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RedLaser for iPhone scans for bargains

by Mel Martin May 18th 2009 at 3:00PM

I wouldn't have thought it was possible to get an iPhone to capture barcodes clearly, but Occipital has done it with a new $1.99US iPhone app called RedLaser [App Store]. Why capture barcodes? One good use is to find better prices for a product. Scan a product in the store, then RedLaser captures the barcode and does a quick Google or Amazon search to give you quick price comparisons.

I tried the app at a bookstore and my local Best Buy and was surprised how well it worked. You need pretty good light to capture a barcode, which is an issue with the iPhone camera, not the RedLaser software. You need to hold the camera steady. The best way is by holding down the button to take the picture, then release when you are steady.

RedLaser gives you the option to try again, and guides you on how far the camera needs to be away from the barcode. Then RedLaser instantly goes out to the internet and gets you the price comparisons.

In practice I had some misses. The camera wasn't at quite the right distance, or I was a bit shaky holding it. In most instances, however, I was able to get the barcode and see the price comparisons I was looking for. It's also important that the camera not be tilted in relation to the barcode. Try to keep everything lined up. And the app will not work at all unless you have an internet connection. It would be nice if it could store the barcodes, then go out and identify them when you have a good signal.

You also get the ability to mail your product list to yourself or a friend to read it on a bigger screen when you get home.

The clever technology in the app is able to sharpen the image a great deal, making the iPhone camera a feasible platform for this app. When you take the picture the barcode will look pretty fuzzy, but after a couple of seconds of processing it looks quite good, which is the magic that RedLaser accomplishes.

I'd expect this will work fine for most people, but there are some negative comments at the iTunes store as well, largely, I suspect, from people who couldn't hold it steady, had bad light, or glare falling across the barcode. When I eliminated those issues, it seemed to work fine.

Note: This app only recognizes US and UK UPC and EAN barcodes. It works works best on standard-sized barcodes, but I had success with some smaller ones as well.

Here's are some screen shots of RedLaser in action:



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I wouldn't have thought it was possible to get an iPhone to capture barcodes clearly, but Occipital has done it with a new $1.99US iPhone...
 

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18 Comments

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balls

Better prices than a bookstore or BestBuy? NO WAI!!!

May 20 2009 at 11:16 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
collide000

A comment in the UK app store states the app is useless in the UK as it doesn't search any UK sites, even though the description states it does.

Shame, I've been waiting for something like this, guess I'll just have to keep typing the title of products into a google search...

May 20 2009 at 8:31 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Risto T

They should integrate accelerometer based steady shooting like Darkroom or similar apps

May 19 2009 at 10:01 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
terryandbella

I just bought it and tried several products with various size UPC codes. It passed 5/5 times. On one book, which has a very small UPC, i needed to use the clarify case's lens, the others were taken with the straight iphone 3G camera. With good lighting, you shouldn't have an issue. Results were very quick, and very very accurate.

Compared to the G1's scanning app, i think this is a pretty close 2nd, although the focus still needs improvement.

May 19 2009 at 1:58 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
ben8799562

You might want to try out pic2hop for the iPhone. It is free, and has been available for over a month. The issues are the same (steady hand, good distance), but it works pretty well.

May 19 2009 at 1:49 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mars

This would be great addition to Delicious Library: the ability to scan my books, CDs and DVDs with the iPhone and then sync the data with desktop application.

Anything in the works on that sense?

May 19 2009 at 12:50 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Zach

I gave it a try. It blows. It's easier to just use Amazon's picture taking app, which is free.

May 18 2009 at 9:50 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Tim Dorr

It's funny because I had this idea a long time ago, but the method to implement it really isn't there until they allow direct access to the camera. I really want to be able to scan an image in real time, similar to how Delicious Library does it. It's got to have that satisfying beep ;)

May 18 2009 at 5:30 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
DesiLinguist

I just bought the app, tried it and it didn't work even after 10 tries! I tried to make sure that there was no glare, that the view was aligned correctly with the barcode and that the distance was also just right. No luck!

Even if I am doing something wrong, it's too much effort to get it just right. When you are in a store and want to look up something quickly, it will be much, much faster to either use SnapTell (for books) or just type the name into Google Mobile App.

*sigh* $1.99 wasted. May be it will get better with time and I will get my money's worth then.

May 18 2009 at 4:56 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to DesiLinguist's comment
Vikas Reddy

Sorry you had a bad experience. One question, were you trying RedLaser in good lighting? We tested it mostly in stores, where the lighting is good, and it worked really well. Also, did you try it on more than one barcode? There are a few "bad apples" of barcodes that don't work well in general.

We will definitely be improving RedLaser over the next few weeks, so please keep it installed and let us know what you think about the updates.

May 18 2009 at 6:12 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Thomas

I tried a friend's copy, and though he claimed it worked, on the book we tried, it never worked, even after 5 tries. Strangely, the picture seemed quite clear (no glare, etc), but it kept mixing up 6's and 0's, and usually getting a couple other digits wrong too. I don't know whether this is reading the actual lines or the digits, but it looks to me like it would work much better just doing OCR on the digits, which were perfectly clear to my eye (certainly, far clearer than the simplest captchas, which have long been defeated by OCR).

May 18 2009 at 9:08 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
bibi-pov

You know, I love the iPhone and was really underwhelmed by the G1, but I played with a friend's G2 last week and they have an app that does exactly the same thing. And here I really thing they have the edge. Because of the autofocus you can be closer, so it works better and most importantly, it analyze picture in real-time, meaning it tries to read the barcode in real-time and shake is much less an issue. I really hope we'll see that in the next generation or in iPhone 3.0 (but I don't remember seeing anything even remotely related in the prez).

May 18 2009 at 3:31 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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