Sports Illustrated announced yesterday that their latest series of issues previewing the upcoming college football season will have covers enhanced through the use of augmented reality technology. Using your phone’s camera and the Life VR app for Android or iOS. you can point your phone at the cover of one of four different Sports Illustrated issues (listed here) and it will come to life with a full video.
What makes this impressive isn’t just that a video loads — that would basically just be the same as a normal QR code — but the fact that the video appears on top of the magazine in 3D space, even as you move the camera around and change angles and perspectives.
Sports Illustrated, TIME, and Life VR have all been contributing to the VR ecosystem for a while and this newest feature for magazines is an interesting evolution of the otherwise static print medium. However, until everyone has glasses or some way of easily seeing these sorts of videos and features they won’t be as widespread. Typically I’m not inclined to pull out my phone to experience a magazine that’s already in my hand.
What do you think of this feature? Do you think this is the future of magazines? Let us know down in the comments below!
