Volograms Launches Volu to Change 3D Content Creation for Augmented Reality

AI-Powered Mobile App Makes Immersive, Dynamic Content Creation for AR Easy

Artificial intelligence (AI) and volumetric video innovator, Volograms, debuted the public version of its 3D content creation app, Volu. Using advanced deep learning and computer vision technologies, its AI-powered mobile content creation platform is the first to allow smartphone users to easily create, share and play with immersive, dynamic content for AR/VR (augmented reality/ virtual reality) from one quick mobile video.

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“Technology advances are creating new forms of content and changing how we communicate. Innovators like Volograms will help pave the way for all smartphone users to embrace the next era of AR/VR experiences by simplifying user-generated content creation,” noted Thomas Alt, founder of Metaio, an AR company acquired by Apple, where he then served as director of engineering and director of strategic deals, before taking on his current role as venture partner at Atlantic Bridge. “Being able to create AR-ready content with a smartphone from a single video perspective in a way that isn’t ridiculously complicated or limited to an inanimate object is groundbreaking.”

Volu is an extension of Volograms’ mission to make AR/VR content creation more accessible. Despite AR users topping 90 million in 2021 in the United States alone and 2.4 billion mobile AR users estimated worldwide by 2023, content creation tools for AR/VR have been too inaccessible, expensive, complicated or rudimentary to earn mass appeal to date. iPhone users can now use Volu to create their own content and share with family, friends and their extended social networks.

“Augmented and virtual reality will change our communication patterns and our everyday lives, similar to the advent of the internet, social media and smartphones. Eventually, it will be ubiquitous,” said Rafael Pagés, CEO and co-founder, Volograms. “However, just like every other technology leap, first it needs to become more accessible. Putting the power of dynamic 3D content creation into every hand, pocket or purse carrying a smartphone with our Volu app is the first step. We are enabling user-generated content for AR by turning standard smartphone cameras into AR-ready cameras.”

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Volograms got its start helping professional content creators achieve the same high-end, full-body video reconstructions as the more than 100 professional sensors previously needed with only a dozen consumer-grade cameras. Now, with the public launch of its first mobile app, Volograms is further broadening the reach of volumetric video as it allows users to create fun, immersive content from a single smartphone video.

Based on feedback from thousands of Volu beta users around the globe, Volograms fine-tuned key capabilities within the new version of the app before general release – including enhancing reliability, speeding 3D reconstruction, incorporating a self-capture timer, and adding new creative effects and algorithms to improve the quality of critical details such as facial features. In addition, the team is working to add a more advanced sharing functionality for easier co-creation and access for Android devices imminently.

Understanding the Technology Behind Volu

Leveraging years of experience improving volumetric video content creation and its extensive content database to feed its AI algorithms for computer vision and 3D reconstruction, Volograms’ proprietary technology enables Volu to deliver the capabilities that make AR-ready mobile capture accessible for the masses. Key technical components include:

• Single-view volumetric capture, which allows for 3D reconstruction from a single, mobile camera viewpoint
• Automatic foreground segmentation, which eliminates the need for a green screen and allows app usage in uncontrolled environments – even outdoors
• Markerless motion capture, which powers 3D-skeleton estimation to properly capture human movement without any additional equipment or sensors
• Compatibility with advanced sensors, including LiDAR, to generate more accurate results
• Comprehensive cloud computing processing and keyframe-based sequence encoding and compression
• Future-ready integration with machine learning tools to make processing mobile and eventually allow the move to real-time streaming with 5G

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