Latest ARKit Demo Showcases Virtual Drawing

Ahead of the launch of iOS 11, developers have been tinkering with ARKit, Apple's upcoming augmented reality platform, and showcasing the myriad ways that it can be used in apps and games.

The latest demo comes courtesy of Osama Abdel-Karim, who uses ARKit to virtually paint on a notepad using his fingers.


According to Abdel-Karim, an iOS 11 library named Vision was used to develop the virtual drawing feature. Vision includes an object tracking feature that is able to detect the thumbnail of a finger and track its movement to enable the drawing.

Abdel-Karim has outlined the steps he used to create his ARKit demo and provided the full source code for the project.

When it launches this fall, ARKit is positioned to become the largest AR Platform in the world, using the camera, processors, and motion sensors in the iPhone and iPad to create some incredibly impressive augmented reality interactions.

As outlined in our video covering ARKit, the feature uses technology called Visual Inertial Odometry to track the world around an iPad or iPhone, allowing a device to sense how it moves in a room. ARKit automatically analyzes a room's layout, detecting horizontal planes like tables and floors, which then allows virtual objects to be placed upon those surfaces.


The first apps and games with ARKit won't be available until iOS 11 is officially available to the public, but we've seen what ARKit can be used for, with developers demonstrating everything from live filter applications in a recreation of A-ha's Take On Me video to live measurements of furniture and room spaces.

Check out all of our previous ARKit coverage below to see what else developers can do with it:

- ARKit Roundup: Turn-by-Turn Directions, Precise Room Measurements, and Pac-Man
- Apple's ARKit Used to Recreate Classic A-ha 'Take On Me' Video
- Apple Users' Mixed Reality Future Teased in Latest ARKit Demo
- Latest Apps to Showcase Apple's ARKit Include Simple Measuring Tape and Minecraft
- Developers Share First Augmented Reality Creations Using Apple's ARKit

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Top Rated Comments

icrude Avatar
100 months ago
Really thought he was going to draw something else.
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jonnysods Avatar
100 months ago
This is so cool. Every time I see these demos I get excited about the possibilities.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Zirel Avatar
100 months ago
“Sure Apple is behind in VR/AR, Microsoft and Google are so much advanced because they released a couple of juicy press releases and pretty demos in controlled environments.”
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
FactVsOpinion Avatar
100 months ago
Call me a pessimist, but I just don't see any practical use in real life, nothing more than a gimmick, just like holograms when they showed them in Star Wars, 40 years later no practical use for everyday.

Don't get me wrong, nice to see companies investing in new technologies, but just because it's new and flashy, doesn't mean it's useful, and yes, like every new thing it will have a niche, but not an everyday use for regular people.
Couldn't disagree more.
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These things make me want AR glasses again...

...Or a brain implant.
I think the lenses will certainly come. And then years later, an implant; perhaps from Musk's comapny
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
melgross Avatar
100 months ago
It’s frustrating that Apple doesn’t have a beta section up in the App Store. In situations like this, where I run the iOS betas, I would love to have some of these AR betas on my iPad to play with, knowing, that since they are betas, that they might crash, or otherwise not function properly.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
naeS1Sean Avatar
100 months ago
These things make me want AR glasses again...

...Or a brain implant.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)