What Does Augmented Reality Mean as a Medium of Expression for Computational Artists?

Cécile Chevalier, Chris Kiefer
2019 Leonardo: Journal of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology  
As augmented reality (AR) quickly evolves with new technological practice, there is a growing need to question and re-evaluate its potential as a medium for creative expression. The authors discuss AR within computational art, framed within AR as a medium, AR aesthetics and applications. The Augmented Reality Immersive Instruments (ARImI), a twoday forum on AR, highlights both possibilities and fundamental concerns for continuing artworks in this field including visual bias, sensory modalities,
more » ... interactivity, and performativity. The authors offer a new AR definition as real-time computationally mediated perception. Augmented Reality in a broader context Augmented Reality (AR) has seen recent resurgence with new tools, user interfaces and related algorithms. In some respects these technology are stabilising (e.g. new mobile AR frameworks), however within the arts, AR technology is arguably still in early development [1] and are just beginning to see wider use by creative practitioners. Despite this early stage of development, AR technology are becoming available to the masses in ubiquitous forms (mainly through gaming and mobile technology), and these new platforms are providing new Preprint, accepted (2018) for publication in Leonardo Journal (date to be confirmed) Journal ways of creatively altering our perception of the environment in more detailed, nuanced, multisensory, timely and perceptually believable ways than were previously possible. This is happening above a rising base-level of pervasive technology as it and its data merge both 'physical and mental constructs' [2] . We see computational arts as a practice centering on the creation of interactive artworks that are fundamentally algorithmic (probably digital, but possibly, for example, biological, mechanical, analogue). In the context of expressive media for computation arts, we define AR as real-time computationally mediated perception. Mediated because there is the potential for the 'Augmented' in AR to be a transformation of the environment as opposed to an overlay, as we typically see in functional AR systems (e.g. mapping apps). We understand the term meditation as subsuming augmentation. Realtime because AR responds to present events, and builds mediations with a temporal connection to these events. Computational in that an algorithmic process or automaton senses the environment and creates mediations. We choose perception in preference to reality as new AR technology invites new forms of perception and sensory situated experience, made possible through mediation that no longer nuances one reality (real or virtual) over another, instead approaching them as one environment, as one relational system. To explore this, we map-out ways in which new AR technology might be applied as a medium for creative expression. We do this through (1) building on discussions of AR as a medium and related aesthetics, (2) locating a genealogy of AR, (3) AR applications, focusing on sensory mediation and interactivity and through (4) forum discussions and a multidisciplinary overview on AR [3]. This discussion contributes to current discourse concerning AR technology as a medium for computational artists, and explore AR's virtual and physical relations and boundaries.
doi:10.1162/leon_a_01740 fatcat:lmtavmofirbktozgpe3mztooie