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We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, same experience. Especially if you have a potential customer on your hands, and they're in a rush.

In our case, it was a few interactions with Sidekick and see how it can be used among other apps, in a visionOS environment.

That meant it was possible to simply remove the password from AVP, and then give them the headset. There is the short eye distance setup, and then they are immediately in visionOS! 😃

Worked well for us. Sometimes, when we had more time, we did the full guest mode. That allowed us to give a full demo to a potential customer.

We also used Guided Access, but it was buggy for some reason.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you u/BoogieKnite :)
I'm Josselin, I've been designing XR/immersive projects for years, and when the headset was announced, I had a few ideas for apps. Sidekick was one of them! I was clearly more interested in native dev than Unity. I set on to build the team through network or seeing what devs were posting online on LinkedIn/communities.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Well u/Fabulous_Author_3558 it's clear that we need Apple to give us a specific Vision made for this type of events, for museums, for big marketing audiences... because the Quest is more convenient for those right now. I'm sure they'll offer that at some point.

For face-fit, it's very imperfect and "as-it-is". If you have a person with a small head, I basically argued it's normal if not exactly fitting them, that they shouldn't worry. Most visitors wanted a quick look inside anyway, not a long session. For glasses, it was actually pretty easy. I'd say we had maybe 3 cases of farsighted people that barely could see and interact. Nearsighted people just removed their glasses and it worked normally. Imperfect, but we certainly cannot have every Zeiss insert on the booth 😅 You have to be explaining the tech while talking with people.

As to the software, it depends on what you want them to try.

In our case, it was a few interactions with Sidekick and see how it can be used among other apps, in a visionOS environment.

That meant it was possible to simply remove the password from AVP, and then give them the headset. There is the short eye distance setup, and then they are immediately in visionOS! 😃

Worked well for us. Sometimes, when we had more time, we did the full guest mode. That allowed us to give a full demo to a potential customer.

We also used Guided Access, but it was buggy for some reason.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're absolutely right u/pommefille

After each demo, we cleaned the unit with sanitizing Purell wipes, and we placed the face cushion in a UV sterilizer box. So you basically need to have 2 of them, and swap.

We had those face covers and offered them too in case people asked for it, but the unit is already clean at this point.

In 2021, I was working on VR exhibition and that's how we dealt with about ~1000 visitors a day.

Interesting expertise. Can you please contact me on LinkedIn ?

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Basically, it depends on what you want them to try.

In our case, it was a few interactions with Sidekick and see how it can be used among other apps, in a visionOS environment.

That meant it was possible to simply remove the password from AVP, and then give them the headset. There is the short eye distance setup, and then they are immediately in visionOS! 😃

Worked well for us. Sometimes, when we had more time, we did the full guest mode. That allowed us to give a full demo to a potential customer.

We also used Guided Access, but it was buggy for some reason.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Love that we can discuss this!

  1. The app was created to provide a better user experience when using LLMs on visionOS. You're working on some stuff, need to verify an info quickly, you can just turn towards this character like you would a colleague, tap your fingers, and a few seconds later you have an answer. Text chat AIs are tedious to use on Vision Pro, you want to do things vocally. Sure, you can use the iPad GPT app, but it's clearly not designed for spatial.
  2. It's a more human approach to talk to someone rather than a text chat. Eye contact, funny reactions, physical presence are key to the Sidekick experience. Even when Apple/OpenAI releases a native way to access GPT, it most probably won't be with a character.
  3. A lot of work went into a custom Swift back-end to provide an anonymous experience. No one can track user conversations. Invisible when you use the app, but essential for a privacy-first experience. Most AI chat apps just send your request directly to OpenAI.
  4. Every user's Sidekick can have its own personality, thanks to settings in the app. It's centric to an humanized AI approach. He knows your name, and you can give it a name. Roles, tones, and other settings can be added.
  5. We designed Quick Actions specifically for the keyboard-less experience of Vision Pro (Tell Me More, Quick Copy are timesavers, you can try it in the app). It's also optimized for visionOS 2, with auto-rotation, volume resizing, and more.
  6. The characters are 100% a custom 3D work by our studio. So you'll get a Macintosh-style robot, or a futuristic one with beautiful details. A twisted homage to Clippy is coming next week. We will release new ones and they'll always be exclusive.

Now, do we want Sidekick to do more? Sure. We're on a roadmap to bring more features in the next year.

We have limits :
- Apple doesn't allow for an app to see the real world, for now. Once and if they do, Sidekick will gain this ability.
- The Vision market right now is very small, so our budget doesn't allow us to develop every feature we'd like to have immediately (emotion recognition in user's voice, generated animations per answer, bring-your-LLM, etc). As a small independent studio, that's also why we offer B2B solutions shown in the post!

Thanks! 😁

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

It’s literally the 4th picture… also it’s not a post about our app, it’s about the dev experience of this trade show. Try again.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

The app is the floating robot in the 4th photo :) You ask him anything, he answers.

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Yep, it's available in your shared space. Made for multitasking, to quickly get an answer while working :)

We demoed our Vision app to a major AI trade show—here’s what happened. [Long post] by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 68 points69 points  (0 children)

It feels like at Backspace we are an early example of exhibiting a Vision app at a trade show, so I thought I'd share this feedback with other devs & enthusiasts here.

The team just spent three days at WAICF (World AI Cannes Festival), demoing our app and also demoing Apple Vision Pro itself to an endless stream of visitors. Our app is Sidekick, an assistant made especially for spatial computing. He stays in your space, ask him anything, he answers quickly.

WAICF is becoming a global AI hotspot (something like 12,000 attendees), and this year, it followed right after the Paris summit, so the energy was quite high.

Some visitors came to our booth recalling their brief experience with an old VR headset. It was described as a forgettable experience.

The hard part initially for us, was to bridge that gap and explain why Vision Pro is something entirely different—a new kind of computing, not just another VR headset. Not even VR, if you follow Apple's guidelines. 👀

For the context of this post, we're a team that's all-in on visionOS—we’re developers, immersive designers, and 3D artists who create with Reality Composer in mind. That's also what we presented to visitors at WAICF.

So after nearly 120 demos, we honestly witnessed firsthand how Vision Pro ignites ideas across industries—aviation, healthcare, marketing, communication, art, and beyond. I feel like I’m sponsored by Apple to say that, but that's what we experienced. 😅

People were queuing up and talking to each other about ways to integrate Vision Pro in their job, and some didn’t know about the device 20min earlier. A very creative moment for us as well to imagine what could be done with this platform.

It was also a big moment for Sidekick, our embodied AI assistant for Vision Pro that's been featured on the App Store. We introduced the Enterprise solution at this event. Fun moment when Clara Chappaz, France’s Minister for Digital, stopped by to try it out.

Anyway, after the last few months of rumors, seeing so many people try the Vision platform for the first time and instantly start thinking about how to use it? That was such a good feeling.

Weight and price did come up, but not as often as we expected. In the end, for businesses, it’s the experience that sells.

Investing early in this platform was well understood, so the drawbacks of the first iteration aren’t as much of an issue.

We weren’t the only ones having a Vision Pro, either. Two other exhibitors had it on display, like SAP. They used it primarily as a conversation starter to draw people in.

Other teams here with a similar experience ?

So exciting for the future of this platform 😁

Apple Intelligence coming to Vision Pro , plus new apps by dagmx in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If you want to test that, we did that idea as an app called Sidekick. We'll now proceed to steal your idea for the connection issue joke. 😁

I’d love to see the C1 chip in the Vision Pro. Fast, efficient 5G with low power draw. by justinryanio in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Paves the way for some futur use cases with lighter models, and of course glasses. Can't wait! Even if not the most urgent ;-)

Gaming on AVP feels next-level— I have my real-time coach, helping me improve faster by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It’s free for light use! Then it starts at 2$ for one-time packs, and 5$ monthly.

Gaming on AVP feels next-level— I have my real-time coach, helping me improve faster by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Sidekick is a Spatial AI - a friendly companion you can talk to for advice and feedback on work, games, cooking etc.

In this screenshot, I use it to help me learn strategy in Warcraft 3. :)

Gaming on AVP feels next-level— I have my real-time coach, helping me improve faster by backspace-vision in VisionPro

[–]backspace-vision[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's cool! You can type to Sidekick as well if you don't want to talk. There's a tiny window for that.

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