Aliens, NFTs and the Art of Sharing

18 ALIENS & ARtv

18 ALIENS was a light hearted experiment in physical and virtual sharing. We gave away 18 sets of aliens on a first come, first served basis at Beta X in Leicester in March 2022.

Concept, design + production: Graffio Arts. Pixels: Jonathan Feuillet. 3D objects + animation: Jack Ellis. The brains behind the Beta X project: Seed Creativity. Funding: LCB. Beta X project manager: Ady Alexander.

Make it stand out

Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

WHAT IS ARtv?

ARtv is an augmented reality content delivery system. Show video or activate 3D objects whenever you point your mobile device at an ARtv symbol. Each symbol can be unique and each can deliver it’s own content. A symbol could be a picture, a graphic or a logo.

Symbols can be displayed anywhere that you can imagine - on a poster, a wall or even as a tattoo. If you’d like to find out how you could use ARtv for your project, then get in touch.

18 ALIENS AT BETA X

These aliens have no monetary value and are comprised of pixels. Each alien was presented as an augmented reality marker on a series of cards. These cards can be shared with friends, family or random strangers, as you see fit, sharing your ownership of the alien. Anyone that owns a card can download the Graffio AR app and point it at the card to summon their alien from a galaxy far away!

The concept of virtual ownership is becoming more and more a part of our daily lives. When viewing a movie, we used to purchase a physical product, like a DVD. Now, it is more common to pay a gatekeeper to allow us to stream content. In this interaction, we no longer own a physical object and our access to the content may only be for a limited time. Virtual properties in virtual worlds continue to develop in terms of status and real monetary value.

Crypto currencies are on the rise and NFT systems, designed to protect the intellectual property rights of creators are now a part of a frenzied land grab of virtual assets. Meta seeks to control our experience of the Metaverse. As these new frontiers continue to develop should we stand back and ask what we want from virtual worlds? How do we want to interact with each other? What do we value? Is it all about individual or corporate ownership? Remember when we used to share?

THE POSTERS

ALIEN PERSONALITIES

To establish the idea that each alien was an individual and worthy of collection, each alien had a backstory created. These were brief introductions with a name and a biography that was part hard sci-fi and part, a tongue-in-cheek riff on popular culture.

ALIEN BEHAVIOUR

The aliens had individual sounds, breathed and performed different actions when touched. Some would react if you got within a certain distance from them.

AUGMENTED REALITY AND YOU

A new world is opening up and if things play out in the ways that we are told that they will, it will have an enormous impact the ways that we do things. The increased use of augmented reality technology into our every day lives will likely be accelerated by brands like Apple that are investing huge sum of time and money into transforming our relationship with their current technology. We know this stuff is coming and its likely that we’re going to be using it as an addition or substitute for the technology that we current use. The day that augmented reality glasses become adopted as a mainstream device, is the day where mobile phones may start to look the quaint product of a previous generation.

The 3D aliens in this project use technology that is only currently, universally available on Apple devices although large parts of the project also worked on Android devices. We tend to create projects that have mixed functionality, so that they are as inclusive as possible.

If you’re interested in using some form of AR for a project, we can help you work through the kind of options available. Once you understand the basics and the limitations become clear, the fun starts as you consider all the things that you could do. There is incredible potential for new types of engagement, user journeys, brand associations and relationships to physical locations with augmented reality.

Want to do something incredible with AR? Tell us what you want to do!

AUGMENTED REALITY, INSTITUTE INTERNSHIP, GRAFFIO ARTS, GRAFFIO AR APP, RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT, DESIGN, TECHNOLOGY, BETA X, LCB, VIDEO, INTERACTIVE, IDEAS, EVENTS, CULTURE, ARTS & CULTUREGraffio ArtsApril 25, 2022RESEARCH