Augmented Reality (AR) enables us to create holograms and place them in space. Precise placement of holograms around us helps to imagine future objects in context. Therefore, it has tremendous potential to support design processes. This article outlines three ways in which AR is fundamentally changing the ways in which designers work. These mark the beginning of an upcoming revolution in design processes worldwide. 

1 AR enables to see how products will look before manufacturing them

When designing digitally, we often lose our sense of scale. In fact, it is common for designers to be surprised with the way their designs look when brought into life. To minimise risk and leave less room for error, we can visualise our designs with AR in their actual size (and in 3D!). One immediate application of this is in product design, as AR can help view our future products and interact with them virtually. The image above shows how we can take a simple cardboard box and project our package design onto it. The visual experience of your design in full scale can provide an opportunity to experience the design realistically before making a commitment to manufacturing it. As this technology can eliminate the costs of physical prototyping, it can increase the number of iterations in your design process, which will enable you to produce better design results with less effort.

2 AR Supports on-site Design in ArchitectureSo far we talked about the usefulness of AR in product design, but what about other design disciplines? As you will now see, another major application of AR is in architectural design. When architects design new buildings, they need to consider how the building fits within its context (the environment around it). One of the most common ways to do so is to create a 3D rendering of the building using computer tools. While this can help to imagine the future building, there is one major downside for rendering - the environment around the building must be created digitally, in order to produce a realistic result. Therefore, when using renderings we often add generic environments, which only loosely resemble the actual site where our building will be built. By using AR, however, we can project the virtual version of the building onto the actual site, which enables us to experience the design on-site. As a concrete example, the image below shows a simple virtual model of a traditional Japanese house projected onto its site in Okinawa (Japan). Since experiencing the design on-site enables us to get new insights and find ways to improve our design, AR opens new possibilities for architectural designers.

3 AR enables new modes of communication in design teams regardless of expertiseAnother way in which AR is revolutionising design is by opening new modes of communication between designers. By combining AR with another technology for eye tracking, we can now inform designers about the attention and interest of their conversation partners. This practice is called “immersive gaze sharing”. In the image below we have a virtual model for a building from two viewpoints of designers engaging in conversation (David and Tracy). In this case, the designers are wearing AR headsets (Microsoft HoloLens 2). Focusing on the right image which shows what Tracy sees, you can see a red ball at the top right of the image. This ball marks David’s current focus. By looking at this ball, Tracy can know what David is focusing on, in real-time. The opposite is also true - David can also see what Tracy is looking at on his display. As this information can reduce misunderstanding and streamline discussion time, its value for design practitioners is invaluable. This technology also has the potential to bridge knowledge gaps between designers with different expertise, or between designers and their clients. 

Final thoughts

The three applications shown above deliver a clear message - whether we are designing a product or a building (or any other visual object), there is much potential for AR technology in design practice. At the same time, the high costs of AR glasses makes them somewhat inaccessible, at least for the time being. Where does this leave us? In case you are interested in utilizing the technology for your projects, one potential solution is to begin by using AR on your phone or tablet device. While the display is less realistic compared with advanced AR glasses, you can still experience your designs in 3D, and use AR to inform your designs. The gradual adoption of AR as a solution for professionals in various fields is expected to drive prices down in the near future, so there is much to look forward to!