Sole Mobile Programmer (iOS/Android) for the central offering of AT Creative

AT Creative

In 2008, Dan Boys, CEO of AT Creative, approached me with EU funding to develop a geographically aware app for walking tours in Derbyshire. The goal was to create a framework that could be reused for similar apps, allowing new content like routes and points of interest (POIs) to be easily integrated.

I initially developed versions of the app for Android and iOS, alongside versions for BlackBerry and Symbian (Nokia) phones, though the latter two were soon discontinued. Since then, we’ve produced over 25 apps, each based on the same core framework but customized to meet the unique requirements of different clients.

Core App Functionality

The foundational app features included:

• A list of Places of Interest (POIs).
• A list of routes.
• A map displaying routes and POIs.

Additional pages, like an introduction and an about page, were included, but the above elements formed the core functionality. Once the app was opened, it would track the user’s location. When the user approached a POI, the app would notify them (with a beep) and display a page about the POI, which would then be marked as "visited" in the POI list.

Technical Challenges

One of the main challenges, especially early on, was tracking the user’s location efficiently. Geofencing wasn’t an option because the minimum trigger distance (100 meters) was too large for close-up landmarks or sites. Instead, I registered for fine-grained location updates (every ~5 meters), which required efficient handling to avoid excessive battery drain. The solution involved minimizing processing inside the location callback, checking distances from all POIs using highly optimized code.

Client-Specific Customizations

Over the years, new clients brought additional requirements, which led to continuous adaptation and innovation. Below are some examples of custom features:

Mapping

• Custom Map Overlays: Clients often provided custom map images to be overlaid on device maps. The challenge was ensuring seamless alignment with the underlying map to prevent visible edges during navigation.
• Ordnance Survey Maps: For the Yorkshire Dales National Park, we integrated Ordnance Survey (OS) maps using their framework. This required handling large image tiles that exceeded the Android app size limits, so we distributed them via expansion files.
• Custom Icons: Many clients requested different icons for various POIs, including filters to display only selected categories of POIs.
• POI Information: Some clients required different types of information to be displayed when a POI was selected.

Audio and Video

• Audio Playback: Several clients provided interviews and audio clips associated with POIs. Users could click within the text to play these, with full playback controls (pause, forward, and rewind).
• Conditional Video Playback: One app included a video of an explosion that could only be unlocked after visiting three specific POIs. To trigger the video, the user had to "push down a plunger."
• Automated Commentary: A boat tour app featured automatic audio commentary triggered by the boat’s location, reading out descriptions of nearby landmarks.

Images and Media

• Photo Galleries: Users could scroll through photo galleries within the app.
• Fading Images: We implemented a fading effect to display a historical photo over a current image of the POI, allowing users to fade between the two to see how the location has changed over time.
• AR Image Overlay: For one app, we developed a feature that allowed users to overlay a faded historical image over the live camera view.
• Panoramic Viewer: For the Yorkshire Dales app, we built a 360-degree panoramic image viewer using OpenGL, allowing users to scroll around and explore panoramic photos.

Additional Features

• iSpy Game: One app included a simple iSpy game where users could tick off items they spotted during the tour.
• Augmented Reality (AR): We developed an AR feature for a game that allowed users to "catch" animated butterflies in their camera view.