Samsung looks to be expanding its AR Emoji usage for users. The company has been granted a patent with the USPTO for a video call feature that uses virtual avatars instead of regular video streaming.
The pattern states that the current video conferencing feature is high in latency, requiring an entire image to be generated and compressed before being transmitted. A virtual avatar would reduce the amount of data that would need to be sent; since there is no longer a video feed to be streamed.
This can reduce the bandwidth usage for users especially in areas where internet speed are slow and data are expensive.
Another reasoning mentioned in the patent is that during a video call, people aren’t able to make eye contact with each other because the camera isn’t placed directly on the screen. AR Emoji get around this by presenting an Avatar for people to engage with; especially since the avatar can be generated from a picture of the user.
The only drawback is that the current AR Emoji features show an exaggerated version of the person’s facial expressions. Losing quite a bit in terms of facial tics.
We’ll see what Samsung decides to do with the patent. It is possible for Samsung to come out with an AR Emoji video call feature in the future. If Samsung does develop it into a live feature, we do hope that there will be an upgrade of some sort to make better 3D avatars compared to what the AR Emoji can do currently.
(Source: Patently Mobile via The Verge)
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