smARtorials: Smart Video Tutorials for Practical Work in Augmented Reality (2021–2024)

Today, 80% of learning and problem-solving takes place in the workplace, where employees observe others, receive guidance from them, or solve problems based on their practical experience. However, experienced colleagues are often unavailable because they are engaged in other tasks, working at a different location or at a different time, or have left the company. Video tutorials have emerged as an alternative to in-person instruction, allowing employees to follow along with and learn from recorded work activities. However, for the often specialized tasks performed in SMEs, commercially available tutorials are usually not available, and creating them in-house is time-consuming and expensive. Even when tutorials are available, employees often have to spend a significant amount of time sifting through lengthy video sequences to find the parts relevant to their specific problem or need. Consequently, video tutorials are rarely used for knowledge transfer and application, particularly in SMEs.

SmARtorials is designed to help SMEs create their own text-based tutorials, video tutorials, and tutorials in augmented and virtual reality, as well as put existing or self-created tutorials to practical use. This is intended to enable employees to pass on knowledge through self-produced video tutorials for which they previously had no suitable means of explanation. In addition, they can apply the knowledge created and shared by others in this way in practice with minimal effort. This is to be achieved through the development of smart video tutorials on digital media, in which work activities are filmed and can be further explained verbally or in text.

In this project, two application partners from different fields (KKT: manufacturing, F&K: healthcare) are working together with an implementation partner (Task9) and a research partner (HCIS) to achieve the project’s objectives. The consortium’s composition ensures a strong focus on SMEs and practical application, as well as a focus on the needs of the application partners. The partners are also developing the solutions collaboratively and in an interdisciplinary manner from the outset. Following a joint requirements analysis, three iterations of development and practical testing will be conducted with the application partners, culminating in a finished product designed to support knowledge transfer in SMEs. To enable the integration of tutorial recording and playback into daily work routines, smart glasses are used, which employees can wear during specific work activities. Through the use of barcodes, automatic adjustments to the tutorials, and the recognition of employees’ activities, precisely tailored sections of tutorials are to be offered during working hours. This enables users to easily access exactly the section of a tutorial they need (even if it is unclear which one that is).

The project begins on June 1, 2021, and ends on May 31, 2024.