To mark the launch of its teen-themed latest issue, Colors magazine tapped the tech skills of Fabrica to add an extra layer of augmented reality to the printed words and pictures. shots.net caught up with Fabrica's executive director Andy Cameron while he was over in London to find out more about the project.
The problematic relationship between print and online publications has been bugging the magazine trade for a while now. The question driving the debates: how do you sustain readership of print products in an age where everyone expects to get everything online and for free? And against that backdrop - how can magazines offer something unique, or at the very least begin to work with online in new and interesting ways?
With the latest project for Colors magazine, Fabrica, the Benetton Group communications research centre, has set out to tackle that challenge, blurring the line between analogue and digital with an interesting augmented reality project. Sure, AR is hardly new - it's been applied to everything from music videos to Game Boy games and even car ads - but using the technology to reinvigorate the besieged magazine industry? Well, that's kinda different, as Cameron and fellow creative director Erik Ravelo explain.
"For the teenage issue of Colors magazine we started working with the website in a very different way, with the aim of reaching contributors to the magazine who we've never met in person. We decided to open it up to more collaborators and invited submissions on the teenage theme. We were prepared to get nothing but it actually worked really well. People can always publish content themselves on their own blogs and on their own websites but there's still a strong lure to the printed word."
Having received a raft of submissions via the Colors website, which gets a complete revamp and redesign with the release of each issue, Cameron then set about examining ways of repurposing the content in an entirely new way.
"We saw the BMW campaign and thought about ways of using that concept for Colors," he reveals. "We wanted to keep the execution as simple as possible so we decided to fill the magazine full of visual codes to unlock video content on the website. The idea was to develop certain pieces from the magazine by extending the articles and giving them an additional depth and new life online with extra video content."
Handing the reins over to in-house coder Julian Koschwitz, the challenge became one of developing the software to execute the concept. Using the open-source AR Toolkit, Koskovitch developed the back-end which was then exported to Flash to enable the AR codes printed in the magazine to trigger video content.
"The learning curve at the beginning was steep," muses Cameron, "but once the concept was refined it took about three months to build. Now it would probably take us somewhere closer to a month to create a similar project."
The end result is a selection of articles presented with aesthetically distinct AR codes that trigger video content to play out online. Static printed matter comes to life on screen as interview subjects and contributors speak to the camera about the deeper stories behind the headlines.
"For us this is a really interesting way of bringing print and online together," suggests Cameron. "It valorises the print issue because you can't access the material unless you have the magazine, which then gives you access to these other levels of information. It also has significant implications for the ways publicity and advertising can be developed in the future, and in particular for the way in which you can make connections between traditional print advertising and online."
In particular Cameron points to the possibility of delivering an iPhone experience that would drive users from billboards, magazines, even product price tags in stores, to a more layered and interactive sort of brand engagement online.
"There have already been several interesting projects that utilise AR techniques to allow people to position virtual objects in real spaces. In particular there's a project from a designer called Robin Westergren, who created a spec application of the technology for Ikea which would allow consumers to position virtual furniture in their homes. That's the sort of application we're excited to get to work on."
Check out some extracts from the AR Teen issue of Colors in the gallery. Print them off and head to coloursmagazine.com to experience it for yourself.
Images and demonstration video copyright Fabrica
