We recently launched our Digital-out-of-home (DOOH) website. The site highlights our most successful solutions – solutions we have integrated into our projects over the years, and have been paramount to shaping interactivity paradigms.

These solutions, with a special emphasis on Natural User Interfaces and Augmented Reality, include screens, kiosks, billboards, wall, floor and ceiling projections and many others.

For a better look at our solutions, as well as practical applications for each one, visit http://www.ydreams.com/products/

In our continued effort to make sure our interfaces are easy to use and visually appealing, we’ve recently launched these in the Lisbon area. Have a look

A tactile shopping center directory for Forum Sintra (on the outskirts of Lisbon) and tablets for accessing additional info about l’Oreal products at Perfumes & Companhia shops in Portugal.

Forum Sintra Shopping Directory

Consulting info on shopping directory

Tactile Tablet for L'Oreal Products

An amazing Virtual World, fueled by YDreams technology and design, recently opened to the public at Istanbul’s Marmara Forum on December 15, 2011. YDreams conceived and developed an enchanted realm inhabited by friendly eccentric creatures called Marmarians for the Multi Mall Management Group shopping center, whose aim was to offer young guests a space for creative expression while simultaneously connecting with shoppers, and enhancing customer loyalty.

Young guests to the center are invited and encouraged to let their imaginations run wild and “give life” to their own exotic creations. Two touch consoles, located at each end of the video wall, comprised of fifteen 40” monitors, invite shoppers to create and customize creatures that ultimately become a type of virtual pet. Guests use the touch screens to create their new Marmarian from scratch – they decide on the shape of the body, its texture and color as well as the color of its eyes and stripes or spots. The variables available enable guests to create up to 30.000 distinct creatures, so the risk that any two will be identical is minimal! After determining what their new Marmarian looks like, guests name it and release it into the brand new Virtual World!

Creating their new pet creature is only half the fun; to make sure they grow into happy, healthy Marmarians, they need to be fed and visited, a task that can only be accomplished by checking in at the touch consoles at Marmara Forum. The more you visit your virtual pet, the bigger and happier it grows, and the more you are able to further customize it by adding new features.

In addition, a dedicated website (http://www.virtualworldmf.com/front/web/index.php) is also available so that guests can regularly check up on their Marmarian from home to see how it’s doing. Furthermore, a point system which gives way to discounts at selected Marmara Forum stores and restaurants has been implemented, so by checking in at the center to feed and visit their pets, guests are also increasing their eligibility to win great discounts.

Bruce Sterling mentioned our virtual aquarium project “Fixelêndia”, for Forum Sintra on the outskirts of Lisbon, on his ‘Beyond the Beyond’ blog via Wired.com

http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2011/12/augmented-reality-ydreams-fixelandia/

The video powered by YDreams’ technology:

Audience Entertainment (AE) ̶  co-owned by YDreams  ̶  and NCM Media Networks are bringing audiences’ favorite brands to life on the big screen in select movie theaters across the U.S. this holiday season.

AE and NCM Media Networks worked together with a top travel industry brand to create a new interactive cinema audience game. The game, powered by a proprietary platform that enhances human-computer interactions and create engaging and robust applications, will be used for the first time in a national cinema ad campaign across the United States.

In the game, moviegoers are able to join a classic cartoon character in a 90-second interactive, big screen version of a wild water ride from the comfort of their movie theater seats. By moving their arms and acting together as a group, the audience creates a virtual “human joystick” to control the videogame action onscreen – zipping down the slide and retrieving objects along the way. The score will be posted at the end of the game, but no matter what the tally, the audience always wins by being among the first in the U.S. to experience the future of cinema advertising.

The new AudienceGame is being presented exclusively during NCM’s FirstLook pre-feature program in select movie theaters in major markets including Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Knoxville, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Washing-ton, DC.

This exciting new campaign features Audience Entertainment Group’s first-ever use of the combi-nation of live video and animated overlays in an AudienceGame.

To view the game, CLICK HERE.

Ynvisible, YDreams’ first spin-out company, has successfully set up the first production site for the assembly of its interactive displays and their integration into final products, enabling the company to take on its first higher-volume commercial projects. This first production capacity is the result of a partnership between Ynvisible and Guide, a printing house with over four decades of experience specialized in graphic design and printing services for the publishing industry.

The partnership between the two companies brings together Ynvisible’s technological know-how and Guide’s experience in industrial printing. In addition to the installation and optimization of the production process, Guide will also be involved in the production efforts to deliver Ynvisible’s commercial projects.

After a successful series of tests, Ynvisible is currently producing batches of final products for its first commercial projects. First products will be delivered in the coming weeks to international clients. The installed capacity allows Ynvisible to produce up to tens of thousands of units of a final product per month, using in large part conventional printing processes.

According to Jani-Mikael Kuusisto, Ynvisible’s Chief Business Development Officer, “the set up of Ynvisible’s first production line is a major achievement that will allow the company to start delivering commercial projects and test different market applications. In addition, it is also a critical infrastructure for developing and testing future generations of Ynvisible’s technologies and products”.

Nuno Penedo, Guide’s CEO, added that “Ynvisible’s technology brings new life to traditional printed/graphic products. The combination of electronic elements and paper products provides new opportunities for an ancient substrate – paper – and offers an energy boost to the graphic arts and printing industries.”

The partners are looking to expand their forms of collaboration, as Ynvisible introduces its technologies and interactive solutions to further production locations and geographical markets.

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:

Following Portugal and Switzerland, the Sensorium (a sensorial experience initially developed by YDreams for L’Oreal Portugal’s Luxury division, and launched in November 2010) roll-out continues. Another interactive gondola was just installed in Stockholm at Åhlens, Sweden’s largest department store!

Forum Sintra, located on the outskirts of Lisbon, is the 12th and most recent Multimall Management shopping center in Portugal. The center, which opened its doors to the public in April 2011, wanted to offer shoppers an innovative attraction that would appeal especially to younger audiences, and help foster enjoyable memories and positive connections between guests and the center.

After brainstorming with client Multimall, creative technologies specialist YDreams proposed a giant-sized interactive virtual aquarium they dubbed Fixelândia, for the enjoyment of the center’s guests. (Note: the name is a play on words because in Portuguese fixe means cool, but also sounds like the word ‘fish’)

The experience, unique to Forum Sintra, gives guests the chance to create and thoroughly customize their own virtual pet fish. Two touch consoles, located at each end of the giant virtual aquarium, comprised of fifteen 40” monitors, invite shoppers to customize their pets. Guests use the touch screens to create their new friend from scratch – they decide on the shape of the body and fins, as well as the color of its eyes and stripes. The variables available enable guests to create up to 30.000 distinct fish, so the risk that any two fish will be identical is minimal! After determining what their new pet will look like, guests get to name it and release it into Fixelândia!

Creating their new pet fish is only half the fun; to make sure they grow into happy, healthy Guppies, the fish need to be fed and visited, a task that can only be accomplished by checking in at the touch consoles at Forum Sintra. The more you visit your virtual pet fish, the bigger and happier it grows, and the more you are able to further customize it by adding new features. In addition, a dedicated website (http://www.fixelandia.net) is also available so that guests can regularly check up on their pet fish from home to see how it’s doing.

The 2014 FIFA World Cup is just around the corner and Rio de Janeiro’s Maracanã Stadium is set to host the final game.

While work to renovate and upgrade the stadium is in full force, fans can check out YDreams’ Augmented Reality app, developed in collaboration with Sirius for Odebrect Construction, to get a better look at the 3D model of the new & improved stadium.

Positivo Informática’s Educational Alphabet Table, powered by YDreams’ Augmented Reality technology, was distinguished with a Gold award by IDEA/Brasil - the Brazilian edition of the renowned North American International Design Excellence Award (IDEA).

YDreams conceived and developed the Augmented Reality software that powers Positivo Informática’s award-winning Educational Alphabet Table. Positivo Informática, one of Brazil’s largest computer and educational technology manufacturers commissioned Estúdio Flexiv de Design to redesign the table for improved usability. The newly refurbished table was distinguished this past August, in São Paulo, with a Gold award in the Informatics category by IDEA/Brasil, an organization endorsed by the Industrial Designers Society of America.

The table was distinguished by the society for ideally combining design, ergonomics and technological interactivity. The Educational Alphabet Table is a ground-breaking tool for the education and literacy of children, youths, adults and students with special needs. Animations, videos, sound resources and augmented reality technology, allow for interaction with objects in the virtual world, creating an interactive and stimulating atmosphere for students.

The Educational Alphabet Table was also hailed as being environmentally friendly, inclusive, safe and sturdy. Its bright colors and attractive shapes are especially appealing to children. The combination of technology and design have rendered an educational table that serves as a teaching and learning aid that greatly facilitates digital inclusion.

Rock in Rio, one of the largest music festivals in the world, is going strong in its namesake city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The festival kicked off on September 23rd and is underway till October 2nd. Also going strong and determined not to miss the music festival is YDreams Brasil, which is bringing its own brand of interactivity to the festival with two very different stands!

The first immerses visitors in an underwater voyage aboard the Nautilus of Rock – a stand-come submarine, where visitors can, among other things, create and customize their very own virtual rocker-fish, which immediately come into being in the sub’s virtual aquarium. The latter stand developed for the state government of Rio de Janeiro, and of a very different nature, keeps the adrenaline pumping by giving folks a chance to take a virtual flight over the breath-taking sights Rio de Janeiro state has to offer.

Both are without a doubt two excellent ways to make sure there is never a dull moment at Rock in Rio 2011.

The Nautilus of Rock

Virtual Hand-gliding over Rio de Janeiro State

CTT (Correios de Portugal), the Portuguese postal service, commissioned YDreams to develop several interactive solutions to boost customer involvement and autonomy at its new HQ flagship store in Parque das Nações in Lisbon.

The flagship store, inaugurated September 12th, 2011 at its new Lisbon headquarters in Parque das Nações, features YDreams’ interactive solutions, developed and designed to offer appealing interactive platforms that promote and advertise CTT’s products and services, and foster customer involvement and promote autonomy. Guests to the new store are now able to use the latest technologies to purchase products (i.e. stamps, envelops and books) issue money transfers, customize their own postage stamps and browse CTT’s extensive financial products portfolio.

YDreams’ solutions include six large touch screens dispersed throughout the store that double as digital signage informing customers of the various product lines (postal services, telecommunications, etc.) available at the store. A sophisticated back office platform uploads dynamic content onto the tactile touch screens, which display in addition to product information and promo campaigns, recreational yet practical options such as taking one’s picture in loco and using it to create customized postal stamps, or using Augmented Reality technology to visualize envelopes and boxes in their actual size and shape.

Elsewhere in the store customers can interact with a Multi-touch table to explore CTT’s financial products such as international money transfers and certificates of deposit in greater detail. Furthermore, using the potential of multi-touch technology, users can simulate long-term savings investments and view a variety of financial product sheets that they can be forwarded to their email accounts.

Finally to round off the CTT high-tech flagship store experience, YDreams has also created a series of interactive projections featuring randomly generated contents, which are projected onto the store window display, further contributing towards drawing the attention of passersby, promoting the new venue as well as its campaigns and services.

All YDreams’ interactive apps were designed and selected to harmoniously blend into the architectural project for the venue, which was conceived by S3 Arquitectos, a Lisbon based-firm.

YVision, YDreams’ Natural User Interfaces (NUI) division, has just announced that its Beta version now supports development on Mac OS X.

For more info and to give it a try, go to: http://www.yvision.com/2011/09/15/yvision-development-now-also-supported-on-mac-os-x/

Positivo Informática, the largest computer and educational technology manufacturer in Brazil commissioned YDreams to develop an Augmented Reality (AR) - educational table they named Alphabet. The educational solution debuted at the 55th Congess for São Paulo Municipalities, this past April, at the Centro de Convenções Costa da Mata Atlântica in São Paulo state.

The table, which has been endorsed by the Brazilian Ministry of Education, combines colorful animations, video and sound to create an interactive environment. The table features a webcam, 32 inch LCD screen and AR markers that represent the characters in the story. The 2D markers are captured by the camera and transformed into real-time 3D images, which can be treated as “virtual marionettes” on the LCD screen.

Carla Flores, Positiva Informatica’s Product Manager explained that the company chose to go with a ‘virtual theater’ theme so that the product could progress and grow from there. Basically the ‘made for the classroom’ Alphabet Table starts by telling the students a story. The students, aided by teachers, then select a character and re-enact what they’ve heard. The camera transforms the markers into on-screen 3D characters, which the students interact with by playing out what they’ve listened to or read. At a more advanced stage, the students may also use Alphabet to create a story of their own, which they can record and edit resulting in a short animated film.

The educational game, which can be played by six students at a time, is ideal for promoting collaboration, exchanging knowledge, and teaching children and students with special needs their “ABC’s”.

Starting at minute 1:00, the video below shows the Alphabet Table in action:

This past June, Ynvisible and Enfucell, a leading Eurpean Cleantech company, collaborated on an integrated prototype for the 2011 edition of LOPE-C in Frankfurt. Both companies are now looking to extend this partnership in order to pursue integrated commercial applications and joint development projects. Potential joint products include magazine covers and greeting cards.

Furthermore, the YDreams spinout has a new edition to its team: industry veteran Jani-Mikael Kuusisto, previously Business Development Manager for Printed Intelligence at VTT, the largest applied research organization in Northern Europe, joins Ynvisible as its Chief Business Development Officer.

Today, YDreams’ Natural User Interfaces (NUI) division is officially releasing the free Beta version of its YVision software development kit (SDK), via its dedicated website at http://www.yvision.com.

YVision is the result of ten years of research and development in human-computer interaction. Created by the company division that focuses solely on NUI design and software architecture, this framework is behind many of YDreams’ interactive solutions and has been deployed in thousands of engaging and robust NUI applications.

According to Ivan Franco, YDreams’ Director of R&D, “Our framework is the missing link between traditional Game Engines and Natural User Interfaces. It promotes creativity and expressivity, by offloading the complex interoperability of the multiple technologies, which are indispensable to deliver state-of-the-art interactive products.”

YVision is a component-based framework that allows programmers to develop complex systems based on pre-built modules, which are operated by behavior trees. The .NET – based framework assures faster development, removes the need for complex resource handling and offers users multi-platform deployment for desktops, mobiles and consoles.

The SDK features a full abstraction layer for real-time 3D rendering and was also designed to support the upcoming Microsoft Silverlight 5, enabling users to build the next full 3D experience for the web browser. In addition, YVision offers state-of-the-art physics and computer vision. The creation of NUI applications also depends heavily on sensor acquisition and processing, so YVision is ready to process complex sensor data and manage several kinds of input devices.

“The current beta release is for PCs only. Because we want to offer the best possible experience, extensive testing is being carried out for the Mac and Silverlight platforms, and mobile platforms will soon follow”, explains Mr. Franco,“Stay tuned, because we intend to follow the ‘release often’ motto”.

The SDK, along with detailed information and instructions, is available for download via the following URL: http://www.yvision.com. We hope you will enjoy it and look forward to hearing your feedback!

In the video below, Audience Entertainment, co-owned and fueled by YDreams’ technology, brings interactive fun to a nightclub event in China. Simple hand gestures enable the crowd to control and maneuver the car in a Redbull-themed virtual race: