Ursa - MIT Reality Virtually Hackathon
Team
Mischa Abakumova Design & Strategy / Gentry Demchak Developer / Margot Lieblich Design Research / Dan Cole Producer / Tejas Shroff Unity Developer
Project
2019 MIT Reality Virtually Hackathon project developed with an amazing team. We created a prototype AR app with the goal of helping shoppers make sustainable purchases. We used PTC Vuforia to recognize different products and then display a quick and easy to understand buy/sell signal to the user. Healthy for you, healthy for the planet!
Inspiration
One look around the supermarket these days and you get the feeling that they're not so super after all. With so much choice it makes it difficult to make sustainable choices. Put simply, the way we shop right now is unsustainable. Thankfully, more and more people are realising this. But they need a helping hand. A simple, fast way to make decisions at the shelf.
What it does
It makes choosing products that are better for the planet simple, decisive and fun. And it does it quickly while you're at the shelf. (With your 5-year old pulling on one arm! Or your lunch hour ticking by too fast) Using AR, your phone almost instantly recognises the product from the label and sparks a reaction from our polar bear. A deeper dive reveals more information and how we came to our decision.
Technology
This app was built with Unity and Vuforia
Challenges
Multiple image tracking - How do we get all that data and keep it updated? The crowd. If the polar bear can't find the product we ask consumers to simply snap the barcode and send it to us. We'll do the rest but you can sleep easy knowing you've helped.