Tag: Apple TV

The latest Apple TV becomes the first video peripheral to offer 360-degree videos

Article

You can now view interactive, 360-degree videos on the new Apple TV | Mashable

Video

From the horse’s mouth

Littlstar

Press Release

My Comments

Increasingly the 360-degree “virtual-tour” video is being seen as part of exhibiting a location or marketing a product. Even real-estate agents are using them as a tool to show off properties for sale, while TV serials are using them to give their fans a look-see in to the environments that the shows are set in.

But they are typically offered on Web pages that are best viewed in a browser with you moving your mouse up and down or dragging your finger up and down around a touchscreen or trackpad to pan around.  You may find that you zoom using your mouse’s thumbwheel or pinch in and out on a touchscreen or trackpad. Similarly navigating may require you to simply click or tap on where you want to go.

In some cases, they may also play properly with virtual-reality headsets of the Oculus Rift kind if you use an app for the device.

But what about viewing these 360-degree videos on that large-screeo TV or video projector. This may work if you throw that Web page on the large TV screen but you may not be lucky with some virtual-reality or 360-degree plugins working properly on the large screen.

Litlstar have tackled this issue through developing an app for the 4th-generation Apple TV set-top device that shows the 360-degree videos on the big screen. This exploits the Apple TV’s new remote control which has a trackpad by you using that trackpad to pan around.

This can be exploited on other smart-TV and video-peripheral platforms especially where some of these platforms are implementing gyroscopic remote controls or remote controls that implement multiple D-pads. Similarly, a games console of the XBox or PlayStation variety could be used as a tool to show the virtual-reality videos on a large screen.

It could also allow for one to watch some video content yet have an opportunity to “break off” in to a personal “walk-through” of that scene or building, yet be able to return to where they left off in the video content.

Who knows when Android TV or a subsequent Freebox décodeur will end up exploiting these abilities to enhance video content.

The Apple TV gains gaming ability

Articles

Apple TV 4th Generation press picture courtesy of Apple

The new Apple TV

Dancing in the dark with the new, improved Apple TV | Engadget

Apple TV supports ‘Guitar Hero Live,’ ‘Disney Infinity’ via Bluetooth | Engadget

The new Apple TV brings apps, Siri and a touchpad remote for $149 | Engadget

Will the New Apple TV Replace Your Gaming Console? | Tom’s Guide

From the horse’s mouth

Apple

Press Release

Video

My Comments

Apple have just premiered the fourth-generation Apple TV set-top box which has answered various predictions concerning it gaining games abilities. This is amongst it premiering the iPhone 6S family, the large iPad Pro and the iPad Mini 4 – devices that Apple fanbois will be waiting outside the Apple Stores for the first sale.

This device comes with a more capable remote control which includes a microphone so you can speak to Siri. This is a similar natural-language personal assistant like you have on your iPhone or iPad.

But it is based on the tvOS operating system which will also have a development platform and app store similar to what you experience with iOS-based devices. This will also encourage the development of games for this platform.

How are you going to control the Apple TV when you are playing advanced games? These devices will use MFi-compliant Bluetooth controllers as your advanced control devices and Apple is trying to snap at the XBox One’s, PlayStation 4’s and Nintendo Wii’s heels. As well, Airbnb, Gilt and other non-entertainment companies are putting up apps for this platform. This is a function you won’t be able to gain on your existing Apple TV device, which will simply earn its keep with Netflix, iTunes, AirPlay and similar applications.

The Apple reps had demonstrated games like Guitar Hero Live to show the Apple TV’s gaming prowess and had made it feasible to continue playing games across the Apple iOS platform. The good question to raise is whether the games that are offered are as good as what is offered for the XBox One or PlayStation 4, or will they be like most smart-TV / set-top-box fodder like casual games? Similarly, could this be another attempt to open up paths for independent games studios to write games for the big screen?

What I see of this is Apple jumping in to a market that is already owned by Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo and, like the Android-based consoles that have shown up before, could become very difficult waters. As well, they could work alongside Microsoft to use their regular-computer heritage to free up the big-screen gaming environment by encouraging independent games developers to write games for these devices.

The Apple TV still exists as a platform

Articles

Apple Remembers That The Apple TV Still Exists | Gizmodo

My Comments

What is the Apple TV device?

This is a very small set-top box offered by Apple that connects to your TV and stereo system. But it is typically used for its AirPlay video playback abilities, especially when people are renting or buying video content through the iTunes platform and want to view it on their favourite large-screen TV set. Here, people use the iTunes software on their Macintosh or Windows computer to procure the video content with the payment card and/or iTunes voucher and simply “throw” the content to the TV using this device, perhaps using its remote control to pick content or control its playback from the couch.

What was going on with the Apple TV?

Apple had been focusing their operating-environment software development efforts on the iOS mobile-device and the Macintosh regular-computing environments while forgetting about the Apple TV’s operating environment and user interface. This is although a trickle of apps, typically “on-ramp” interfaces for various IPTV and video-on-demand services, was being developed for the Apple TV platform.

The improvements about to take place

Luckily Apple had “woken up and smelt the coffee” when they saw competitors, including TV manufacturers, work on and build up smart-TV operating environments that appeal to the 10-foot “lean-back” operating experience. Now they are working on a software redesign for the Apple TV firmware to bring the user experience up-to-scratch and in line with the latest iterations of the iOS mobile platform.

There is the increased focus on having apps being delivered to the Apple TV platform in a similar way to what has happened with the iOS platform. But I hope this isn’t carte blanche for substandard “junkware” to fill the iTunes App Store. More likely, it would become an increasing number of “10-foot” on-ramps for various online services and that any existing apps targeted for this device are refurbished for the new firmware. There is also the idea of implementing the same kind of colour improvements to the user experience as what has been experienced on iOS devices.

Like all Apple devices, the improved Apple TV will be designed to work tightly with the rest of the Apple ecosystem at the expense of other common industry standards. But I would at least like to see Apple work on the Apple TV and their ecosystem to provision “core-quality” video games that can compete with the Xbox, PlayStation and Wii platforms instead of that computer name being sidelined when it comes to gaming and interactive activities. For example, they could work on multi-screen games that allow iOS devices to serve as “second-screens” or just simply use the iOS devices as game-control surfaces.

Who knows what this could mean for Apple to make their whole ecosystem become more “firm” and “across the board” like what Google and others have been working on with their ecosystems.