In the Augment app you can now detect vertical or downward surfaces like walls, doors or the ceiling. This is in addition to the upward surfaces detected so far during the environment scan. The application includes a filtering system to easily use them as support for your 3D models. It lets you check what's been detected and target only specific types of surfaces.

Besides new options are available to set the placement behavior of the 3D models. Everything combines to quickly place the models on the right surfaces. Who wants to have dinner on a table floating on the wall of the living room ?

3D models can naively be placed everywhere on the environment now that new surfaces with various orientations are detectable. To keep the real-life use of objects, options restrict the surfaces which can support the models.

The options can be set from your account on the Augment manager website (https://manager.augment.com/).
Activate the model edition to reach them ("edit" button on the model tile) then go to the tab "Behaviors".
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The parameter indicates the types of surfaces available for a model at insertion or when moving it. Setting the right values avoids mistakenly placing the model on an unreal position and hitting undesired surfaces.
Three values are currently defined:

Values can be combined. At least one value must be selected for the model to be insertable in the scene.

For instance, you can restrict the placement of a chair to the floor surface or a painting to the walls. You can also allow a TV to be vertically posed on a piece of furniture or fixed on the wall by combining the 2 first values.

The option specifies the behavior of the model when it switches from one type of surface to another. (this assumes that both types of surfaces are allowed - see previous section).

Objects can be sometimes placed on their different faces. They can rest on their underside on a piece of furniture or be fixed by their rear face to the wall. Other times, the same face remains in contact with surfaces like a carpet placed on the floor or hung on the wall as decoration.

Here is the transition behavior option to define whether the object should rotate during the transition.
One of the three following values can be set:

During the live session, you're invited to move the device to detect the different planar surfaces materialized by the objects of the environments: floor, tables, chairs, walls, doors...

When inserting a model, the areas of the available surfaces targeted by the device are displayed as transparent yellow polygons. A pattern fills the polygons to symbolize their type: hexagons for floor-like planes, bricks for wall-like planes and checkerboard for ceiling-like planes. The type of visible surfaces depend on the currently active filter (see below).

At the start of the AR session, all surfaces are shown as the filter accepts all the types. When you search for a place to insert the model, the surface pieces appear.

Once the model is placed, the surfaces are no longer rendered but they are still detected in the back stage.

At any time, you can check the environment detected by going to the environment bar and activating the "visible" option. The different surfaces are fully displayed with different colors. You see them evolve as you scan (planes may expand, appear, or disappear as detection improves).

The option is useful to check that a specific surface has been effectively detected and to guide you to scan other areas of your environment.

The filter allows you to select the kind of surfaces to use for placing or moving a model. It's convenient to access surfaces obstructed by others or to clean up the visualization a bit. Three buttons can be activated:

Note:

The filter and the placement parameters of the model combine to determine the surfaces ultimately allowed as support. If you exclude all the surfaces compatible with a model you will not be able to insert it in the scene.

For instance if your model is a piece of furniture to position on a floor or a wall, you can filter out the floor-like surfaces to help you to put it on a wall. But if the model was only compatible with floor-like surfaces it could not be inserted anywhere.

If the recipe for adding a model to the live scene remains unchanged *, the way to place it changes a bit with the new types of surfaces. To respect both the model's placement setting and the active filter, an indicator slides over the different surfaces you point with the device. It shows you if you can tap to place the model there:

* (just select it in your 3D safe or flash a QR code)

Moving a model is as easy as dragging and dropping it. Still, the new filter system and model settings influence where it can go. If a surface is inaccessible due to the model rule or the active environment filter, an indicator appears to help you understand the situation:

The model uses the different detected valid surfaces to move and jumps from ones to others. Transition behavior applies when the types of the two surfaces are allowed and different. Yet, the movement stops at the edge of the current surface if the other is forbidden or if there is no surface at all.

Note:
The lowest horizontal plane of the scene is considered an infinite plane. This is an intended exception: since it usually corresponds to the actual floor, it allows models to be moved without fully scanning it.

The new surfaces are compatible with Places so you can simply save and share your composition as before.
When editing a Place the environment bar allows you to display and filter surfaces as in the live session. However, since a Place is a static view, when inserting a model, no indicator will be visible to guide you on where to place the model: use the "visible" option to display the existing surfaces and pick the right one.