At the Echo Park storefront gallery in LA Smart Objects, you can only appreciate the art on show by staring at your smartphone. The ‘Armory Captures’ exhibit is said to be an experiment in using free technology “to broaden and democratise the art-viewing experience”. Viewers point their smartphones at custom augmented reality tags (similar to QR codes) on the gallery’s walls and floor and scan them with Augment, a free app. What they see are 3D models of work by 20th century masters such as Picasso, Miro, Frankenthaler and Lichtenstein (although, like me, you may prefer the comic book originals that Roy ‘borrowed’ from!).
So how did these works become scannable tags? 3D scans were produced from works at the modern wing of the 2015 Armory Show in New York using another free app, 123Dcatch. Between 8-20 photos of each work were snapped from different angles and the app generated a 3D model from them.