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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

augmented reality

Right now, Amazon AR is Kinda Silly for the Kitchen, but Just Wait

Amazon released augmented reality (AR) capabilities through its iOS app yesterday that allow consumers to place virtual versions of objects in real world settings through their phones. The number of products you can place is currently limited, but there is a Kitchen category where you can preview how virtual wares will look on your countertops or in cabinets.

Right now, the feature is more fun than truly useful in the kitchen (I can see it having more of an immediate impact in the living room). Mostly because a lot of the kitchen items are small, like a Cookie Monster mug which I don’t really need augmented reality to show me how much space I need on my counter.

If you’re looking for some utility, the app might be useful for bigger countertop appliances like toaster ovens or slow cookers to get a sense of how they would fit and look in a smaller kitchen. Or if you want to get a sense of how a style of kitchen barstools would look. Or you can get a sense of how a red toaster will work with the current color scheme of your kitchen.

The virtual mockups are definitely rough, and there really aren’t that many items to preview right now. But right now isn’t really the point. Amazon is a company that definitely does not live in the present, it’s always got one eye on the future and setting itself up for success then.

You can see how this would be helpful with larger appliances such as a refrigerator, or oven hood or cooktop to see how it will look. And the ability to provide real-life room mapping would be of great use, for example showing it a space and Amazon pulling up all the appliances that would fit there, or appliance colors that would go well with your existing decor.

There was one bit of unexpected coolness from my brief AR experiment. When I Airdropped the pictures from my phone to my MacBook, it immediately brought up the corresponding page to buy the product on Amazon in my browser. Well, “coolness” may not be the right word, but never let it be said that Amazon is not the master of the frictionless purchase.

You can check out the AR capabilities right now in iOS. Jut go the Amazon shopping app and click on the camera. From there you can find the best place for that Cookie Monster mug.

Visualize it: Augmented Reality and the Future of Food

All around us, augmented reality technology is beginning to give us more information about our immediate environment than can be seen with the naked eye. There are (AR) apps for overlaying where nearby WiFi signals are centered, and apps that help surface unseen nearby locations and attractions to visit. Now, food production is set for transformative developments thanks to AR.

On this front, Huxley has developed what it bills as the world’s first “augmented operating system,” which mashes up augmented reality with artificial intelligence. “ By combining vision, environment, and plant data, we can now grow more with less using AI,” Huxley reports.

Imagine a smart greenhouse of the future, where farmers with augmented reality glasses can surface information about what kinds of plants at various stages of growth surround them. The same greenhouse might have smart cameras that keep track of everything from watering status, to activity from pests and threats.

Huxley is being leveraged for these kinds of food production scenarios, and is even being leveraged to optimize marijuana production. It is a hands-free system that combines AR, AI, and machine learning to optimize “plant vision,” as seen in the screenshot here.

“Intelligent Automation for Controlled Environments is the future,” the Huxley team reports. “By collaborating with the most innovative companies and organizations we can provide anyone in any language the power of a master grower. Data just got dimensional.”

According to a recent Wall Street Journal story, augmented reality can also help optimize harvesting plants: “New cameras, sensors and smartphone apps help monitor plant growth. One company is even developing augmented-reality glasses that can show workers which plants to pick.”

The same story notes that companies are also developing new ways to grow vegetables in tiny spaces and often urban spaces, including rooftops, balconies, and abandoned lots. From controlled lighting to augmented reality solutions for discerning when to harvest plants, these solutions were not found on grandpa’s old farm.

Meanwhile, Danish researchers are investigating ways to use augmented reality to optimize the trimming and boning process for pork bellies. “The AR technology has demonstrated lucrative applications in industrial QA procedures and even farm management applications appear to benefit from applying the technology,” the researchers note.

So how might augmented reality boost your food frontiers when you are at the table in a restaurant? A company called Kabaq is on top of that concept. It is developing 3D and augmented reality menu and visualization technologies so that you can see exactly what your order will look like in front of you, from every angle. Check out the technology in action in this video:

Watch how you can use Apple ARKit in Food ordering

The technology driving augmented reality devices and applications is rapidly advancing as well. Apple is one of many tech giants driving the technology forward, and the result is likely to be ever smarter AR-driven food applications. Stay tuned to this space.

Analysis: With HomePod, Apple May Finally Deliver On The Promise Of HomeKit

After months of rumors, Apple finally introduced a wireless streaming speaker called HomePod this week, their first new hardware product since the Apple Watch debuted in 2015.  The Siri-enabled wireless speaker also doubles as a HomeKit powered smart home hub, giving Apple a new fixed HomeKit control point beyond Apple TV. The HomePod will ship in December and is priced at $349.

There is a bunch to break down here, including the HomePod compares to Amazon’s Echo, but let’s first look at what exactly Apple introduced.

The Hardware

The new HomePod is an impressive piece of hardware. The HomePod includes Apple’s A8 chip, a system-on-chip CPU/GPU that debuted in 2014 with the iPhone 6. It has a six-microphone array with advanced echo cancellation, which Apple says will enable “Siri to understand people whether they are near the device or standing across the room, even while loud music is playing.”  The Siri-powered speaker also features seven beam-forming tweeters, each with an amplifier, and it also includes what Apple calls room-sensing technology that allows the device to optimize its sound based on the specific spatial characteristics of where music is being played.

During the event, Apple made a string of other important announcements that led up to the climactic debut of the HomePod:

AirPlay2

One of the most important foundational technology upgrades announced Monday was AirPlay 2, a much-needed update to Apple’s wireless streaming protocol. With Airplay 2 we finally get multiroom audio support, a huge upgrade that will allow homes with Apple’s HomePod – as well as products from partners like Bose, Bang & Olufsen, Marantz and others – to stream audio wirelessly to different rooms and to multiple speakers. The upgrade puts Apple’s streaming music framework on par with Google’s Chromecast for audio, which already supports multiroom audio.

Apple’s AirPlay 2 Early Partners. Image credit: The Verge

A notable absence from the list of initial partners was Sonos, a company that almost single-handedly created the wireless multiroom audio category.

HomeKit

The release of AirPlay 2 will not only bring multiroom audio support, but it also adds speakers to the list of devices controllable with Apple’s smart home protocol, HomeKit. By adding the speaker category to HomeKit, consumers will be able to control their wireless speakers through the iOS Home app.

The arrival of the HomePod also brings a second fixed smart home hub device into the lineup. Like Apple TV, the HomePod allows for remote access to any HomeKit compatible device through the Home app. However, with far-field listening capabilities and integrated Siri, the HomePod instantly surpasses Apple TV to become Apple’s most capable smart home hub.

What Does All This Mean?

The pricing, capabilities, industrial design and messaging gave us all we need to know to break down Apple’s strategy:

The HomePod Is, Above All, A Music Product: The HomePod is built to be a great wireless streaming speaker. With seven beam-forming tweeters – that’s one more sound driver than the Sonos Play 5 – it’s built to sound great. Sure, the HomePod has built-in Siri, but Apple messaged this as a revolutionary multi-room speaker first and a virtual assistant second.

This Is a Premium Product : The price of the HomePod, $349, may seem fairly affordable when compared to other Apple products, but at roughly double the price of the Amazon Echo and nearly triple that of Google Home, this is a much higher priced than other smart speakers.  It’s clear Apple has Sonos, probably moreso than Amazon or Google, in its crosshairs.

Apple Is Finally Bringing An Upgraded Siri Home: One of the messages from Apple this week is Siri has finally grown up. By adding anticipatory computer features, opening it up further to developers with a year two SiriKit and creating a Siri face for Apple Watch, the company finally feels they have a virtual assistant on par with Google Assistant. And now with HomePod, Apple has a true voice assistant to bring into the home.

Apple Vs. Amazon

Where does this position Apple relative to Amazon and the Echo?

I think given the premium pricing strategy, Apple appears to be ceding the fixed smart speaker mass market to Amazon. By choosing a music-first, premium approach, Apple appears content to let Amazon win the numbers battle with its lower-cost smart speaker.

However, letting Amazon blanket the mass market with $49 Echo Dots does not mean Apple is ceding the virtual assistant market to Amazon. In fact, if we learned anything this week it’s that Apple plans to leverage the hundreds of millions of Siri-powered iPhones, iPads and Apple Watchs in the market as it does battle with Alexa. .

And not only is Apple leading with iOS, but they plan to make it a much more rich and robust platform with new efforts like ARkit, their new augmented reality developer platform. Imagine pairing a well-done augmented reality app with a voice assistant capability in the home, and you might have something pretty cool.

Ok, so while it’s a bit of a risky strategy, it’s probably the right one for Apple. By ‘dancing with one who brought them’ in iOS and augmenting their home strategy with a premium-priced smart speaker/virtual assistant for the home with HomePod, Apple now at least has a strategy to do battle with Echo, even if their new smart speaker is priced out of reach for some consumers.

Lastly, let’s not forget that the HomePod with HomeKit is a true smart home hub, with all the built-in intelligence to make a powerful Apple-powered smart home come to life. While the Amazon Echo has done an good job integrating with hundreds of various smart home devices through its skill platform, it’s limited in its ability to execute on things such as scenes. With HomeKit and a new rev of the Home app for iOS, I think Apple may finally have what it needs with the HomeKit-HomePod combo to deliver on the early promise that had so many excited about HomeKit.

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Can Augmented Reality Help You Order Food In Another Country?

Food and travel often go hand in hand as one of the best things about visiting new places is sampling the local cuisine. But when you’re abroad and unfamiliar with the native language, you might have trouble ordering your dinner and feeling confident in what you’re going to get.

Enter the new augmented reality app, Waygo. The concept is simple – Waygo doesn’t require an internet connection or anything fancy, just point your phone at a restaurant’s menu and the app will translate it for you into English. And it’s not just a translation app – as Tech.co points out, it actually shows you pictures of the dish you’re translating, in case the words on the page don’t give you a good enough idea of what you’re about to order.

The app is currently aimed at people traveling to countries where Japanese, Korean and Chinese is spoken but plans on expanding in the near future. According to the company blog, the app is powered by proprietary algorithms that create simple phrases from translations. When it is compared to a top commercial translation software, Waygo was found to be 5x faster and twice as accurate. With 4,000 images and 14,000 curated images, the app is likely to help most folks traveling in Asian countries pick the right thing off the menu.

Read more about Waygo at Tech.Co.