Augmented Reality
Volun t e e rs C re a te a U n i q u e Ex p eri en ce for A SL A A tt endees
Todd Robinson, ASLA
When our team was charged with designing the BSLA’s
Host Booth for the ASLA 2013 Annual Meeting, we came
with the stipulation we move away from the status quo and
create something distinctive for the event. The event was
last hosted in Boston in 1999, and the city has changed
remarkably since that time, much of it at the hands of
landscape architects, architects, and engineers. The Big
Dig has been completed, the waterways are much cleaner,
and the seaport has been developedBoston is a
different city and we have a lot to show off. In November,
some landscapes are past their prime and we looked for
a way to showcase them at their best.
Our initial booth designs included multiple HD monitors
showing professional videos of Boston’s award winning
sites in their seasonal prime, alongside static pictures and
site descriptions. But as the concept moved from design
to reality, various obstacles became apparent: cost of
infrastructure and installation, cost of professional videographers, site selection, and the eventual exclusion of some
top attractions.
Section of map of Boston created by BSLA for ASLA 2013 attendees. Elizebeth Knox
Augmented reality was proposed as a way to replace
the monitors. This new technology is used on smart devices
and overlays computer generated images onto a real
world environment – a way of making static images come
to life. The team experimented on a few options, and found
an app named Aurasma that uses image recognition to
stream interactive content right onto the screen of a smart
device. The positive features of this particular app included
it’s cost (free to set up and for conference attendees to
utilize), a simple user interface, and ease of video upload.
It also provides the ability to stream video to multiple
devices that are linked to an Aurasma “channel.” By using
this technology the booth went from being able to show
ten or so videos on a few monitors, to showing hundreds
of videos on any smart device just by aiming it at different
areas within the booth.
2013 Boston Society of Landscape Architects Fieldbook
93