Apple’s Clips app adds new AR Spaces

Clips, Apple’s free video creation app for the iPhone and iPad, adds new AR Spaces powered by LiDAR on iPhone 12 Pro and iPad Pro models, allowing creators to transform a space by adding immersive visual effects that map to the contours of a room, and can be easily shared with anyone. 

Clips is also expanding creative options with monthly content releases containing new filters, stickers, and more. First introduced on iPad Pro last year, the LiDAR Scanner on select iPhone and iPad models1 enables depth-sensing capabilities. The technology measures light distance and uses pixel depth information of a scene to deliver realistic augmented reality (AR) experiences. Clips 3.1 now enables users to record videos with effects that map to the shape of a room and the objects within it.

With AR Spaces in Clips 3.1, users can scan a room and see a live preview of effects that bring dynamic lighting, falling objects, and immersive scenes to life. Using the rear camera on a supported iPhone or iPad,2 users will see effects appear on walls, floors, surfaces, furniture, and objects.

According to Apple, Clips 3.1 includes seven new AR Spaces effects to choose from:

• Prism: Ribbons of rainbow light scan the walls, floors, and objects in a room.
• Confetti: Celebratory bursts of confetti fall and accumulate on flat surfaces.
• Disco: Shining lights reflect off the disco ball that hangs from the ceiling of the space.
• Dance Floor: Colorful tiles of light dance in patterns across the floor.
• Sparkles: Golden sparkle emoji and white glitter fill the space.
• Stardust: Magical trails of starlight encircle and follow a person in the video.
• Hearts: Floating heart balloons bubble up within the space.

Using AR segmentation and occlusion, Clips recognizes people in the video and projects the AR Spaces effects in front of and behind them, making it feel as if the effects are all around the space and subjects. AR Spaces can also be combined with all of the animated stickers, text labels, and emoji overlays — and can be recorded in all aspect ratios in Clips, including 9:16 vertical, 16:9 horizontal, and square.

Clips now offers even more creative content options with monthly updates. Apple says users can expect regular updates to the Clips library of filters, Live Titles, text, stickers, and posters related to seasonal events and cultural trends. And, in Clips 3.1, opt-in notifications are now available to keep users up to date when new content is available.

With Clips for iPhone and iPad, users can create personal video messages, quick social videos, school projects, and more with features like AR Spaces video effects with the LiDAR Scanner, Live Titles captions that are automatically generated from a user’s voice, and TrueDepth camera effects like immersive 360-degree Selfie Scenes and expressive Memoji characters. Clips lets users add personality to their videos with dozens of filters, animated stickers, and full-screen animated posters. The app includes more than 100 soundtracks that automatically adjust to match the length of videos.