The New York Times and Facebook are collaborating to publish a series of augmented reality driven reporting on Instagram to help readers better explore and understand the increasingly complex world in a more personal way.
The Times will also be launching a new AR Lab to support this work. The lab will work in conjunction with a dedicated newsroom team which will manage the development of the AR effects, and will work with Facebook’s Spark AR platform as the underlying technology.
The partnership reflects the Times’ continued investment in digital-first journalism.
However, the Times will remain independent in its world coverage and will have full control over the design and content of each published effect.
Readers can interact with the effects on the @NYTimes Instagram account profile page, under the effects tab, and throughout the Times’s digital and print products.
On September 20, readers can launch the AR effect by holding their smartphone camera over a QR code featured in the paper.
