Apple and it’s love for Augmented Reality continues with this latest patent on AR based navigation o
Apple Maps when first introduced was heavily trolled and became the meme sensation all over the world. Apple did not let that affect and the result is heavily improved Apple Maps that you see on latest iOS device. It has improved a lot and close to 11% people prefer Apple Maps nowadays compared to 4% in the year it was introduced.
A lot of patents have been filed related to navigations offered on iOS devices in the past five years and now Apple has come up with Augmented Reality based navigation system. Recently, a published patent Application which was filed earlier this year surfaced which describes a system for using a smartphone camera (such as an iPhone or an iPad) for overlaying navigation prompts on the live view of the road in front of the driver.
Based on the patent, AR based version of Apple Maps would work by analyzing several captured images to establish the position of the horizon and lanes identified. Apple Maps would then block out areas of the images outside of the route which is most suitable to the driver and highlight it and then overlay images representing navigational prompts directly onto the lane.
Apple via its patent application also suggests that AR navigation would improve a driver's understanding of route information by comparing it with present solutions, such as a smartphone mounted to a car's dashboard or via a smartphone's display on a heads-up display on the car's windshield. With Apple's proposed AR system, the navigation prompts would appear directly on the driver's view of the road, providing a more immediate understanding of the route as compared to present methods.
With these and many recent AR based patent filings from Apple, it clearly indicates that Apple plans to be a market leader when it comes to AR based software services.
