Facebook's AR Studio is now open to all third-party developers
Facebook is opening its augmented reality tool AR Studio to all third-party developers, the company announced Tuesday.
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As part of the expansion, Facebook said it will also enable something called world effect technology within AR Studio in the coming days, which will let developers incorporate moveable, 3D objects into their AR apps.
AR Studio was introduced in April at Facebook's F8 conference as part of the Camera Effects platform, and since then, it's been in closed beta, with only about 2,000 brands and developers able to build on it.
Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has focused the company's AR efforts around the camera following the success of camera-based AR tools and games like Pokemon Go and social media face filters.
"We're going to make the camera the first mainstream augmented reality platform," said Zuckerberg when launching Camera Effects.
Facebook rivals Apple and Google have also prioritized AR development within their portfolios. Earlier this year, Apple unveiled its ARKit platform, which aims to take Apple's installed iPhone base and enable developers to create augmented reality apps. In August, Google came out with its own platform called ARCore for Android-powered phones.
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