Facebook Inc. is trying to expand its presence in the burgeoning augmented reality market with the public launch of AR Studio, a platform based on code it acquired from MSQRD Inc. back in 2016.

AR Studio is claimed to be a platform that “empowers creators to connect art with data to bring augmented reality into everyday life through the Facebook camera.” Announced at the Facebook F8 conference in April, the platform was beta-tested with about 2,000 brands, publishers and artists prior to its public launch. Facebook said it’s now putting “the power of augmented reality in the hands of all creators.”

Hype aside, the platform is all about real-time overlays via Facebook’s built-in camera/picture-taking feature. For users, that means that they can add AR overlays on top of their pictures as they take them.

But for developers, it also means that they can now freely design and then deploy to Facebook their own customized and stylized AR picture overlays. Although that may not seem entirely exciting to anyone Generation X and older, millennials, those born after about 1980, along with those younger yet, love the idea. Struggling Snap Inc. primarily popularized the concept a few years back.

Facebook is better known as the owner of Oculus, maker of the Rift virtual reality headset, but founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg sees augmented reality playing an increasing role in the social networking giant’s future, saying in April that AR as the company’s “next big bet.”

“Think about how many of the things you use [that] don’t actually need to be physical,” Zuckerberg was quoted as saying. “You want to play a board game? You snap your fingers, and here’s the board game … you want to watch TV? You don’t need a physical hardware TV, you buy a $1 app ‘TV’ and put it on the wall.”

Facebook is not alone in pursuing AR. Apple CEO Tim Cook is a huge fan too, saying in March that he believes augmented reality is going to be the next big thing. Apple launched ARKit, its AR developer platform in June, then subsequently added support for AR in its latest range of iPhones via iOS in September. Google LLC is also active, offering its own developer kit in the form of ARcore along with support in the latest version of Android.

Photo: Brian Solis/Flickr