Understanding Augmented Reality: Blurring the Lines Between Physical and Virtual Worlds

Every day, we interact with our world through screens. Taking photos with our smartphones, connecting with friends on social media, setting timers, and using GPS maps—our digital devices increasingly influence our experiences.

But what if we could digitally add objects, textures, and people to our surroundings? Augmented reality technology does exactly that, blurring the boundaries between the physical world and the virtual world. As this technology develops and many industries adopt new applications, understanding augmented reality becomes more important.

Augmented reality (AR) is a technology that uses a device like a tablet or specialty goggles to blend virtual and physical elements into one cohesive display: the AR device superimposes virtual elements onto an image of the physical world.

For example, you could point your smartphone toward your living room and use software to place different chairs in that room. You are superimposing a digital object (chair) onto a real-world setting (your room).

Give shoppers a new way to experience your products when you add augmented reality (AR) to your online store. Showcase realistic, interactive versions of your products and let shoppers get a true sense of the size, scale, and detail of your products..

Use Shopify AR

Augmented reality is not the only technology that lets a person interact with realistic digital objects or a virtual environment. There are three main categories of this technology, with important distinctions:

Virtual reality (VR) dates back to at least the 1980s, but thanks to advances in technology, it’s taken off in the past decade. Virtual reality gives the user a fully immersive experience, typically through the use of virtual reality goggles. When a person enters virtual reality, they are fully unaware of the physical world around them. VR replaces the user’s surroundings with fully digital images.

Unlike virtual reality, augmented reality (AR) virtually adds digital objects to a real-world environment. Using input devices like cameras, light sensors, depth sensors, and microphones, an AR app will place virtual objects in a user’s environment, as seen through their mobile phone or AR-enabled devices. Augmented reality overlays digital images onto images of real-world settings and enables users to see something that doesn’t exist in their real environment.

Mixed reality (MR), often referred to as AR 2.0, is a mix between augmented reality and virtual reality. MR is similar to augmented reality, making it easy to conflate the two. The terms “mixed reality” and “augmented reality” sometimes are used interchangeably.

There are a few main types of augmented reality, and each functions in a slightly different way:

Marker-based augmented reality hinges on image recognition of a predetermined physical cue to trigger the AR elements. This will often be a QR code, photo, or visual pattern that the AR software recognizes. As the name suggests, this type of AR depends on some sort of visual marker.

Markerless AR does not require a specific marker that the AR software recognizes. This is a sophisticated application of AR that requires more computing power. Markerless AR uses object detection to map out a physical space and add computer-generated images to a user’s surroundings, as seen through mobile phone screens, smart glasses, or another interface.

Projection-based AR does not require the user to hold a mobile device. Instead, projection-based AR uses cameras and projectors to augment an environment by projecting digital images onto physical objects (like a wall or sculpture) or inserting images into a user’s real-life surroundings.

AR technology requires three main components to work: input, software, and output. AR experiences need some sort of input from the real world—typically provided by mobile devices’ cameras. The most complex and invisible part of augmented reality is the work the computer does with the input it gets. Once the software has processed the input data and figured out where to overlay digital elements, it must then display the final image to the user.

Virtual reality is a fully immersive experience that typically uses VR goggles to replace a user’s environment with a digital one. Augmented reality is a technology that adds digital elements to a user’s real-world environment, creating a hybrid of physical and digital. With augmented reality, the user can still see their physical environment plus a layer of digital images added to their experience of the real world.

Sometimes. Augmented reality uses sensors to ingest data from a real-world environment, and then uses that data to accurately add digital content to that environment. The data can come from a variety of sources including cameras, light sensors,depth sensors, GPS, and microphones. Some AR apps use artificial intelligence to more efficiently process large amounts of input data.

Augmented reality depends on three principal components: input (cameras, depth sensors, microphones, and other sensors), software to process the inputs, and then output, or the final image on a screen or projector. These components work together in dedicated AR devices or the average modern smartphone.