This AR App Can Paste An Object From The Real World To Your Computer Screen

Dhir Acharya - Oct 27, 2020

This app lets uses take a photo of a real-life object, automatically remove the background, then convert it into a digital image.

ClipDrop is a reality-bending application that allows users to drop real-life objects into a desktop screen, and the AR app is taking the internet by storm, as revealed in a demo tweet posted by developer Cyril Diagne. The app was actually developed before, but it has now come a long way and is more refined.

The concept of this app is to let uses take a photo of a real-life object, automatically remove the background, then convert it into a digital image. Then, users can paste the image on the desktop screen or use it in apps.

Not just people and objects, the app can also do the trick with text in a book or a physical page in the surrounding environment.

ClipDrop seems good at telling between objects in focus and the background, but it sometimes produces blurred edges or leaves out parts of the object. These bugs are presumably faults in the beta phase, which will improve over time.

In addition, the application works directly with others such as Photoshop, Powerpoint, Pages, and Canva, meaning users can paste objects into a project they’re working on. Using the desktop app, users can also pull images or text from apps or websites.

AR app clipdrop — The AR app lets you take a photo of an object then paste on your desktop display

You can get ClipDrop for all platforms including Windows, Android, iOS, and macOS. But you will have to pay $39.99 to unlock all the features of the app.

In fact, AR phone apps are not new. Havard University developed the first AR app in 1968, called “Sword of Damocles” – an AR/VR head-mounted display system developed by Ivan Sutherland. The system was connected to a camera.

Sutherland conceived the “Ultimate Display” concept that allowed simulated reality to appear indiscernible from the real world. This involved virtual reality viewed through a head-mounted screen that could look realistic with augmented 3D sound as well as tactile feedback.

Besides, computer hardware has to produce and maintain virtual reality in real-time, users need to experience interactive capabilities with VR in a realistic way.

Though we cannot say ClipDrop has met Sutherland’s concept for the Ultimate Display, there’s no denying that augmented reality has been eating its way into our real world.