About

Welcome to our Reality Computing blog. You may be wondering what this is all about!

Put simply, we see a new category of technology emerging around spatial and shape data describing the physical world. We call this Reality Computing. This is really a meta-category encompassing ways of capturing spatial and shape information from the physical world, operating on that information with digital tools, and delivering digital information back into the physical world visually or materially. Consider:

• The physical world can now be captured using technologies from 3D laser scanning to photogrammetry, and these capabilities are being introduced in ever more varied devices.

• Information from the digital world can now be delivered into the physical world in many new ways. Digital information can be materialized using technologies ranging from 3d printing and other forms of additive manufacturing to numerically controlled earthmoving equipment at a civil engineering scale. Digital information can also be presented visually in physical contexts in exciting new ways, using augmented reality for example.

• Connecting between the digital capture of the physical world and the physical delivery of the digital world is a growing landscape of software tools for working with the data these processes require.

That data is generally some variety of point cloud, high-density mesh, or voxel-based structure; that is, data types that can record and document the rich variety of the physical world. And data that is very different from the descriptive geometry the world of design most often uses today.

We call this "Reality Data"; and we expect that this will soon become apparent as a platform shift in the kind of data and therefore the kinds of tools that will be used by anyone who designs, produces, or manages physical things.

And the emerging category of technologies that support the capture, manipulation, analysis and delivery of this kind of data we call "Reality Computing". Reality Computing is a new meta-category, a category of tools and technologies that break down the barriers between the digital and physical worlds, and enable direct modeling, analysis, and fabrication.

By considering these technologies under a systematic, overarching category, we hope to better understand how this will affect businesses and careers in the near future, and help businesses make strategic decisions in this area. We welcome your thoughts on this blog at the email address below and hope you will engage with us over the months to come.

Tell us, how will Reality Computing affect your business, your career, your hobbies and passions, and your world?

Warm regards,

The Reality Computing blog team

[email protected]