Our YVision team has been pretty busy these last few months replacing some of the engines to make sure YVision is executable on as many platforms as possible. The work’s paid off! This latest release brings better support for Silverlight 5 and mobile devices in the near future.

Check out the features for the latest release:

• Support for Silverlight 5 final (RTW) - Now you can run your 3D interactive applications in the browser. Extensive work has been done to make sure you app compiles for .NET 4.0 and Silverlight 5 with minimal code changes. Check out a couple of demos on our cases page.
• SLARToolKit on .NET 4.0 - Now you can take advantage of the popular augmented-reality engine on other platforms other than Silverlight. SLARToolKit is now included in the SDK, you don’t need a separate download. Be sure to check the SLARToolKit license to make sure it fits your needs.
• Steering behaviors - These allow you to apply behaviors (defined by Craig Reynolds) like seek, flee, pursue, evade, wander, arrival, obstacle avoidance, containment, wall following, path following and flow field following to your objects. These can be combined in behavior trees to achieve complex behaviors like flocking, queuing and many more.
• Settings and visualizers - You can now easily expose settings to users so that they can customize/calibrate the application.
• New project templates, item templates and code snippets - In our continuous effort to simplify your work, we added many more templates.  The samples are provided as templates so that you can mess around with them as much as possible. All the samples work on Silverlight and Windows.
• Multiple bug fixes - The framework has proven to be very robust but not without a few issues. If you find any new issue, please report it to us.

This release is only for Windows but we hope to have the Mac OS X release soon. We are working on optimizing the ‘build process’ so we can have simultaneous and more frequent releases in the future.

Go to our download page to get this latest version. We hope you have as much fun trying it out as we did developing it!

Associação Salvador realiza hoje cerimónia de entrega de Prémios

A Associação Salvador, com o objetivo de estimular a investigação no domínio da reabilitação psicomotora, promove anualmente o Prémio “Ser Capaz – Investigação e Tecnologia” que tem um valor de 10.000 euros. A cerimónia pública de entrega dos galardões realiza-se hoje, às 18h30, no Espaço BES Arte & Finança na Praça Marquês de Pombal, 3, em Lisboa.

A atribuição deste prémio prevê o financiamento de projetos que contribuam para o desenvolvimento de produtos, instrumentos, tecnologias, metodologias, equipamentos ou sistemas técnicos que previnam, compensem, atenuem ou neutralizem a incapacidade de uma pessoa portadora de deficiência motora.

O período de candidaturas da segunda edição do prémio decorreu entre 23 de maio e 14 de outubro de 2011, tendo o júri, composto por Salvador Mendes de Almeida, fundador e presidente da Associação Salvador, por António Câmara, presidente da YDreams e por Fernando Lobo, professor -DEEI-FCT– Universidade do Algarve, selecionado três vencedores de 22 candidaturas rececionadas.

Declarações de Salvador Mendes de Almeida, presidente da Associação Salvador: “Faço um balanço muito positivo desta segunda edição do Prémio Ser Capaz pois recebemos um elevado número de candidaturas de projetos com elevada qualidade, que espero virem a contribuir para o desenvolvimento de novas soluções que favoreçam a vida das pessoas com deficiência motora na sociedade.”

Prémios

1º Prémio – Valor € 5.000 - Miguel Silva /Jorge Martins/Paulo Melo/Carlos Vasconcelos
Projeto “DACHOR - lntegrated Design and COntrol of Hybrid Active Orthoses”

Menção Honrosa 1 – Valor € 3.500 – Projeto IntellWheels
Luis Reis/António Moreira/Marcelo Prety/Brigida Faria /Sergio Vasconcelos

Menção Honrosa 2 – Valor € 1.500 - Projeto Living Home Center
Carlos Pires/Fernando Pinto /Victor Teixeira (Microsoft)

Click on image but for the full effect turn on webcam & sound

The video powered by YDreams’ technology:

Ynvisible (YDreams’ first spinout company) in collaboration with Enfucell and IDTechEx, produced close to 1600 interactive badges to distribute to participants and attendees at the upcoming Printed Electronics USA 2011 tradeshow.

Ynvisible's Interactive Badge for the Printed Electronics Tradeshow

The badges contain three interactive graphic layers, activated by the push of a button. Each layer, designed specifically for the event, conveys IDTechEx’s marketing messages. Technologically, the interactive badges are a hybrid solution, based on a combination of printed electronics  ̶  Ynvisible’s electrochromics-based interactive graphics and Enfucell’s SoftBattery®  ̶  and traditional electronics, namely the printed circuit boards, buttons and wiring. Designers from Ynvisible and IDTechEx jointly designed the interactive badges, with the final assembly of badges carried out by Ynvisible.

“The combination of established color printing and printed interactive graphics brings new levels of interaction and communication power to everyday items. Consumers who enjoy the interactivity of on-line content and services will now increasingly start to find such features also in printed products”, said Jani-Mikael Kuusisto, Chief Business Development Officer for Ynvisible.

IDTechEx Printed Electronics USA 2011 conference and tradeshow is the biggest event in the world on the topic. This year’s tradeshow will be the largest Printed Electronics exhibition to date, with 105 exhibiting companies already confirmed. The tradeshow is on from November 30th to December 1st, 2011 at the Santa Clara Convention Centre.

The following video gives us a comprehensive overview of printed electronics spin-out Ynvisible and its relationship to parent-company YDreams:

Sport Club Recife, a football team in North-eastern Brazil, recently posted the video below showing the club using YVision’s free Beta version of its software development kit (SDK) to create a Boxfall application featuring 3D Augmented Reality cubes customized with the team’s logo!

Yvision, a YDreams’ spinout, is dedicated to the research and production of software development kits. To find out more about them, or download their SDK, visit their website at http://www.yvision.com.

A few posts ago I mentioned that the YDreams Group was expanding; turns out our family across the Atlantic has also been growing. Both YDreams Brasil affiliates (Rio de Janeiro & São Paulo) have taken on new members over the past months and in part because of it, they’ve decided to implement the Close Encounter (CE) sessions originally launched here at Lisbon HQs a few years back.

Close Encounters are small internal weekly conferences whose format varies; it can be a round table discussion, a talk about a specific topic or an artistic presentation. Speakers may be volunteer YDreamers or invested guests. Nuno Artur Silva (Produções Fícticias), Artur Arsénio (Robotics), Manuel Lima (Data Visualization) or Prof. Rui Aço (Oficina do Desenho), are some of the wonderful speakers we have had the privilege of having at our CEs. Internally we’ve also had folks talk about ‘Interactive Narratives in Cinema’, the ‘Power of Collaborative Tools’, ‘Digital Art’, and ‘Managing Your Personal Finances for the Financially Challenged’, among others. As you can see the idea is as much to discuss themes related to our core business as to inspire and inform!

Brazil’s first Close Encounter is underway in São Paulo as I write. It’s actually been a day and a half affair, and from looking at the program it sounds much like Orientation meets Team-building Seminar! The session includes an inspirational interview from co-founder and CEO. António Câmara, presentations of the company’s more emblematic cases and talks about, amongst others, “how we as a society have moved away from a ‘heavy’ and ’solid’, hardware-focused modernity to a ‘light’ and ‘liquid’, software-based modernity” (from Zygmunt Bauman’s ‘Liquid Modernity’).

Sounds like interesting stuff! Here’s to the first of many CEs in Brazil!

Ynvisible, YDreams first spin-out company, and Inês Henriques, its CEO and Virgina Tech alumna, were recently profiled on the university’s website. To read the article click HERE.

Ynvisible, YDreams’ first spin out, was recently at LOPE-C (Frankurt’s Large-area, Organic & Printed Electronics) Convention from June 28th to the 30th, 2011 to showcase the printed electronics developer’s various prototypes.

Ynvisible’s revolutionary technology was a key factor in convincing Jani-Mikael Kuusisto to come on board as Chief Business Development Officer, a position he previously occupied at VTT Finland. Mr. Kuuisto officially joins Ynvisible on August 1st, 2011.

The video below shows Ynvisible CEO Inês Henriques explaining the prototypes developed thus far:

Parent-company YDreams now counts three spinouts and one joint venture

The YDreams Group is proud to announce that its members are growing in number. A joint-venture with a North American partner brought us Audience Entertainment in December 2008; Ynvisible, dedicated to developing and producing electrochromic displays was officially launched in early 2010, and listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in February 2011.

2011 ushered in two more spinout companies - Yvision, developer and producer of software development kits, and more recently YDRobotics, which will specialize in robotics and mechatronics fields.

More information about each one HERE!

YVision was created by the company division that focuses solely on Natural User Interfaces (NUI) application design and software architecture. The innovative development framework has been efficiently deployed in engaging and robust NUI applications that have been, and are, the motors behind many of YDreams interactive solutions.

Click HERE to experience YVision firsthand on your browser. (Note: webcam needed!)

For more detailed info about YVision, go to: http://www.ydreams.com/yvision/

We also recently demoed the YVision app at are2011. You can check it out at the following video link. Demo starts at 05:06 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsN0tCkAR-Y

O Concurso «Realize o Seu Sonho» é uma iniciativa que apoia a estruturação de ideias e projectos em planos de negócio viáveis. Temos como Júri o Dr. Francisco Pinto Balsemão, Prof. António Câmara (CEO da YDreams), Prof. António Gomes Mota, Dr. Manuel Forjaz, Dr.ª Vera Pires Coelho, Prof. Tomaz Morais, Dr.ª Isabel Jonet, Dr. José Miguel Queimado e Dr. Paulo Taylor.

Candidate já o seu projecto! Inscrições grátis até 15 de Maio em www.sonho.org. Demora só 30 segundos! Prémios até 60.000€. Pode ver aqui o vídeo promocional do Concurso. Os parceiros deste projecto são IBM, Ericsson, Grupo José de Mello, SIC Notícias, Metro Porto, Metro Lisboa, Carris, NYSE Euronext, entre outros.

A Acredita Portugal é uma organização sem fins lucrativos que tem como objectivo estimular o empreendedorismo e apoiar na realização de projectos. Mais informações em www.acreditaportugal.pt ou realizeoseusonho@acreditaportugal.pt.

Tem um projecto ou ideia por implementar?

PARTICIPE NO CONCURSO REALIZE O SEU SONHO!

Pode candidatar até 3 Projectos!

Inscreva-se hoje (em 30 secs) em www.sonho.org!

The winners of the INVENTA – Caixa/INPI Award were announced February 24th at the awards ceremony that took place at Caixa Geral de Depósitos headquarters in Lisbon.

YDreams was shortlisted for the INVENTA.COM – Future and Communications award for their Virtual Sightseeing patent. The overall grand winner for the evening was Coimbra University for their “Nouveaux derives de porphyrine, notamment chlorines et/ou leurs applications en therapie photodynamique” patent.

For a complete list of winners click HERE.

About INPI
INPI, the National Institute for Industrial Property, was constituted in 1976; their mission is to protect and promote Industrial Property on both a national and international level and to serve as a mediator between Portugal and international organizations, where Portugal is a member state.

According to Robert Rice “Augmented Reality is going to be bigger than the web, and it is going to affect nearly every industry and aspect of life”.

Karina Israel is going to explain why in a course she is giving on Augmented Reality at ESPM - Escola Superior de Propaganda e Marketing’s (Superior Institute for Marketing & Advertising) São Paulo Campus in February 2011. Enjoy!

For more details go to: http://www.espm.br/inovacao/curso.asp?cursoID=44

YDreams’ mark can be felt at the 26th edition of São Paulo’s International Auto Show underway from October 27th to November 7th at the Anhembi Exhibition pavilion. Car lovers of all ages who flock to the event are privy to interactive technologies that make exploring the cars on display only half the fun.

The interactive technologies specialist introduced a ‘Superman’ style X-Ray vision app that proved to be a most original way for visitors to the Fiat stand to get to know the ‘insides’ and standout features of the brand new Mio prototype, the first collaborative car in the industry. Right next to the car stands a large-sized plasma that invites people to see what event-goers have to say about the Mio on Twitter. The app picks up all Mio-related tweets and playfully displays them alongside the person’s head in comic-strip style thought balloons.

See video below:

Further along, at the Toyota stand, visitors come across another YDreams’ creative application that was developed to help create public awareness and spread the word about the work the Toyota Foundation has been doing to reforest the Brazilian Atlantic Rain forest, as well as its attempts to help preserve the Blue Macaw. At the stand, people are able to see their moving silhouettes outlined on a video wall depicting tropical settings; in an adjacent video wall, people see their silhouette set against landscapes of the Brazilian Pantanal, where a Blue Macaw soars overhead before disappearing from sight.

Lisbon City Hall is sponsoring a campaign to create awareness and educate primary school students about the meaning and significance of the upcoming holiday on October 5th, date when Portugal will be commemorating the centennial anniversary of the implementation of its first republic. To do so, City Hall called on YDreams to come up with a fun and highly interactive solution, aimed at children between the ages of 8 and 10, to pique their interest about one of Portugal’s most significant marks in history.

YDreams conceived and developed ten Augmented Reality (AR) collectible cards and a dedicated website for exploring the cards’ contents online. The AR-based cards, a total of 8,000 in packs of 10, will be distributed to students throughout Lisbon city schools on October 5th. Each card in the pack features a brief description of key events, symbols or ideals that led to the republic’s implementation, accompanied by illustrations and an AR marker that can be viewed and explored in an entirely unique way by accessing the dedicated website lodged on Lisbon City Hall’s homepage. Using a PC with an Internet connection and a webcam, children hold the Augmented Reality cards up in front of the webcam and watch as the respective marker comes alive on the screen in the form of a 3D model that they may observe from several angles by turning and tilting around.

Children may choose to collectively explore the card’s AR contents at school, or at home. Although the website was designed specifically for Magalhães net books, the 1st PC designed and produced entirely in Portugal, and aimed at predominantly young audiences, it will run on any computer make or model. Anyone interested in learning about the fledging Republic’s earliest moments may digitally browse the cards and 3D images online at http://cartoesdarepublica.cm-lisboa.pt/.

The privacy concerns prompted by the image acquisition for the Google Street View service, has been controversial and some very funny images have been captured. Recently, the Google cars were seen cruising through Portuguese roads. This time the victims were two YDreamers…

YDreams’ headquarters are located close to the beach. A big number of YDreams’ employees take advantage of this and go surfing or body boarding, early in the morning and at lunch time. These two were caught just after a morning session.

YDreams’ employees are big sports fans and practice all kinds of sports: mountain bike, BMX, tennis, skate, kiting, kite-surfing and boarding, paint ball, kart racing, etc. The headquarters are equipped with showers so that afterwards they can head back to work, fresh and smelling good…

YDreams’ Solidarity Movement has been up and running since 2007; the initiative involves raising funds and donations (such as clothing, books, CDs, bikes, computers, DVDs and so forth) from the folks at the company. The donations are then channeled to those who most need them through Solidarity and Charity Institutes in the Lisbon area.

The text below in Portuguese, courtesy of our HR department, explains in greater detail the aim and results of the project. The pics below tell the rest of the story.

“Decorreu mais uma edição, a 3ª consecutiva, do YDreams Solidarity, um projecto iniciado em 2007 pelos Recursos Humanos da YDreams. O grande objectivo deste projecto é anualmente proporcionar a pelo menos uma instituição de solidariedade, a oportunidade a todos os que por lá vivem, uma vida um pouco melhor, um dia repleto de alegria. Assim, é pedido a todos os YDreamers, que tragam roupas, livros, CDs, aparelhagens, bicicletas, computadores, DVDs, etc, no fundo tudo o que já nos foi útil e que hoje podemos e queremos dar ao próximo.

Read the rest of this entry »

Moving to the new building in the FCT campus was a very important milestone for the company’s corporate culture.

Our old offices couldn’t keep pace with the company’s growth, people were sharing desks and the Alcântara’s office (central Lisbon), albeit strategically located, was slowing creating the feeling of a YDreams that was physically divided into backoffice (Production and R&D) and front office (Sales and Marketing). Project Managers where in the middle, almost literally, since they spent more time going back and forth the Tagus bridge than anyone else.

So it was great when all the company came to be reunited on one building. Moreover, it was a building that we designed and conceived to fit our own needs - band studio included.

Nevertheless, after the reunification joy settled for a bit, we realized that with the explosive growth, new people constantly arriving and frantic work rate, we were in danger of losing a bit of the DNA that defined us as a company.

Looking around at all the shiny gray walls that were now surrounding us, some YDreamers realized that they needed some life and provided a great canvas for some funky signage to shake things up. Moreover, why keep the initiative to walls and not devise a series of actions to shake everything up? This is how YShakeIt - Project 363 was born.

Entrance to the Quality Test Room (left) and the Sound Studio (right)

Staff Only Door

The project is really a series of activities aimed at keep corporate culture and foster creativity, involving people from all departments which “lead” each activity. There’s a Project Manager also, of course, someone needs to keep an eye on the budget.

Some of the stuff we’ve been organizing so far:

- Close Encounters Sessions

Close Encounters are small internal weekly conferences we have. The format varies, it can be a round table discussion, a talk about a specific topic or an artistic presentation. Speakers can be YDreamers or external guests. Nuno Artur Silva (Produções Fícticias), Artur Arsénio (Robotics), Manuel Lima (Data Visualization) or Prof. Rui Aço (Oficina do Desenho), are some of the guests we were lucky to have so far. Internally we’ve also had people speaking about Interactive Narratives in Cinema, the Power of Collaborative Tools, Digital Art, Finances for non-financial People, among many others. As you can see the idea is not to discuss work, but to inspire and inform in different ways.

- Cinema Sessions with commentary and discyssion

Kicked off recently, some of the movies included Switching, by Morten Schjødt and Man with a Movie Camera, by Dziga Vertov.

- Friday After Work Caipirão

I think this one is pretty self-explanatory.

- The Other Side of the YDreamer

YDreamers often have hidden talents, this way they can share them with the rest of us. The photography exhibition is a good example.

There are many others kicking off or in production like podcasts or arduino workshops, and maybe Close Encounters will soon have an external format. Keep tuned!