RealityKit drives AR development for iOS devices. Augmented Reality is an engaging technology that delights users and delivers unforgettable experiences. As a result, more businesses are trying to develop Augmented Reality apps.
If your business wants to develop AR experiences for the iPhone, the RealityKit framework is something that it should familiarize itself with. This post will explain everything that your business needs to know about RealityKit.
RealityKit: Delivering Augmented Reality Features to iPhone Apps
Apple developed RealityKit specifically for Augmented Reality to enable organizations to create an unforgettable AR experience for their users.
If your business is interested in overlaying virtual objects on real-world objects, RealityKit is the most effective tool for capturing the appearance and behavior characteristics of skeletal animations and other entities rendered as AR objects.
RealityKit is a native Swift API. What does this mean for organizations and developers interested in building AR applications? Since RealityKit is a native Swift API, iOS developers can begin creating AR features using Swift.
Your iOS developers already know the native iOS programming language. Now they can apply that knowledge to creating AR apps. Thanks to RealityKit, fewer barriers are in the way of your business fully utilizing Augmented Reality.
To fully understand RealityKit’s impact on the AR experience, it is necessary to review the framework’s technical capabilities.
Object Capture
Organizations using the Object Capture API for RealityKit can turn photos from their iPhone or iPad into a photo-realistic virtual object. Object Capture utilizes photogrammetry to power photo-realistic rendering.
Your business can transform a photo into a 3D model in minutes using this powerful API for RealityKit. The virtual content rendered can be quickly integrated into Xcode development projects or viewed in AR Quick Look.
With Object Capture, your business can quickly create Augmented Reality experiences that delight users and provide unparalleled detail.
Realistic Shading, Occlusion, and Physics
RealityKit is capable of producing AR content that is nearly indistinguishable from reality. The small details are extremely important to produce an immersive AR scene that closely mimics reality.
Tiny details like reflections, shadows, motion blur, rigid body physics, etc., all contribute to immersive AR experiences. RealityKit uses information from edge detection features and the LiDAR Scanner to produce content that interacts with the physical world as expected.
For example, your business can place objects behind or under other objects, around corners, etc., and only the part of the virtual object you expect to see will be rendered. In addition, RealityKit allows development teams to create custom render targets and materials.
The end result is AR experiences that can be fine-tuned by developers and designers.
Video Texturing
RealityKit enables developers to add video texture or content to any part of their AR scene. You can use this powerful AR framework to bring images, objects, and surfaces to life with rich video animations.
For example, you can utilize video texturing features to make an object move, a character express emotion through facial expressions, or turn a surface into a virtual screen that can play video content.
With the power of video texturing, your organization can create AR experiences that drive value for its brand and delight users of all ages.
Scalable Performance
RealityKit takes full advantage of Metal’s latest features, CPU caches, and multiple cores to deliver a stunning, scalable AR experience. RealityKit auto-scales AR performance to match the underlying hardware.
As a result, your organization only has to build one AR experience. There is a large ecosystem of Apple products, from iPads to iPhones. Since people hold onto their devices for long periods of time, your organization has to account for several generations of iOS devices when developing an app.
RealityKit ensures that you don’t have to build a specific AR feature for each device. Instead, build one Augmented Reality experience, and RealityKit will automatically scale its performance based on the iOS device being used.
Easily Build Shared AR Experiences
Prior to RealityKit, building shared AR experiences with ARKit was time-consuming and difficult. RealityKit handles the more difficult networking tasks like maintaining a consistent state, optimizing traffic, performing ownership transfers, and handling packet loss.
As a result, iOS developers don’t have to spend time writing laborious code. Instead, developers can focus on building immersive AR experiences that delight users and add value to the brand.
Is Reality Composer Part of RealityKit?
Reality Composer is an app that developers can use to build AR scenes and experiences. Reality Composer is often lumped together with RealityKit because they were both introduced at WWDC 2019, and they are both used to build AR.
The Reality Composer app is available for macOS and iOS. Developers use Reality Composer to add animations, interactions, and other elements to their AR apps. Reality Composer makes adding additional features to AR easier than ever before.
Typically, developers and designers will use Reality Composer and RealityKit together to simplify the development and design process.
Final Thoughts
RealityKit is a powerful AR builder for Apple products. If your business is interested in Augmented Reality, the RealityKit framework makes it easy to get started. If you want to learn more about RealityKit or AR app development, contact an experienced mobile app development partner like Koombea.
