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New Startup to Carry Businesses into the Mixed Reality of Microsoft's HoloLens

Microsoft’s augmented reality device, the HoloLens, has yet to be released, but companies already keen to take advantage of the wearable computer’s unique ability to overlay virtual software environments over the physical world.  One company, called Object Theory, in particular is hoping to help the rest do so ahead of the launch.

hololens medical modeling

Object Theory is new.  In fact, they’re so new that they were just founded less than ten days ago, but the team may have the experience to bring HoloLens applications to life, as the founders consist of Michael Hoffman, a former member of the HoloLens Studios team that worked on NASA’s own HoloLens projects, and Raven Zachary, a former Los Alamos National Lab employee who has also designed iPhone apps for such high profile clients as the ’08 Obama Campaign, Starbucks, Zipcar, Whole Foods Market, and Amazon. Together, the duo will assist businesses design applications for Microsoft’s “mixed-reality” device, with Zachary telling GCN, “Our expertise is applying our understanding of this technology to create real value for organizations, whether that be internally facing or public-facing. This technology is so new that organizations do not yet have these skills in-house.”

And the possible apps that can be developed for such a device are pretty infinite.  On the gaming side, Microsoft already blew a lot of minds with their Minecraft demonstration at E3, but the true potential is exercised in such applications as medical programs for mapping the human anatomy over patients or exploring Martian landscapes from Earth.  While any of these possible use cases might easily have a 3D printable tie-in, Windows 10 will feature a 3D modeling app for creating 3D objects virtually before bringing them into the physical world. Hoffman and Zachary are able to target any of these applications, suggesting they can aid in the development of new user interfaces, surface reconstruction, object persistence, UV mapping, and APIs for Windows 10.

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There are already a few 3D printing-related businesses ready to take advantage of the HoloLens, including Sketchfab and Autodesk.  If the HoloLens is as groundbreaking as Microsoft advertises it to be, then these two may be the ideal consultants for those in the 3D printing industry to get their apps into the mixed reality of Microsoft’s new device. To learn more about Hoffman and Zachary’s startup, check out the interview below: