Over the past couple of months I’ve had the chance to get in a bit of research and development time with Unity, and one of the areas I have looked at is Augmented Reality. By far the most entertaining experiment so far has been my “AR Driving” demo. It could be said that this particular demo isn’t strictly AR (because it doesn’t overlay graphics on the video stream) but still, it uses AR technology to map the orientation of an AR marker to the steering, acceleration and braking of a car. I recently demoed it in our London office, result: Fun!

The demo works by reading the orientation of a single AR marker printed on an A4 sheet. The sheet is folded so that the marker is visible to the camera on one side, and a steering wheel image is visible on the other side – so the user knows which way up to hold the paper!

The rotation around the Z axis (as in, turning the steering wheel) is mapped to the car steering, although not entirely linearly – in order to make the controls easy to use it required a few tweaks, such as smoothing out the sometimes jittery raw data, and giving bias to a ‘not-quite-dead zone’ around the zero-degrees rotation area to make it easier to drive the car in a straight line.

The acceleration and braking controls are implemented by reading the “tilt” of the marker around the X axis. Holding the marker straight-on to the camera gives the equivalent of a steady gentle press on the accelerator. Tilting the top edge towards the camera pushes down the accelerator, while tilting it away releases the accelerator completely and applies the brakes.

The final result is a fairly intuitive driving control, and most people who had a try in the office seemed to find the car responsive and easy to control on their first try, as the video shows!

Last night, Ben, Resh and I went to the launch party for The Cube Store, Nissan’s multimedia design exhibition celebrating their new model, The Cube.

The event was held at Boiler House in Brick Lane and featured live street-art battles, beat boxing and some very funky cube-inspired designs.  We may have also had a glass of champagne or two…!

The design of the space itself is cube-tastic.  Inside a dome is a wall-to-wall multimedia video experience that features fast-paced city and product shots.  Very cool.  The street art took place on either side of giant stacks of red cubes, which comprises the central design.  Despite being a launch for a car, the Cube was presented as design, alongside design.   This sets it apart from most other automobile launches, where the car is the star and everything revolves around it.

Cubelist club cards were distributed to attendees, each with their own individual shapes and colours, driving to cubelist.com.  There you’re asked to match the colours to your card to unlock your membership – a creative way to encourage sign ups.  The members section includes a design-inspired webzine, discounts at The Cube Store and access to exclusive Cube events.

My favourite section on the page, surprisingly, is the Build Your Cube section, which is an interactive experience that has you customize your Cube in separate sections, which you “drive” around the environment.

Once you’re happy with your design (complete with funky dashboard mats), you can “take your Cube for a spin,” where your car follows your mouse through a series of paint splotches in an interactive visualisation.

When you navigate to the Cube section on the Nissan page you’re presented with the tagline, “It’s an unusual club that isn’t for everyone, but if you’re not everyone…” Clearly Nissan is targeting people who like to be different and try to build a community around the car’s unusual design, much like VW’s famous Lemon angle, or Mini’s cult following.

If you don’t have a Cubelist card, you’ve got to apply for one by completing a 24-question profile test.  This illustrates the mystery and intrigue they’re trying to build around the car.  Only once Nissan “gets to know you better” and you pass the test will you be invited to join this community… And not everybody will be.

The Cube Store opens to the public today, November 26^th and will run until January 3^rd.  The pop-up shop was created in collaboration with Parisian design emporium, Colette, and will feature a range of Japanese inspired lifestyle products from renowned international designers.  The Nissan Cube will be displayed alongside a series of music, fashion and creative experiences throughout the seven week stint.

Check it out if you’re in the area!

Skive's Louis Clement and Publicis Modem's David Prideaux grapple over a BIMA while posing for the cameras

Team Skive enjoyed a big night out in Camden last Thursday at the BIMAs, held this year at Koko.

Together with Publicis Modem, we picked up 2 awards from a possible 7 for Start Thinking Soldier, including Best Interactive Advertising and Best Advergame – and later found out we were within a whisker of the coveted Grand Prix, which ended up going to Philips Cinema 21:9.

Matt Stafford keeps the paparazzi at bay with his crutches while Jon Groom, Asan Aslam and Jim Hall reap the applause

The agency took a whopping 16 Skivers to the event, showing the scale of the project and the sheer number of people involved, and a good night was had by all – not least when beatbox wizard Beardyman took to the stage and jolted the audience awake with his ‘verbal hellfire’.