A couple of months ago I wrote a post about interaction layers, their development and their role in customer experience. In the past week or so things seem to have stepped up a bit in the avatar space, so I wanted to do a brief update / round-up in one place to cover the latest stuff happening here.
THE STATE OF THE ART:
First up is this from Magic Leap - a stunningly funded start-up which has created an AR headset that promises to put lifelike objects - and now people - in the room with you. Say hello to MICA:
Digital Humans from Unreal Engine:
Digital Humans (encore!) from Soul Machines:
Virtual Humans from Quantum Capture:
Whilst from a visual perspective she's not in the same league, it probably is also worth adding Amelia from IPSoft into this mix, given her enterprise focus:
FOCUS & OPPORTUNITY
Magic Leap and UE are (right now) more focussed on the impact they can make in the entertainment and gaming industries (as well as being distinguished by hardware in the case of ML). Soul Machines (typically backed up with IBM Watson), Virtual Humans and Amelia are very much aiming into the enterprise space.
Having been fascinated by this space, one opportunity that strikes me is in the combination of technologies that map and transfer movement, visuals and audio onto another person. Even these visual technologies feel like they could do with better syncing with audio, something that researchers delivered (albeit using different techniques) here:
Imagine combining the photorealism of Magic Leap or Soul Machines' work with the ability to map onto a video YOU created?
Of course, questions remain about how weirded-out people will get about this kind of interaction - and then how quickly they will normalise it. Anecdotally, I understand research has been done ("albeit" by IPSoft) that suggests better interaction satisfaction and interestingly even politeness, when an avatar is used.
PS - if this kind of things interests you, follow Julian Harris on LinkedIn and Twitter - he and the clever Cognition X folks have a fantastic view across the Conversational Interface / chatbot market.
PPS - much gratitude and a place in my heart to the person that coins a better phrase than digital human, virtual human or the amazingly awful Dirrogate (Digital Surrogate) :)