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of a particular form of augmented reality in order to demonstrate the benefits of
specific features of the environment and of its tangible interfaces. One of the latest
works presents a tool for creating 3D photo collages using mobile augmented reality,
in which virtual pieces are textured with pictures taken with the camera and can be
blended with real objects to create interesting works of art (Marzo and Ardaiz
2013
).
Currently, some artists praise augmented reality painting and sculpture as the
future of these art forms, but they are doing this on their websites and blogs
rather than in academic papers (though with some excellent and convincing
examples of their AR artworks). The blog entry “The Future of Painting?” by Jones
Trevor (Trevor
2013
) and the webpage and video “Between Physical and Digital:
Augmented Reality Sculpture - 2013” by Ian Hutchinson (Hutchinson
2013
)are
particularly worthy of note.
Among a variety of AR paintings and sculptures, the most common are the
techniques of replacing a painting with an animated video that brings its content
to life (see, for example, Baradaran
2011
;Trevor
2013
), and the 3D mapping
projection on real-world sculptures or buildings (for some examples of Projective
Augmented Reality, see Valbuena
2007
; Roberto and Teichrieb
2012
). Many exam-
ples of different types of AR sculpture can be found in other chapters of this topic.
10.2
Augmented Reality Painting
In this chapter, a particular type of augmented reality artworks will be considered
that is close to (or is based on) a traditional understanding of painting. We will
refer to this type as “Augmented Reality Paintings” in more general terms, because
augmented reality is in its very essence and also because the use of the term is
consistent with the name for a similar type of topics that are called “Augmented
Reality Books” (see: Amazon
2013
). An augmented reality painting comprises two
parts: a conventional physical painting (such as an art print, or an oil or acrylic
original painting) and an AR-based digital component that is integrated with the
physical painting in such a way that only experiencing the both parts at the same
time with an AR-enabled device makes the entire painting complete and meaningful.
To test this concept of Augmented Reality Painting, six experimental artworks
were created. They were also intended to explore and exhibit some possible diversity
of this novel type of painting in terms of both its content and form. As a result,
paintings 1-4 used flat images with transparent backgrounds as their augments,
which were visible using the Layar application. Paintings 5 and 6 were augmented
with 3D objects, floated in the air in front of them, that could be experienced with
the Junaio AR browser. In both cases, a person just had to scan the physical part of a
painting with their iPhone, iPad or Android phone in order to see the entire artwork.
These six Augmented Reality Paintings constituted a solo exhibition
Hidden
Realities
that took place in the Scott Building's Foyer Space at Plymouth University
(UK) from 8 to 19 April 2013 (see Fig.
10.1
). All the paintings were gallery-
quality framed A3
C
art prints of original digital paintings, produced by the author.
