AR Puppet: Animated Agents in Augmented Reality

AR Puppet is a hierarchical animation framework for Augmented Reality agents, which is a novel research field connecting Augmented Reality (AR), Sentient Computing and Animated Agents to a single coherent human-computer interface paradigm. This framework enables the control of the physical environment and virtual animated agents using the same interface, blurring the boundary between the real and virtual world. Any physical object that can be monitored or controlled by a computer can be incorporated into the framework and used in AR applications. AR Puppet explores the requirements for context-aware animated agents concerning visualization, appearance, behavior, as well as associated technology and application areas. The framework is built on a powerful collaborative AR middleware and it allows for experimentation with a wide range of applications and many different characters – physical and virtual alike.