APP SPECIAL...... New app claims to look inside all objects

New app claims to look inside all objects





The app developed by engineers in Germany gives information about any objec or food item just by scanning it with a smartphone camera

A German engineering firm has recently announced that it has developed an app that looks directly inside objects and displays specific constituents. The app named `HawkSpex mobile' will have applications across a wide range of areas and uses the front facing camera.

One of the case scenarios the app developers provide is how one can use the app to find if an apple labelled organic is really organic. One can use the app to find if the apple contains any pesticide residues.

Even though it is not a new idea and Even though it is not a new there are several systems that can perform such scans today, users need to use exter na l ha rdware attachments such as a prism. That can be costly, impractical and interferes with a smartphone's design.

“What makes our app special is that users don't need anything for a scan other than the camera already integrated into their smartphones,“ says Prof Udo Seiffert, expert group manager at the engineering firm.

Generally, these kind of scans are performed with a special hyper spectral camera. The hyperspectral camera adjusts to a different coloured light each time and deter mines how much of a colour's light is reflected by an object, thus generating a complete spectral fingerprint of the object. However, the `HawkSpex mobile' app uses a mathematical model to extract any information on an object.

Instead of an expensive spectral camera measuring the intensity of light reflected by different colours, the app uses the phone's display.It successively and illuminates the object with a series of different colours for fractions of a second.

This way, if the display illuminates only red light on the object, the object can only ref lect red light ­ and the camera can only measure red light. The app's intelligent analysis algorithms enable and compensate a smartphone's limited computing performance as well as the limited performance of the camera and display.

The app is expected to be launched officially by the end of this year.

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