Gadgetory

so when Royal Caribbean reached out asking to sponsor a piece on the technology they're building into their cruise liners my initial reaction was like what am I gonna say about navigation systems then I looked at the list of high-tech ship features that they were going to be showing off hydrogen fuel cell power systems facial recognition and Mark Asian VR dessert bar wait what and then I promptly boarded a plane for New York okay so some of the text they covered in the keynote did actually end up being ship stuff like how they're using augmented reality to overlay navigation information during adverse weather conditions and how by using computer modeling to change the hull shape they were able to reduce drag through the water by about 5 percent improving the ship's fuel economy and reducing its environmental impact then they moved into the open source platform that Royal Caribbean is contributing to that's designed for much faster innovation in the industry as a whole now on the surface this future app that's part of it has the ability to see and book cruises view a map of the ship and book excursions and activities which is pretty standard hey we've got an app fair but if you dig a little deeper you honor them incredible functionality a digital concierge will understand and answer common questions guests to guests shipwide messaging is built-in so you can avoid incurring SMS roaming charges and to help coordinate meetups and scheduling shipwide multi deck location tracking makes it simple to see like where the kids are hanging out or if the reason that you can't find each other is that you're actually at the same end of the ship but on different decks and then comes the really next-level stuff Royal Caribbean will be using machine learning to look at factors like your past preferences demographics your travel companions and your schedule to recommend activities during time slots when you're available so if you're dining with the inlaws it might suggest a nice red wine pairing rather than a vodka soda and the central component of this more open ecosystem is the bring your own device concept so no more clunky NFC bracelets just install the app snap a selfie scan your luggage when you embark and you walk on board the facial recognition cameras will authenticate you based on the picture that you just took which brings us to the deck of the ship complete with clouds that actually ended up looking more like giant sheep suspended from wires but uh a +4 effort you guys and where we get to the real reason that I would be willing to allow an app to know where I am on the ship at all times now they're still evaluating different technologies for how to do it most reliably but the demo that they did tonight here allowed me to just fire up the app click a drink monitor the real-time status like what then about a minute later someone shows up hands me the drink and takes off if that is not the future of pampering I don't know what is and augmented reality was another big talking point here as I mentioned before it's already in use for navigation but it's also got some more entertaining uses so guests waiting to embark can play augmented reality games and on the deck you'll actually be able to point your phone at these kinds of picture frames and they'll give you an x-ray vision like experience into the real time inner workings of the ship with live views available of places like the galley where the food's being prepared the bridge the engine room and more now not everything they demoed here necessarily has a firm rollout time but there were some other really cool concept level things with virtual dining as the standout for me using HTC vibes with front-facing cameras for hand presence they had us try three different food morsels in front of us that were also being tracked by the cameras so the VR dining experience would actually know what you're eating and then adjust the visuals to match now obviously it's pretty first gen right now but I can imagine that as VR headsets get lighter and less clunky taking a bite of ice cream for instance and watching snow begin to fall or biting into something spicy and being transported to a scorching desert would be pretty cool obviously I wouldn't eat three meals a day like that but as an experience it was utterly unique and everyone walking out thought it was a ton of fun next we wrote the automated shuttle so cool this was actually my first time in a fully driverless vehicle and headed into the future stateroom showcase so rooms like this will be rolling out over the next year as you walk in the room welcomes you opening the curtains and setting the mood with some lights even displaying a message on screen if you're let's say celebrating a special occasion with your cruise and then everything in here including the air conditioning can be controlled via the built-in touch controls through your phone from anywhere on the ship or good night in the case of certain functions like scene lighting with your voice a standout feature for me was the support though for both chromecast and Apple TV because I am exactly the kind of person who would want to bring my own content with me on a trip that's fantastic the stateroom concept room took mood lighting one step further with displays built into or projected onto the ceiling and the floor allowing you to go to sleep to the sights and sounds of a clear starry sky or a tropical storm if that suits your fancy although we don't have an ETA for those to be rolled out after that we rode the shuttle one more time arriving at the hydrogen fuel cell power unit from Ballard that it turns out was actually using the 150 kilogram hydrogen storage trailer in the parking lot to run many of the demos we saw today including the Robo screens and the immersion tunnel so the box on top here is about one-third fuel cell stack along with some accompanying components like the safety mechanism and fuel delivery system and a humidifier that actually recirculates some of the waste moisture to keep the whole unit operating at an optimal humidity level then down below we get a filtered air intake a compressor that's actually an automotive supercharger that's been modified by the manufacturer for peak reliability the cooling system which captures the heat from the exothermic fuel cell reaction and would normally use seawater in this heat changer to dissipate it along with a waste reservoir that ends up collecting pure water that on a ship then could be added to the drinking water supply saving energy for the high powered desalination units that cruise ships normally rely on entirely so thanks to Royal Caribbean for bringing us out to New York to cover this cool event and thanks to you guys for watching this video sucked you know what to do but if it was awesome get subscribed hit the like button check out the link that we'll have to Royal Caribbean in the video description and while you're down there maybe check out our merch store which has cool shirts like this one as well as our community forum