Our most recent project has taken us to the Middle Eastern nation of Qatar where YDreams partnered with SDI, an innovative Canadian marketing agency to put together an interactive and itinerant roadshow dubbed Koora Time. The roadshow, aimed primarily at engaging youths, kicked off on May 10, 2013 during the quarter finals of the Emir Cup.

The Koora Time Roadshow (Koora means football in Arabic) was commissioned by the Qatar Football Association and sponsored by Shell. Following the Cup, it will be activated some 20 times, throughout the country, over the next two years. The roadshow aims to promote football and physical exercise amongst Qatari youths by engaging them through football related interactive games.

The roadshow’s multiple interactive experiences challenge participants to get plenty of exercise. The applications all revolve around YDreams’ technologies complemented by Kinect consoles. A total of seven challenges, which mimic different phases of the game of football and are all interconnected, make up the Koora roadshow. The activities range from “the Locker Room” where visitors first register to participate via a QR coded bracelet, and the “Sprint”, a game where participants are pitted against two virtual opponents to see who sprints the fastest from one end of the pitch to the other, to “the Goalie”, a goalkeeping game where participants see how many balls they can block in one minute, amongst others. At the end, after an intense workout & good fun, players also get to see how many calories they have actually burned.

The Koora Time Roadshow follows other projects YDreams’ has developed for the gulf-based Canadian marketing agency. The partnership between the two companies plans to deliver future exciting projects that foster innovative marketing campaigns through the mix of YDreams’ interactive technologies and design.

The recently-inaugurated Boulevard Londrina Shopping, a mall managed by Sonae Sierra Brasil located in the southeastern Brazilian city of Londrina, now hosts the country’s first Virtual Aquarium developed by YDreams. The aquarium, conceived to entertain guests to the center and increase customer loyalty, is also present, with the same objective, at shopping centers in Portugal, Turkey and Germany.

Link 237, developed by YDreams in collaboration with Bradesco, is usually hard at work at the Bradesco Next agency of the future at Iguatemi Shopping center in Saõ Paulo, Brazil. But last week it stepped out for a visit to INFO magazine’s newsroom in that city. At Bradesco Next, Link 237 is controlled through a series of micro-localisation antennas but during its foray out into the world, the bot was controlled by a tablet with access to wireless Internet.

YDreams’ Visitors’ Center for Santander features in AICEP’s (Portugal’s Trade & Investment Agency) new promo video! YDreams comes in at 3:05m

Intel worked closely with YDreams to develop an innovative solution that bridges the gap between online and in-store shopping.

For more info, click on link to read solution brief: Intel_Retail_YDreams

This year YDreams partnered up with Intel once again to make an appearance at the annual Lego World event at the Bella Center, Scandinavia’s largest exhibition and conference center, located in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Last year, YDreams’ stint with its Lego-theme based Virtual Aquarium at Intel’s Lego World booth was a hit, so Intel and Lego invited us back for a repeat performance. This year, in addition to the eye-catching aquarium, YDreams also displayed its Boxfall application, where guests are able to interact with virtual Lego building blocks that fall from the top of a screen.

The Lego-adapted Virtual Aquarium on the other hand, invited guests to create and thoroughly customize virtual pet fish based on Lego building bricks. They decided on the shape and color of the Lego brick that will determine the fish’s body and fins, as well as the color of its eyes and stripes. The variables available enabled guests to create a multitude of distinct fish, so the risk that any two fish were identical was minimal! Once guests finished creating their Lego fish, they released it into the Virtual Aquarium, sat back and watched as their new friend explored its new environment.

YDreams’ Virtual Aquariums can now be visited at several shopping centers around the world. The first were developed and deployed for Forum Sintra (Portugal) and Marmara Forum (Turkey) and two more were recently launched at mfi group shopping centers in Leipzig and Munich, Germany.

Naves do Conhecimento (Knowledge Vessels) is an ambitious project that has spread across several Rio de Janeiro neighborhoods. The project, headed by Rio de Janeiro Municipality, and coordinated by the city’s Special Secretary for Science and Technology and managed by IDACO, Rio’s Institute for the Development of Community Activities, aims to provide citizens with free access to recreational activities based on education and front-line technology.

There are currently five Naves do Conhecimento up and running but during the inauguration of the most recent center, Eduardo Paes, Rio’s Mayor, stated that the city aims to open another 40 Naves in the city’s northern and western neighborhoods by 2016. YDreams, whose technology powers all the Naves do Conhecimento, is extremely proud to be a part of this incredible project.

Below, a video that captures the spirit well:

YDreams’ virtual aquarium for the Intel booth @ Lego World 2012 (that took place earlier this year in Copenhagen) was distinguished with a Gold award in the AdverGame category @ the El Ojo de Iberoamérica 2012 XV International Festival, one of the most reputed advertising festivals in Latin América!

Below link to the entry, complete with project details and photos:

http://alejohnny.me/el-ojo/acuario_lego.html 

Check out the Lego Virtual Aquarium on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRVqsGCRJm4

Conceived in collaboration with Bradesco Bank, and designed by YDreams, the premise for the bank was entirely based on interactivity and technology, and how these elements would facilitate daily client-bank relations and optimize time.

The space has been opening to the public at Shopping Iguatemi JK in São Paulo, Brazil since late August 2012. Below some pics of visitors and clients exploring the space:

Sharing secrets with ‘Link 237′

The ‘Hand-on’ Counter

Multi-app tactile table

Karina Israel, YDreams Executive Director, recently gave an excellent presentation on “Human Computer Interaction” at Intercon 2012 in São Paulo, Brasil. The presentation, in Portuguese, gives numerous examples of YDreams’ projects such as Espaço Bradesco Next. YScope, Virtual Aquarium Fixelandia, and the Los Fearless experience at the Nike Vault shop at the L.A. Staples center, among others, which exemplify well how people interact with computers today!

To see complete video presentation, CLICK HERE!

Below the video:

Natural-user interaction specialist YDreams got together with Lisbon City Hall and Lisbon’s Tourism Association and several other technological partners to create the Lisboa Story Center. The interactive technology–based exhibition, inaugurated today, opens to the general public September 12, 2012 and will retell the history of the city by allying technology with historical facts and anecdotes.

Located in the heart of the recently refurbished Terreiro do Paço (Palace Square), the Lisboa Story Center covers two-thousand square meters; YDreams technology and design decks the halls of one of the center’s rooms treating visitors to an hour-long journey through the history of the city (starting with the city’s founding up until the April 25^th, 1974 revolution).

According to Filipe Vasconcellos, YDreams’ Global Managing Director, “the objective of the project was to create a form of interaction with visitors to the city but also a special connection with native Lisboners. Using YDreams’ cutting edge technologies was a singular way to show guests the changes the ancient city has experienced across the centuries, making the city into what it is today.”

The interactive technologies enable visitors to experience, for example amongst others, the scents of the spice trade that fueled the Portuguese maritime expansion, a model of pre-Pombaline Lisbon offering a unique look into what the city was like before the destructive 1755 earthquake, but above all a better understanding and contextualization of the city heritage on display.

Bruce Sterling mentions “Bradesco Next” in his beyond the beyond blog on the WIRED website!

To read post click HERE.

At first glance you’d half expect the Jetsons’ to jump out from behind a hi-res plasma and welcome you to the future! But no, the future is now and you’ve just stepped into Bradesco Next, the ultimate bank of the future, located at JK Iguatemi shopping center in São Paulo Brazil.

Multi-app walls and Bradesco services for mobile devices

Conceived and designed by YDreams, the concept for the bank was entirely based on interactivity and technology, and how these elements would facilitate daily client-bank relations and optimize time. In tune with Bradesco’s needs, YDreams’ goal was to create an environment where technology would adapt to the needs of clients instead of the other way around. This led to the creation of Bradesco Next, the first project of its kind in the world, which promises to surpass everyone’s expectations due to its advanced technology, elegant design and truly innovative concept reaffirming the financial institution’s vocation as one of Brazil’s most innovative and visionary banks.

The Jetsons’ pet canine Astro may not be on hand, but the amicable Link 237, a charismatic robot that freely roams Bradesco Next, is. Link 237 greets clients with a smile and invites them to explore the space. Once inside, multi-app walls boast maximum display resolution and impressive 4x full HD screens accommodate a wide range of client needs and requests.

Link-237

Since the concept that guides Next is centered on simplicity and clarity, planning the future is possible and easy. Based on each client’s profile the Life Cycle service displays each person’s personal interests, financial situation and consumption patterns. The application may predict for example, the ideal time to purchase a home, or set up a personal pension plan. This information may then be forwarded to the client’s email or discussed in further detail with a bank officer.

Another milestone in innovation includes the bank’s new ATM machines, which will impress clients with features that range from their unique positioning, user-interface, tactile interaction and contactless devices. Transaction receipts are sent by email, and with the large numbers of international visitors expected for the major upcoming sporting events in Brazil, all transactions will be displayed in Portuguese, English or Spanish.

Multi-app walls, Link and ATMs

Other services of note include the One to One Customer Service Room, where the partition glass automatically frosts over to ensure maximum privacy as the client confers with a digital consultant. In addition to the digital consultant, the client also has access to pertinent financial information, and may request a videoconference with an investment specialist in real-time.

Also guaranteed to ‘wow’ clients is the Biometrics Corner. Biometrics were actually adapted by Bradesco back in 2006, and have since accrued ten million registered users. The app developed for Bradesco Next features an attractive tactile interface that allows clients to access information quickly and easily.

The Biometrics Corner

In the end however, if the visitor feels like they’ve had a bit of a high-tech overload, they are welcome to sit back and relax by the Mesa Lounge, a touchscreen display-come table where clients can order a bottle of mineral water, read the latest magazines or find out about the latest cultural events in town.

‘Mesa Lounge’ with cardless ATMs in the background

“Senna Emotion” – YDreams’ interactive exhibition about Brazilian race car driver Aryton Senna, in collaboration with Instituto Aryton Senna, is in the last leg of its ‘Brazilian tour’.

The exhibition, which delighted hundreds of thousands of fans and admirers, kicked off in São Paulo’s Estação República Metro station on May 1st, put in an appearance at Rio de Janeiro’s Museu Histórico Nacional (Natural History Museum) and is now in its final leg of the race at Curitiba’s Cultural Sistema Fiep until August 31st.

Plans to take the exhibition to other Brazilian cities and even abroad are a strong possibility! Below some shots of the exhibition in Curitiba.

Today, YDreams and Hospital de Santa Maria – Centro Hospitalar Lisboa Norte (Santa Maria Hospital – North Lisbon’s Hospital Center) present YScope – a gesture-based tool for sterile browsing of medical imaging. Watch the video below for a demonstration:

 
More detailed info about YScope: 

Surgeons are often faced with strict restrictions in the operating room when it comes to manipulating medical imaging because their hands need to be as sterile as possible. Up until now, to access and manipulate exams, doctors had to use a mouse or keyboard, which required they go through the sterilization process once more, or instruct third parties in manipulating the medical imaging for them.

As a pioneer in the area of Natural User Interfaces, YDreams joined forces with Lisbon’s Hospital de Santa Maria’s Department of Neurosurgery to develop a system capable of solving the problem of medical imaging manipulation in the operating room’s aseptic environment.

YScope is designed to fluidly integrate the use of doctor-computer devices in the operating room. The application was developed in response to the need surgeons have to manipulate medical imaging without having to touch any devices thereby allowing their hands to remain sterile, maintain a greater focus of attention and have greater response times.

Using a set of gestures designed to correspond to ergonomic conditioning, the surgeon can execute all the necessary steps required to view and manipulate medical imaging during a surgery.

Previous experimental applications with a similar objective focused exclusively on manipulating pre-selected medical imaging; YScope goes one step further by efficiently integrating with the hospital’s IT infrastructure, allowing the surgeon to search its PAC (Picture Archiving and Communication System) server and upload the desired exams.

Natural gestures enable the surgeon to upload new exams and select subsets at any time during the surgery. Selected images may be manipulated by zooming in and out, rotating them, taking measurements, adjusting the brightness and contrast, amongst other functionalities.

YScope is the result of a commercial and scientific partnership between the hospital and YDreams. Operational testing in one of the Neurosurgery block’s operating rooms at the hospital will begin shortly after the official presentation on July 27^th. Plans to extend the technology to other operating rooms and specialties are being analyzed.

The Bohemia Brewery Experience opened officially to the public in June 2012. The project is a milestone for YDreams both in Brazil and around the world, featuring the company’s creative technologies as the driving force behind an innovative project – the first of its kind in Latin America – that offers visitors a unique voyage into the art, culture and history of beer brewing at the recently refurbished brewery.

Below a look inside the center!

Rio de Janeiro’s 1st Nave do Conhecimento (Knowledge Vessel), commissioned by the city municipality opened its doors to the public this past Friday, June 1^st. Powered by numerous interactive YDreams technologies such as multi-touch tables, touch kiosks and gesture-based projections, the vessel is located in Rio’s Santa Cruz neighborhood (the city’s west end). Its goal is to offer the local population easier access to culture and information technologies via free internet, free workshops and courses in information technology.

Intel Brazil also participated in the project by developing a course catered to the needs of Nave do Conhecimento’s future users. Dubbed Programa Intel Aprender (Intel Learn Program), the program was designed to teach and foster the basic concepts and building blocks behind entrepreneurism, thereby demonstrating how technology can be used to turn an idea into reality in the world of business.

In addition to the Santa Cruz Nave do Conhecimento, four new “Knowledge Vessels” are being built throughout Rio de Janeiro. When completed all will be part of a knowledge network overseen by Praça do Conhecimento (Plaza of Knowledge), a 1000 sq meter “mother ship” that should be up and running by the end of this year.

To watch brief news video in Portuguese (GloboTV) click on the following link: http://globotv.globo.com/rede-globo/rjtv-1a-edicao/v/nave-do-conhecimento-tim-lopes-vai-ser-inaugurada-nessa-sexta-feira-1/1973769/