Within the framework of a “Berlin University Alliance X-Student Research" seminar, me and other three students from Berlin developed a mobile application for touristic purposes that highlights spatial sound as a dimension of Augmented Reality. In this project, I was responsible for design and development about spatial sounds and all UI menus.
Audio Augmented Reality (AAR) is a subfield of Augmented Reality that specifies augmentation of the auditory sensory modality.
Most AR Apps use visual input as the main modality. The user’s gaze is focused on the screen most of the time which can limit the experience. For solving the problem, we proposed to use audio as the main input and only support it with visual input. Our App guides the user to sightseeing places via related spatial audio.
We used the spatial sound of a Beethoven composition (Adieu au Piano) to locate the Beethoven statue in Tiergarten, Berlin. The main function of our App is getting GPS location of users and the statue for sound navigation, and also the basic UI menus and visual indicators were shown.
▷ Development:
● Unity AR Foundation
● Unity Asset "AR+GPS Location" for navigation
● FMOD Unity plug-in for spatial sounds
▷ Visual Design:
● Unity Assets: JukeBox Music Player, Nature Starter Kit 2, Fantasy Wooden GUI, Game GUI Buttons
The Prototype of the App, which shows the "Start" menu, visual navigation indicators like arrows and distance board, auto-played texts, information board, jukebox, "Back" button and "Quit" the App.
