brave [little] meme

Barcode scanning apps on the iPhone are ten a penny, but £1.99 RedLaser [iTunes link] does something different: in scan mode, it constantly analyses the viewfinder’s video stream until it finds a barcode, without the user having to take a picture.

Big deal right? Well yes, because it’s not supposed to do that. Apple’s latest API’s, released with the iPhone OS 3.1 update, have expanded the use of the video camera to allow Augmented Reality apps to overlay data onto the camera viewfinder’s feed. However, as far as I know, developers weren’t allowed to actually manipulate, or process, said video feed.

How then is the RedLaser processing the viewfinder’s feed? And why isn’t the same technique used by AR apps such as WikiTude, RobotVision and Bionic Eye to process real-world markers? I’d really be interested to see AR applications expand their functionality to real-time processing of real-world markers such as billboards and landmarks. Too early to tell if and when that will become a reality on the humble iPhone.