Augmented Reality for Tarot?

schizandra

It's just come to my attention that Ciro Marchetti has released a new deck; a Kipper deck. Not only that, but if you view one of the cards through the camera of your iPhone, it triggers an animated and musical scene sequence. As far as I'm aware, this is the first time something like this has been done in the world of cartomancy, and it's not at all surprising to me that Ciro is the one who did it. :)

It doesn't quite qualify as augmented reality because you lose sight of the physical card itself once the animation begins to play. I want to bring your attention to how this graphic novel uses augmented reality to digitally enhance the reader's experience with the novel: http://www.experienceanomaly.com/anomaly/book (video is at the bottom of the page). I'd like to fantasize a bit about the applications this technology could have for the digital age of Tarot. I wanted to bring up augmented reality in the digital evolution of Tarot thread, but it seemed a bit too far-fetched to be a useful contribution to the conversation. Ciro's new deck made me think, maybe it's not so far off.

Imagine pointing your device's camera at a card, then seeing the figures and scenes in that card come to life in 3 dimensions! Interact with the card to access card meanings and associations, make notes, etc. View a spread through your tablet and direct it to find prevalent themes such as elemental dignities, directionality or color/number/suit dominance. The augmented reality could overlay arrows or animate those cards to highlight them. For professional readers, imagine handing a tablet to your client so they can see the cards come to life as you're talking about its significance to their question, or as you're flipping it over.

Augmented reality, IMO, would be a perfect way to combine a physical Tarot reading with the benefits of digital technology. It's flashy stuff and obviously it's not for everybody. Some might find it a distraction from the intuitive process. But the digital side of Tarot is here to stay, and many readers find pleasure and value in it. It's fun to think of where we can take it. :)
 

JasonLion

Ciro's app and the technology behind it is certainly impressive. However, I wonder how broadly applicable it will be. It does add greatly to the "showmanship" of a reading, but it adds relatively little to the understanding of the reading. There are also significant challenges in paying for that much animation. Animation generally cost rather more than static art, yet only the better selling tarot decks ever fully pay the artists for their time.

I see the areas where computers are most likely to affect Tarot in other directions. Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could snap a picture of a reading and have the reading appear in your phone complete with perfect card images and links back to the card meanings. Computers are also going to be good at things like analyzing dignities, something that takes people a fair bit of time to master.
 

cirom

This added feature wasn't intended to be that "deep" in terms of teaching or meaning... But its intention was also more than "showmanship". Since Kipper is relatively new to the English speaking world, and the purpose of this project was to rekindle interest in what was essentially a dying system (the publisher of the original Kipper's assessment, not mine).These animations were intended as a visual assistance/reminder, a cheat sheet if you will, to help beginners familiarize themselves with the cards....I would disagree in part with the earlier post. I think some (not all) of these animations do add something to the meaning. "False Person" is one where (IMO) it does sum up the concept better than just the static image can achieve.

As for the "significant challenges in paying for that much animation", that will certainly be the case if and when this feature is copied in future decks, because such animations take a lot of effort and time....but as far as this deck is concerned (and I believe its the only one that includes such a feature, at least at this point), no one is paying anything extra for it.... .... they didn't add a cent to the price of this deck...it just something I wanted to do...