android. In our documentation section you can find all details of this new cross-platform technology and follow the step-by-step set up guide to get started (Android, iOS). We can’t wait to get your feedback and are happy to answer questions you have at sales@wikitude.com or in our developer forum.

And before we close this post, here is a sneak peek of what is coming next! Subscribe to our newsletter and stay tuned to our developments on our dedicated SLAM page.

Update 2017: 3D Instant Tracking now available for Multiple Platforms and Development Frameworks

The Wikitude SDK is available for both Android and iOS devices, as well as a number of leading augmented reality smart glasses.
Developers can choose from a wide selection of AR development frameworks, including Native API, JavaScript API or any of the supported extensions and plugins available.

Among the extensions based on Wikitude’s JavaScript API are Cordova (PhoneGap), Xamarin and Titanium. These extensions include the same features available in the JS API, such as location-based AR, image recognition and tracking and SLAM.
Unity is the sole plugin based on the Wikitude Native SDK and includes image recognition and tracking, SLAM, as well as a plugin API, which allows you to connect the Wikitude SDK to third-party libraries.

Categories
SDK releases

Introducing: Wikitude SDK 5

Update (August 2017): Object recognition, multi-target tracking and SLAM: Track the world with SDK 7

We would like to share the details of our version 5 of the cross-platform Wikitude SDK with you.
We have been working on this release for some time now and consider this our most ambitious release since launching the first version of the Wikitude SDK more than three years ago.

Continue to read the details and you will easily understand why.

For our developers the Wikitude SDK 5 brings increased flexibility when it comes to choosing your development environment.

Beside the existing options to work with Wikitude’s JavaScript API and the well-established extensions for Cordova, Titanium and Xamarin, developers are now able to embed augmented reality features using the new Wikitude Native API for Android and iOS. The Native API will give access to all computer-vision related features like 2D Markerless Image Recognition and Tracking, 2D Cloud Markerless Image Recognition and Tracking.

Speaking of 2D image tracking, the new SDK extends – literally – its functionality here as well. Extended Image Tracking, available in both Native and JavaScript API, is a new tracking mode that will keep the image tracking on although the original target image can not be seen by the camera image anymore.

The Native API is also the base for the new Unity3D plugin for the Wikitude SDK. With the Unity3D plugin developers are able to add 2D target images to their Unity3D based application.

Starting with this SDK release, developers are be able to create and use custom plugins for the Wikitude SDK. Plugins under this framework can receive a shared camera frame plus additional information about recognized images – like the pose and distance. Plugins can either be written in C++, Java or ObjC and can communicate with your augmented reality experience.

Furthermore the Wikitude SDK 5 brings full compatibility with Android Studio (intermediate set-up guide is already available).

WikitudeSDK_architecture_v5

Extended Image Tracking

150527_WT_SDK5_Icon_ExtendedTracking The Extended Image Tracking option is an advanced tracking mode for 2D markerless tracking, that will continue to track your target image, although it can’t be seen by the camera anymore. Users will scan your target image as of now, but will be able to leave the target and continue to move around, still keeping the tracking of the entire 3D scene.
Extended Tracking is the first release of Wikitude’s new 3D Tracking engine and is supplementing Wikitude’s 2D image tracking capabilities. The new mode is fantastic for larger 3D model sceneries, or smaller image targets on larger surfaces, where the user can move around more freely.

Native API for Wikitude SDK

150527_WT_SDK5_Icon_iOS-Android For all developers, who want to use the Wikitude SDK at its core, Wikitude is branching off its computer vision core technology. The Native API contains the full computer vision engine of the Wikitude SDK, but can be integrated using native programming languages for Android and iOS (Java, ObjC).

 

The Native API features:

  • Plugin Framework
  • 2D Image Recognition and Tracking (Offline)
  • 2D Cloud Recognition and Tracking (Online)
  • 2D Extended Image Tracking

Unity3D Plugin for Wikitude SDK

150527_WT_SDK5_Icon_Unity3D
Based on the new Native API, Wikitude offers a plugin for Unity3D so you can integrate Wikitude’s computer vision engine into a game or application fully based on Unity3D. This means you can work with target images and image recognition in your Unity3D app and benefit from the full feature set of the Unity3D development environment. Adding the power of Wikitude’s SDK with the advanced capabilities of Unity3D makes this combo an unbeatable duo.

Plugin Framework

150527_WT_SDK5_Icon_Plugin
The new Plugin Framework allows to extend the Wikitude SDK by 3rd party functionality. Plugins for the Wikitude SDK have access to the camera frames and information about recognized images (pose, distance). This is perfect for additional functionality that also requires camera images. Plugins are written in C++, Java or ObjC and can communicate both with the JavaScript API and the Native API.

The SDK includes two samples for plugins:

  • Barcode and QR Scanner
  • Face Detection

Full Android Studio compatibility

150527_WT_SDK5_Icon_AndroidStudio Android Studio is becoming more and more the preferred IDE for developing Android apps.
While the Wikitude SDK version 4.1 can run in Android Studio Wikitude SDK 5.0 now has been optimized to work nicely with Android Studio.

  • Updated library format .aar
  • Sample App for Android Studio

Availability

Update (August 2017): The SDK 7.0 official release is now available for download. Customers with a valid Wikitude subscription license will receive future updates for free upon release.

Oh, there is one more thing…3D Tracking!

Wikitude will publicly release SLAM based 3D tracking capabilities soon! Please check wikitude.com/SLAM for details. Here is a quick video demo to give you a glimpse of what’s coming.