14 DAY TRIAL // Apple has reportedly snagged yet another mapping company, this time one that does it in 3D. Its technology is currently used by Nokia but, apparently, it won’t be for much longer.
After acquiring Placebase and Poly9, both mapping companies, Apple bought C3 Technologies.
According to reports, the purchase occurred sometime earlier this year, but it is only now being confirmed that Apple is the owner of their assets.
According to Nokia, “C3 uses modern camera equipment to capture as many as one image per second of the same object from up to 100 different angles. The images are then used to automatically reproduce the shape of the objects with very high accuracy.”
Image processing software takes it from there and “automatically drapes each shape with the texture chosen from the pictures of each object.” Apple may implement the technology in a major new version of the iOS, possibly version 6.0 alongside the next-generation iPhone 5.