The following post was written by Layar’s Marjolein Stromeier.

Puur Natuur is a quarterly magazine sent to 730,000 members of Natuurmonumenten, the Dutch Nature Association. I spoke with Marianne Nouwens, Manager of the Corporate Media & Online team at Natuurmonumenten about why they recently made their magazine interactive with Layar.

In May of 2012, Marianne heard Layar co-founder Claire Boonstra speaking at the Nationale Coverdag, an international event for magazine publishers, and became very enthusiastic about interactive print. The next day, she involved the editorial staff in her plans and they got started. Puur Natuur used Layar to enhance the pages of its September issue, and Marianne was amazed by how easy the Layar Creator works.

“The instructions are very clear, it is so easily accessible and extremely simple to use,” she said. “The Layar Creator is a wonderful platform.”

Marianne also praised the support and development team for listening very well to her as a customer and answering her needs.

Natuurmonumenten has really beautiful, wonderful content, both offline and online, so it’s a no-brainer that they have embraced the opportunity to connect this content to their print readers.

Marianne says readers are very enthusiastic about the interactive magazine. In the winter of 2012, Puur Natuur enhanced its second issue with Layar, and saw 80% more viewers from the previous edition after just three days of publication.

Natuurmonumenten employees have provided lots of positive reactions from out in the field, which may be featured with Layar in the next edition of Puur Natuur in the spring.

While we love to focus on Interactive Print and how it can enhance the reading experience of magazines, newspapers and other printed materials, people are currently using the Layar Creator to enhance all sorts of things. Even nature.

If you’ve ever been to a national park or any other outdoor nature spot, you probably remember the information panels most locations display to provide information to readers. They’re found everywhere, even at monuments and other tourist attractions. But what if those static panels could come to life with digital content?

Take, for example, the Dutch Natuurmonumenten (Nature Reserves) in Texel. The info panels at the reserves have been augmented using the Creator to provide a guided video tour of the scenery.

Park ranger Eckard Boot hosts the videos from the very spot where the panels stand, providing answers to popular questions and details about the species of animals and plants in the various areas. So far 11 panels have been enhanced with Eckard’s videos, and they even include “View with Layar” stickers on them to let people know they can be scanned!

Check out the example video below.

The most interesting thing about the Natuurmonumenten’s efforts to enhance their panels is that they did it all by themselves, including the stickers. The Layar Creator allowed them to upload photos of the panels and enhance them with links, social media buttons and, of course, Eckard’s video tours.

We love to see individuals taking the initiative and creating awesome new content with the Layar Creator. This just goes to show that there is no end to the number of ways in which the Layar Creator can be used.