At BlackBerry World 2011, Research in Motion showcased its new BlackBerry Bold 9900 and a preloaded application called Wikitude. The new Bold is the first BlackBerry to include a magnetic compass and the right display overlay software, meaning it’s capable of augmented reality technology.

Wikitude’s main function is the ability to check out geo-positioned Wikipedia articles. For example, pointing your smartphone’s camera at the Eiffel Tower and launching Wikitude will spawn the corresponding Wikipedia article. You can also include Flickr photos, YouTube videos, Twitter tags and Foursquare spots in your geo-referenced results.

Considering that RIM developed Wikitude, it’s not a surprise that it’s highly integrated with BlackBerry’s native apps-including BlackBerry Messenger. The developers adapted it so that you can see where your BBM friends are when you point the camera in a particular direction.

Wikitude also intends to use the social side of BBM as a way for users to meet new people. It’s likely that the BBM Social developer API helped make features like this possible.

The first BlackBerry handset to pack this feature, the Bold 9900, is expected to launch early this summer.

via IntoMobile

If the thought of blasting TIE fighters as they flew around your backyard had you in a tizzy, then this news should really excite you. Qualcomm has announced that its augmented reality platform is dropping the beta label and is now ready for prime time development. Apart from its own AR SDK, Qualcomm is also making a plug-in for the popular Unity 3D gaming engine — so expect to see all kinds of spinoffs of existing Unity-based games coming in the near future. Sorry, iOS users, but the platform is all about Android for the time being (specifically version 2.1 or better). All we have to do is wait for the Kids in the Hall to sanction an official “I’m crushing your head” game, and we’ll be good to go.

And while games built using the Qualcomm SDK and Unity should work on just about any Android device, the company is quick to mention that they’ll “work best” on those running its Snapdragon processors.

via Android Community

For the past year or so people have been talking about augmented reality apps a lot, but to be honest, a lot of those apps have felt like gimmicks. After all, does it really matter if you can hold up your phone’s camera to the real world and see that there are 16 restaurants in the direction you’re pointing? It’s probably easier to find those restaurants if they’re plotted on a map anyway.

But now we’re starting to see apps that actually make augmented reality seem useful. Recently we took a look at an app called Word Lens which not only offers real-time translation of text scanned by your iPhone camera… but actually replaces the text on a sign, printed page, or other real-world object. Unfortunately Word Lens is kind of temperamental and doesn’t work very well yet, but it’s still a pretty awesome example of where augmented technology is headed.

If you’re looking for another use, and one that actually works right now, you might want to check out DanKam. This $2.99 app is designed to help color blind people differentiate between colors they can’t normally distinguish.It does this by allowing you to adjust the huge of colors picked up by your camera until the colors stand out.

While I wouldn’t expect anyone to go through life holding an iPhone up to their face so they can see every last color, developer Dan Kamisky does point out a couple of potential uses for this type of app, such as matching clothing or figuring out whether the status light glowing on your PC or other gadget is red or green.

Although I’m not color blind, some of the comments on the app in the App Store are pretty amazing. While not every color blind user finds the app to help with their vision, a number have said they’ve been able to view charts they could never make out before, or better yet, pick out certain colors in real world settings.

DanKam is available from the App Store for $2.99.

via Download Squad

Word Lens may be one of the coolest mobile apps I’ve ever seen — in theory. Unfortunately it doesn’t work very well right now. But here’s the idea: you point your iPhone camera at a sign or other object with printed text. Word Lens will identify the text, attempt to translate it in real-time, and replace the words on the sign with words in the language of your choice.

For instance, say you’re looking for directions or a shop while you’re in France… but you don’t speak French. Just fire up Word Lens, point it at the street and business signs around you, and while it probably won’t have much luck with proper names, the app will attempt to show you the same signs with words like “bibliothèque” replaced with “library” or “nord” replaced with “north.”

Unfortunately, there are two problems with the app right now. The first is that it simply provides word-for-word translations, so it can’t provide context, which could lead to some confusion, although it may help you figure out if you’re ordering pork or a vegetarian item when looking at a menu in a foreign language.

The bigger problem is that Word Lens just doesn’t work that well right now. I downloaded the free app demo on my iPod touch and started pointing it at various objects around my desk. The demo attempts to identify letters in a word and reverse them. For example, when I showed the app a business card from www.parallels.com, it spit out “www.slellarap.moc” at me. But that was the only text it was able to do that with.

I tried other business cards, a FujiFilm SD card, a letter, a map, and other items lying around, and it wasn’t able to lock onto any text. Instead it kept showing a constantly changing stream of letters for each item. I don’t know if it was the font of the Parallels business card or something else that helped Word Lens identify the letters, but in 5 minutes of testing, that was the only item I could get the app to work properly on.

That said, it was kind of awesome watching the app erase and replace text — with backwards words in the same color and a similar font in the same location. Word Lens definitely has potential. It’s just not quite ready for prime time yet.

The app is available as a free download, but you can purchase language packs from within the app. Currently Spanish go English and English to Spanish are the only language pairs available, but more are expected. Hopefully by the time they arrive, the developers will have improved their character recognition technology.

I should also point out that I tested Word Lens on my iPod touch. The app is also available for the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4, which have better cameras, flash, and auto-focus capabilities — all of which are missing on the iPod touch.

via TechCrunch

A few weeks after a teaser video of a new Star Wars game popped up, showing how you can take control of the Millennium Falcon’s guns and shoot up Imperial forces,the game is now available for purchase for $4.99.

Normally that wouldn’t catch my attention. There are tens of thousands of games in the app store. What makes Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Runner different is the augmented reality mode that lets you blast TIE fighters against any backdrop, using your phone’s camera.

You can check out the game in action after the break. Just beware, it’s not going to look nearly as cool while you’re playing on the toilet.

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Vertigore plans to release a new Star Wars game for the iPhone and iPod touch before the end of the year which features an awesome looking augmented reality mode. Basically, you flip on AR, and instead of playing against a fictional space backdrop, Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Gunner will let you blast TIE fighters flying across real world environments.

Really, the app just replaces the background with whatever your camera is pointing at. It’s not quite rocket science, since as far as I can tell the game doesn’t’ actually react to your environment in any real way. But it looks cool as all get-out.

You can also play the game using more traditional space scenery. Vertigore says Falcon Gunner will have 20 levels and HD graphics. It’s due out this Winter.

Update: The game is now available for purchase from the App Store for $4.99.

You can check out a demo video after the break.

via MobileCrunch

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Windows Phone 7 may be the sexiest new mobile operating system Microsoft has released since, well, Pocket PC 2000. But while it has a slick new interface, an excellent new browser, and other compelling features, it lacks some of the features Windows Mobile users have grown used to over the past decade. That includes copy and paste support, multitasking, and easily removable storage. Developers are also discovering that the tools Microsoft offers for writing third party apps have some interesting limitations.

For instance, developers cannot write apps that have full access to the camera on Windows Phone 7 handsets. As a result, Fortune reports that the developers of the popular augmented reality app makers Layer will not be building a version for Windows Phone 7. Likewise, Fring, a company that offers voice and video chat for the iPhone, Android, Symbian, and other platforms won’t be able to make a full featured WP7 version.

It’s possible that Microsoft could issue an update eventually that will add support for third party camera apps. After all, the company has already promised that copy and paste support will arrive next year, so clearly someone at Microsoft is working to fill in the blanks. But this seems like a pretty big omission at a time when camera-based apps are big business on other mobile platforms. Right now, third party apps an take photos with the camera… but that’s about all they can do.

On the other hands, most reviews I’ve read of Windows Phone 7 point out that taking pictures on the platform is easier than on pretty much any other type of smartphone. Microsoft requires manufacturers to include a dedicated camera button on their phones, so all you have to do is click the button to open the camera app and click it again to take a picture. It’s just as easy as using any digital camera.

via WPCentral

Yelp has released a major update to its mobile restaurant search and review app for Google Android. Like the original Yelp app, Yelp 2.0 for Android lets you search for businesses based on your location, read reviews, bookmarks sites, and do pretty much everything you can do on the Yelp web site except for writing reviews (because Yelp doesn’t want short messages filled with typos). But Yelp 2.0 also adds a few new features that make the mobile app truly mobile.

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First up, there’s a new augmented reality feature called Monocle. When you click the Monocle button from the main menu, a screen will pop up showing you the view from your phone’s camera. Point your phone in any direction to start seeing restaurants, bars, or other businesses near you. The snippets show names, types of cuisine, distances, and average reviews. Click on any snippet to open the Yelp page for that business.

There’s also a new “Check-In” feature, which puts Yelp in competition with Foursquare, Gowalla, and other sites that let you compete with other users to see who uses the local Starbucks most often. I’m not really sold on the whole check-in experience at the moment, but as more and more businesses start offering coupons and other perks to customers who check in on a regular basis, I guess this feature could come in handy.

Yelp’s iPhone app already has both the Monocle and Check-Ins features, so the new update isn’t so much revolutionary as it is a step toward making Yelp’s iPhone and Android apps equal.

Yelp 2.0 for Android is available as a free download from the Android Market.