Is it possible to search stuffs inside a picture by touching it? Yes, it is!

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‘Vanity’ Metrics

The modern world generate 657 billion photos per year. To put it into perspective, we take more photos every 2 minutes than ever existed in the last 150 years. This is according to the annual internet Trend report by Mary Meeker in 2014 which stated that 1.8 billion photos were uploaded online every single day of that year. In other words, our world from the digital dimension is a gigantic mass of visual information.

The problem we are trying to solve?

Nothing new, unique or fantastic. Just another aim at using AI (computer vision) for social discovery.

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We want to enable people search inside any picture by touching. Instead of searching by keywords, we wanted to enable search by touch and in turn grow an ecosystem of picture-loving people. User will get every experience they are already used to (like, comment, share) PLUS a new (touch-based) interaction, hence the name Touchabl.

We quietly launched Touchabl Picture app for Android. You can now actually touch things inside a picture to know what it is. For example, if you see a watch in a picture and you touched it, it will give you information about the watch… plus, it will show you pictures of other watches that looks like it.

Think about all the things you can do with this app! We don’t know how this app will add value to your everyday life – for example, if it can help you get fashion ideas on what to wear or to know the designers your favourite celebrities is wearing, or shop for something when you don’t know the name. We also anticipate the it could be used for sharing Product Groupie by businesses (Product Groupie is a picture containing several related items). See example image of Product Groupie below, each image in the “groupie” is touchabl and shoppable:

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Touchabl app is still in its early stage and we want to make it even better, and competitive enough.
So, here’s what we’re asking of you. Help us test the app and provide feedback to help us improve the experience further.

Here’s the link :+1::heart:
Or go to https://www.touchabl.com
Thank you, as we look forward to your feedback (especially telling us about the things that are not working well).

P.S: In case you don’t know what feedback to give, here are some ideas:

  1. Could you tell, on first impression, what the app is about?
  2. Is the app easy to understand and use without someone else assisting you?
  3. Is the app responsive and fast?
  4. Are there any broken links? Is something misbehaving or not working well?
  5. What are your expectations , and where did we fall short?

Kindly leave a comment below, or you can send an email to teamtouchabl@gmail.com.

Thank you! Much appreciated.

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Can you drop one use case ?

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Hi @wkyo. Thank you for your interest. This is a tough one, but let me try:

  • Jane Doe shares a picture on her timeline
  • Her followers Likes and Comment on the picture
  • There’s this fine red shoe Jane is wearing in the picture she shared, and Fiona (Jane’s follower) want to know what it is and where to buy it (possibly).
  • Instead of asking Jane in the comment section (feeling she might perceive it as a personal question), Fiona touches the picture and she get the information she wants. She also sees other visually similar stuffs in the result the app returned.
  • Fiona can buy the shoe or save it for later (bookmark).

At our back-end;

  • Fiona’s touch is captured and stored as a “Fip” aka fingertip; something like “Like” but for touches.
    -There are other people like Fiona who maybe interested in other stuffs in Jane’s picture (handbag, watch, etc). Their touches (if any) are also captured and stores as “Fips”.
  • With these “Fips”, we can measure what people are touching in any given picture (such as Jane’s), when they were touched and how many people touched what.

Use Case 1
Advertising company somewhere:

  • AdCo, on signing up, gets a dashboard and/or a special button that enable them know how people are engaging with any picture on the platform (via likes, comment, bookmarks and Fips).
  • AdCo creates a campaign targeting interest which appears in user result when they touch stuffs in other people’s picture.

Use Case 2 (sorry)
Sabina, another follower of Jane who’s a fashion-savvy girl or woman somewhere:

  • Sabina, who may not be able to afford Jane’s shoe because it’s expensive (Jane is a celebrity), sees other visually similar but cheaper shoes in the returned search result.
  • Sabina is also able to touch Jane’s other fashions stuff to get similar recommendations within her budget.
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Cool concept/product…could prolly use it to access the amount a person put on too

As long as it doesn’t drain mb, then no issues

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Forget about the business side for a minute. Did you just build a technology that can detect if a bag is either Gucci or Prada? Are you kidding me?

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Yes sir! it was very ambitious and difficult, but we managed to do it. Still fine-tuning it, it can only get better with every update release.

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Una try o

Much like reloaded pinterest

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can you explain this part?

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Good stuff :thumbsup:

Please, can you post a video of the application in action?

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Video files are not allowed on this forum, but you can watch me using Touchabl by following this YouTube link: https://youtu.be/xm6oX4tUkKc

Alternative, you can download the app and see for yourself (unless you are using iOS).

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Are you telling me you didn’t use any API ?.. (Because I know of a company doing image recognition whereby you receive a description of its contents)

BUT, If you’re not using any API for the image recognition then you’ve built something really interesting that I would be happy to engage you about.

Are you fundraising ? What are your plans to take this to next level ?
(Answer these question if you’re not using an API)

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Yes sir. No object/image recognition API used.

Okay. Looking forwarding to it.

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Big chief, @xolubi. Any word for the boys?

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So does it link to, say, Google for similar pictures? How is this pulled off?

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On your website under Team, did you intend to write ‘Pun intended’, because it came out as ‘Pun intened’.

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Have you thought about allowing third-parties build on your application? We’ll be very interested in this here.

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Thank you. This will be corrected right away.

We use similar technology for doing this.

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Yes sir. I will keep you posted on this. Already working on it.

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I just tried your app. Tapped on the headset on one of the pics, it brought similar images, I guess I am still figuring how ur app works.

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That’s the default behaviour. It should also give you the name of the headset.

In the next update release, it will give additional information about the thing you touched; and tapping on the “shopping” cart icon will redirect you to where it can be bought. If there’s something else you would like to see, kindly drop me a line and I will see to it.