Before you delve into the world of Wonders, we would like to share a brief introduction with you to help you to focus on your work, rather than trying to figure out what is actually going on with this location-based augmented thing.
Wonders Studio is the design tool that helps you to compose your exhibition and publish anywhere on Earth. You can import your masterpiece to Wonders Studio and use it in your exhibition to let people experience it in an augmented reality interface. So, here are some points we would like to discuss:
Artworks
The first time you open Wonders Studio, you will see a card with a plus icon in the middle, named 'Add Artwork'. Start importing your work by tapping on that button. Then you can choose what type of work you want to import. After you add an artwork, you can import more by tapping the button with the plus icon under the artwork cards. Your artworks can be removed from Wonders Studio any time, however, this will also end all of your exhibitions containing that artwork.
Importing Artworks
In the current version of Wonders Studio (v0.4.7), you can use 'obj' models by first uploading them to Google's platform Poly. Then, you can import your model to Wonders Studio by using its identifier. Make sure to set your artwork's visibility to 'Unlisted' if you don't want it to be publicly listed on Poly. You will still be able to use it in Wonders Studio.
You can also import your 2D art directly in Wonders Studio from your camera roll.
Exhibitions
You can navigate to the 'Exhibitions' tab by using the button at the top right corner of the 'Artworks' tab. You can share any of your exhibitions on social media with the share button below the exhibition.
Also, currently, ending your exhibition permanently removes it. An option to temporarily hide the exhibition will be available soon.
Editing the Scene
There are a couple of sweet gestures to help you design your scene. You first begin by tapping on a surface around you to snap your artwork onto. Then panning with one finger allows you to move your artwork around. Two finger rotate gesture will rotate the artwork around its vertical axis, and pinch gesture allows you to resize your work. Last but not least, two finger pan upwards on the screen will lift your artwork, and two finger pan downwards lowers it until snapping back to the surface it is on.
At any point of time while you design your scene, tapping on a surface will re-snap the artwork on that surface.
At the top right corner of the screen, there are the environmental condition indicators that show the scanning and GPS quality of the current session. You can tap on the indicators to show/hide a detailed information. To exhibit your artwork, we advise you to choose a location where you have both high-quality GPS signal and an environment suitable for efficient scanning. So, for now, try to stay away from locations with poor GPS coverage, and environments having mirrors and shiny surfaces.
Finally, the blue checkmark at the bottom right corner of the screen allows you to save and publish your exhibition after you finish designing your scene. If you make changes on your exhibition after saving, you can update it by tapping on the blue checkmark again.
More About Scanning
While artworks on Wonders are being experienced, a method called 'relocalization' is used after the user's global location is found. Relocalization is basically the process of making sense of the relation between two scanned environments, the one while the artwork is placed and the one when it is being experienced. So, the artwork can reappear at the same location around the world, with an accuracy in the order of centimeters.
Better environmental scanning while designing an exhibition usually results in better relocalization when the exhibition is being experienced. For this reason, we suggest you scan, simply move around and record, your environment while you edit your scene, preferably at least in the size of 4x4 meters. Yellow points on the screen are going to visualize the scanned surfaces around you.
Also, paying attention to not to include moving entities, like people, animals, vehicles etc., to the scanning would be a good practice to obtain a high-quality environmental scanning; hence, resulting in a more stable and immersive experience.
To Infinity and Beyond
We have so many things to do in near future. Supporting spatial audio and more 3D file types with animations are few items in our priority list. We would like you to start experimenting and discover new tools and methods to make the world of Wonders more immersive, and help us design a platform that meets the expectations of digital artists.
Head to our download page to request a Creator Access to the open pre-alpha, if you haven't already.