The Artvertiser allows citizens to reclaim advertising-saturated city spaces by looking through a hand-held device that substitutes billboard content for art. This virtual canvas is not too far removed from the 3D artists portrayed in William Gibson's "Spook Country" who build location specific installations, viewable through special equipment that creates a layer of virtual reality over the physical. The Artvertiser software is programmed to recognize individual advertisements, each of which can be replaced with art regardless of whether the ad is on a building, in a magazine or the side of a vehicle.

The project was started by Julian Oliver in early 2008, he's now collaborating with Clara Boj and Diego Diaz and you can follow their progress on his blog. They're currently making a set of weather-proof digital binoculars--improved connectivity, battery life and solid state storage--and hope to have the software platform working with mobile devices (running Symbian and Android) by the end of the year. Check out their latest 'postcard' demo below and more video samples at vimeo.

via cpluv