Just in time for the 2012/2013 season, Voetbal International has released its yearly season guide, featuring player bios, team stats, schedules and more for all of the top teams in the Netherlands. Only this year, things are different - the pages have been made interactive with the Layar Creator.

Now when readers peruse the nearly 400 pages of the guide, hoping to learn more about how their favorite team might fare in upcoming football season, they can also uncover more info by scanning the pages with the Layar app. Each team’s page features quick links to news, schedules, results and transfers. Some of the ads in the guide have also been enhanced with links and videos.

This is a prime example of how the Creator can easily add interactivity to print products. Editorial magazines and newspapers are great for Interactive Print, and so are informative guides such as Voetbal International. Readers are already turning to the pages of the guide for specific information, and the opportunity to learn more and to view dynamic digital content within the pages of the guide adds value to the guide.

Since 1916 the Copa América has been South America’s main association football tournament. 95 years later, the tournament is turning to the cutting edge field of augmented reality to help fans connect with the tournament and discover important information.

This year the tournament is hosted by Argentina, and will feature the 10 members of the CONMEBOL (South American Football Confederation) plus Mexico and Japan. Android users can download the official Copa América app in the Android market to keep up with tournament items like the teams, players, schedules, scores and tables.

In addition, the app also makes use of Layar to provide location-based and visual information to users. The tournament takes place at several stadiums across Argentina, and holding your phone up will point you to the various locations. If a match is in progress, the teams playing will be displayed along with the stadium icon.

Users can also access information about each participating squad in augmented reality as the flags of each nation are displayed around you no matter where you are. Check out the video below to have a look at how the developers of this application, Grupo Esfera, have blended Layar into the Copa América app! You can also access the layer from the Layar app by searching for “Copa América”.

The tournament kicks off July 1st, and don’t forget that YouTube will be providing free live coverage of the entire tournament!

In recent years, Spain has become the country of champions when it comes to football.

In 2010, Spain conquered The Netherlands (we’re still recovering here in Amsterdam) in the World Cup Final with a last minute extra-goal just minutes before the match would have gone to penalty kicks. And just last month, Barcelona defeated England’s Manchester United to win the UEFA Cup for Spain.

Spain is also leading on another forefront - the use of augmented reality and Layar. Spain has fostered some truly impressive augmented reality experiences, including many layers on our platform. With a new layer from one of our Spanish partners, B_Cultura, the worlds of football and augmented reality have finally come together!

With the new Sevilla FC layer, fans of the La Liga club can pose for virtual photographs with their favorite stars. Forward Frederic Kanoute, defender Mauhamadou Dabo, keeper Javi Varas and midfielder Guarente are all posed in the AR view so you can snap a photo with them. You can also take a picture wearing a virtual jersey of the club, including home, away, alternate, Europa League and Copa del Rey variants.

To cap it all off, you can also pose with the team’s emblem, as well as a model of the UEFA Cup. With Layar 5.0’s sharing features, users can easily share their screenshots with friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter.

It’s all very basic and very fun, especially for big fans of Sevilla FC. We at Layar are very excited to see a major football club take it’s first steps into augmented reality and can’t wait to see more intersections of AR and football!