Sunil Thankamushy
Mount San Antonio College, USA
Title: Building my Educational Augmented Reality Game App
Biography
Biography: Sunil Thankamushy
Abstract
This is a talk describing my experiences with my team, using the strengths of Augmented Reality (AR) to design a fun and educational app series. The name of the product is, Dino On My Desk. The core technologies we used is the Qualcomm Vuforia as the AR platform, in conjunction with Unity for the gaming engine. As a newcomer into the field at the time, we found that our best resource was our own DIY spirit to crack into the area. I hired a loosely networked team of developers from around the world, including past students of mine (I teach animation and gaming at Mt.SAC college in California) to get the job done. The initial iteration was a 'confidence building exercise' for us all, and see a mockup of the product. The proof of this was in the fact that we were, with very few features, able to entertain test audiences running our AR app on their mobile devices. The next two iterations were built over the previous ones, each time tacking on functionality and engagement methodically. I am a firm believer in the idea that to be effective, a product has to leverage the uniquenesses offered by the technology it is built on. In the process of building this product, we were continually uncovering what the uniquenesses in interaction that AR offered, were. An overview of the AR genres that have evolved over the past few years, and the companies behind it show a trajectory that starts from the 'Magical', through to 'Function-driven', and finally to 'Enrichment-driven'. Finally, I would like to demo my product that started the journey for me in the mesmerizing field of Augmented Reality.