What is Augmented Reality (AR)?
Augmented Reality (AR), is a real-time or indirect view of a physical, real-world setting whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, graphics or GPS data.(Wikipedia) It is the integration of electronic information with the customer’s environment in real time. On the other hand, virtual reality is the opposite. VR is created in an absolutely artificial environment while augmented reality uses the existing environment as well as overlays new details on top of it.
Thomas Caudell coined the term augmented reality in 1990, to define how the head-mounted displays that electrical contractors utilized when setting up complex wiring harness worked. In 1998, among the initial commercial apps of AR was the yellow “first down” line that started showing up in televised football games. Augmented Reality is currently applied in Google Glass, car and truck windshields. The AR Technology is now currently used in Healthcare, Marketing among other industries as well as in the gaming industry as a new addition.
AR lets you see both synthetic light as well as natural light bouncing off objects in the real world.
What is Mixed Reality (MR)?
Mixed reality (MR), sometimes referred to as hybrid reality, is the merging of real and virtual worlds to produce new environments and visualizations where physical and digital objects co-exist and interact in real time.
Mixed reality allows the individual user see the real world (like AR) while also seeing believable, virtual objects (like Virtual Reality). And then it anchors those virtual objects to a point in real space, making it possible to treat them as “real,” at least from the perspective of the person who can see the MR experience.(Recode)