As the Kickstarter for the lightweight AR/VR glasses from Technical Illusions comes to a close, a final push from interested fans sent the crowd-funding campaign over the $1,000,000-mark, successfully funding most of the stretch-goals.
For those who haven’t been following along over the past month- or have been wrapped up in the PS4 hype- “castAR” is an augmented reality/virtual reality interface designed by Jeri Ellsworth and Rick Johnson of Technical Illusions: In simple terms, the glasses project an image streaming from a PC onto a retro-reflective surface; the image appears to the user as a 3D projection that can be interacted with in real-space, and can be viewed from multiple angles courtesy of the castAR’s built-in motion-tracking system; additional AR and VR clip-ons can be attached to the glasses to nullify using the retro-reflective surface in exchange for a more immersive experience…A thorough explanation of this technical sorcery can be found within a previous interview.
Tonight marks the end of Technical Illusions’s Kickstarter campaign; in the final hours, fans raised more than $1,000,000 for the funding of castAR. While the initial campaign request was for $400,000- which would have covered the basic necessities for manufacturing castAR units- most of the additional stretch-goals were met (as of this post, another stretch-goal remains for the $1.1 mil. mark), adding several new features to the base units, including a custom RFID dungeon-creator for tabletop gaming, the ability to watch videos, an integrated microphone, and support for Maya 3D animation software.
While the campaign is coming to a close, castAR units will still be available for purchase afterwards through Technical Illusions; those who secured a castAR through the Kickstarter campaign can expect to get a new taste of augmented and virtual reality around Sept. 2014.
ThePlatformer 