Project: Potato Boy AR Lens Overview The Tato Boy AR Lens is a whimsical and comedic Augmented Reality experience created for Snapchat. This lens completely transforms the user into a stylish, anthropomorphic potato character, blending absurd humor with seamless facial tracking technology to create a highly engaging and shareable digital persona. Key Features: Full Head Replacement: Utilizes an occluding 3D mesh to seamlessly replace the user's head with a highly textured, oversized potato model. Live Facial Integration: Employs face inset technology to project the user's live mouth onto the 3D potato, allowing for accurate, real-time expression tracking, speech synchronization, and interactive comedic timing. Custom 3D Accessories: Features a vibrant yellow knitted beanie and thick-rimmed, stylized glasses with dark, bulbous lenses that exaggerate the character's quirky aesthetic. Custom Color Grading: Applies a warm, golden-hued filter to the camera feed, enhancing the overall potato aesthetic and blending the digital assets with the user's real-world environment. Project Details: Platform: Snapchat (Easy Lens) Project Type: 3D Augmented Reality Head Replacement & Face Inset Aesthetic: Humorous, Surreal, Quirky Lens Link (https://www.snapchat.com/unlock/?type=SNAPCODE&uuid=cdf8d56b5f9149c0a97e77c80e39bfbf&metadata=01)

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Project: Punk Kitty AR Lens Overview The Punk Kitty Glam AR Lens is a custom Augmented Reality experience developed for Snapchat. This project reimagines a beloved pop-culture icon through a subversive, edgy lens. By blending kawaii aesthetics with heavy punk elements and digital cosmetics, the mask offers users a unique, expressive, and high-quality digital accessory. Key Features: Advanced Face Tracking: Utilizes Snapchat's underlying face mesh technology to ensure the 3D mask securely anchors to the user's head, adapting to movements and lighting seamlessly. Custom 3D Modeling: Features a uniquely sculpted, helmet-like mask that combines recognizable feline ears and a signature pink bow with an aggressive, skull-inspired lower jawline. Material & Texture Design: Incorporates realistic PBR (Physically Based Rendering) materials for the metallic forehead spikes, nose cone, and heavy cheek chains, contrasting sharply with the soft matte white of the mask base. AR Makeup Integration: Applies custom digital makeup directly to the user's eyes (visible through the mask's strategic cutouts), tying the edgy aesthetic together and ensuring a cohesive look regardless of the user's physical makeup. Project Details: Platform: Snapchat (Lens Studio) Project Type: 3D Augmented Reality Face Mask & Digital Cosmetics Aesthetic: Punk, Edgy, Kawaii-Goth Lens Link (https://www.snapchat.com/unlock/?type=SNAPCODE&uuid=f5073e7065a148bf8852105c9702611b&metadata=01) Development Process The development pipeline involved conceptualizing the design, modeling the base mesh and hard-surface accessories in a standard 3D software suite, and importing the optimized assets into Lens Studio. Special attention was paid to the lighting setup and environment maps to ensure the chrome spikes and chains accurately reflected light. Finally, facial tracking components were layered to introduce custom eye makeup that tracks accurately with the user's blinks and expressions, anchoring both the 3D and 2D digital objects realistically into the user's physical environment.

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YOUtopia: Build Your Own Perfect World With Nature Built for Snap Spectacles 👓 🌿 The Concept YOUtopia is an Augmented Reality (AR) experience where users search their physical surroundings for objects connected to nature. Inspired by the idea of discovering hidden life (and a bit of WALL-E's penchant for collecting!), users scan their environment to unlock in-game items across different nature categories. These collected items can then be used to decorate their physical space, creating their own personal, customized utopia. 🟢 Meet Bean: Your AI Companion At the heart of YOUtopia is Bean, our adorable AI companion. Bean isn't just a mascot; he's the core of the user experience. Floating inside your space, Bean provides a conversational interface, guiding you step-by-step through the world of YOUtopia, from scanning to decorating. (Double tap on Bean to access Settings!) 🎨 3D Assets & Collectibles The world of YOUtopia is populated with low-poly, charming 3D assets that users can discover and place in their environment. Key Asset Categories: Water: Featuring assets like the Whale and Jellyfish. Plant: Featuring assets like the Sprout. Sky: Featuring assets like the Cloud. Animals: Featuring assets like the Rabbit. 📱 The Experience: Scan, Collect, Decorate The YOUtopia interface is designed for intuitive interaction within AR: Scan: Use the "Hunt" feature to scan your real-world environment for nature-connected objects. Collect: Successfully scanning items unlocks 3D assets, which are stored in "Your Chest." Decorate: Access your chest to place your collected items around your room, transforming your space into your unique YOUtopia. 💡 Reflection & Future Development Challenges Overcome: Conceptual Pivot: We navigated the complex decision-making process between developing for pure AR versus VR environments. Technical Issues: We successfully managed a significant technical hurdle by downgrading from Lens Studio version 5.22.1 (originally intended for Specs) to version 5.15.4 to ensure compatibility with Spectacles hardware. Future Considerations: Optimize the experience to run perfectly on Snapchat Spectacles. Upgrade and refine the UI/UX for a smoother user journey. Expand the item catalog, including introducing a new "Technology" category. Implement a new feature allowing certain "legendary" animals to become active companions within the space.

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Cover image for Tiny Home Village: An Interactive

Tiny Home Village: An Interactive AR Experience Program: Snap Lens Academy (Snap Inc.) Tools: Lens Studio, JavaScript, 3D Asset Pipeline (Blender), AR Camera Tracking Project Overview: Tiny Home Village is an empathy-driven Augmented Reality (AR) Lens created to address housing insecurity among young adults. With 51% of Snapchat users belonging to Gen Z—a demographic where 67% report struggling with housing costs—this project leverages AR technology to destigmatize housing challenges, promote positive portrayals of community stability, and connect users directly to actionable housing assistance resources. Key Features & Mechanics: Interactive Avatar Exploration: Uses front-camera and screen-overlay controls (on-screen joystick) to allow users to navigate a 3D avatar through a virtual neighborhood. Narrative Dialogue Triggers: Approaching low-poly village residents prompts interactive dialogue boxes where characters share lived experiences of transition from crisis to housing stability. Spatial Environment Placement: Utilizes world-tracking via the rear camera to anchor an isometric 3D diorama of the tiny home community onto real-world surfaces. Resource & Action Hub: Displays an in-lens call-to-action poster linking users directly to regional affordable housing programs and support networks. Development & Process: Scripting & UI Design: Programmed custom interaction scripts for character movement, camera tracking, and UI dialogue states. Optimized UI overlays for responsive mobile interactions. Environment & Prop Pipeline: Modeled low-poly 3D assets (modular tiny homes, greenery, vehicles, and municipal infrastructure) optimized for real-time mobile AR rendering. Key Insights & Learnings: AR as an Empathy Engine: Spatial storytelling transforms static data into an interactive experience, making complex social topics accessible and engaging. Asset & Performance Optimization: Maintaining high frame rates in mobile AR requires rigorous optimization of polygon counts, texture atlas sizing, and runtime script triggers during user interaction. Scalable Impact Architecture: Future iterations can expand from single-location narratives into location-based AR series, real-time survey tracking, and broader social impact integrations. Scan the QR code to check it out yourself!

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Niekelle Bloomfield

AR Developer building unique experiences.