Hi, Anne and Sandy have both given good answers to the question about what the difference is between the TextGrabber and Prizmo OCR apps. My quick answer would be similar to Anne's: that for use with a StandScan Pro or Scan Box that supports your iPhone at the right height, TextGrabber might work slightly better for you, but that the voice guidance features of Prizmo for image positioning make it easier to use if you are trying to OCR something freehand. (Anne, Sandy, and I, along with a few other list members, all trained ourselves to use these OCR apps freehand using the previous version of Prizmo. If you have no vision, I'd recommend getting the Light Detector app to check lighting conditions before you use your OCR app freehand.)
In addition, as Sandy says, Prizmo works in a way that is a bit more like conventional OCR apps for scanners, in being able to separate out regions of text and pictures. Because these two apps use different OCR engines, one or the other may perform slightly better for specific documents. And in addition to the basic engine, you may find TextGrabber more streamlined for doing page by page document scans with the StandScan Pro, but prefer to use Prizmo for books. I wanted to point out one feature of Prizmo that hasn't been mentioned: it can can run OCR from PDF files, while OCR apps either require that the image be taken by the user from the camera, or by selecting an image from your camera roll, or by starting with a jpeg image. A number of people have asked whether it's possible to run an OCR from a PDF image -- especially college students who may receive official forms or class handouts as scanned PDF images that they either download or get as mail attachments. In those cases you can use the "Open in" feature to open that PDF document in Prizmo, and OCR the results. Before. we had to screen capture the images to our camera rolls, and then use either TextGrabber or Prizmo to open the last image in our camera rolls and OCR it, and you'd have to do a separate screen shot for each page. This feature of the upgraded version of Prizmo from a few months ago is usable on any iOS device, regardless of that device's camera resolution. There's a good LifeHacker article on "The Best Image-to-Text App for iPhone": http://lifehacker.com/5829568/the-best-image+to+text-app-for-iphone It's old, but basically accurate, except for the current pricing information. Prizmo and TextGrabber have each received recent version upgrades that improved OCR performance and the the app's interface, along with its accessibility with VoiceOver. Apart from the overall quality and accuracy of the OCR performance, both these apps support multiple languages (even in the same document), and can deal with images that are upside down or rotated by 90 degrees. TextGrabber will support OCR in more non-European languages, so that might be another consideration. Prizmo lists for $9.99, and has only gone on sale a few times. TextGrabber's price has been as high as $9.99, especially after the recent version upgrade, but goes on sale more frequently, and has been available for as low as $0.99 and $1.99 recently, so this can be quite a bargain. (Current TextGrabber price is $5.99) There's a third OCR app that a number of people like: TextDetective. It works using the iPhone camera with the device held in landscape mode. For many people, before the release of Prizmo version 2, Text Detective was the first freehand OCR app they were able to get results with. It works very fast, and updates you on the OCR progress. You can save results to history, send as a text message or send as email. However, it only works in English, you have to orient the document correctly (no upside down or rotated text), and the image usually only covers a section of the area or page that you want to OCR. You can use it for non-standard conditions -- like holding it in front of your computer screen to OCR contents when your screen reader voice has failed. TextDetective was released at a very low price ($1.99), but since the New Year has been priced at $9.99. Unlike Prizmo and TextGrabber, TextDetective was designed with visually impaired users in mind. I will say, however, that both Prizmo and TextGrabber did a wonderful job of redesigning their interfaces for use with VoiceOver in response to user feedback. Here are the App Store URLs for all three OCR apps mentioned above, with current prices: • TextGrabber + Translator for iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch ($5.99) by ABBYY https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/textgrabber-+-translator/id438475005?mt=8 • Prizmo - Scanning, OCR, and Speech ($9.99) by Creaceed https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/prizmo-scanning-ocr-speech/id366791896?mt=8 • TextDetective ($9.99) by Blindsight https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/textdetective/id541494875?mt=8 HTH. Cheers, Esther On 6 Jul 2013, at 09:12, Sandratomkins wrote: > Hi, > > Text Grabber has a lovely, simple interface and has quite a good OCR > Engine, but prizmo's is a little more sophisticated. So, if you come across a > piece of text, perhaps in a newspaper/magazine where text is displaced by > pictures/headlines/cartoons etc, prizmo might do rather batter than TG for > you. > > However, I have found that TG does better with shiny surfaces. In short, > the two apps compliment eachother. plus, should one become, temporarily, > inaccessible, something that can happen to the best intentioned of apps, you > will always have the other. > > Finally, prizmo allows you to create multi-page documents/books. i haven't > done much with this myself, but the possibility is there! > > HTH Sandy. > > Sent from my iPhone > > On 6 Jul 2013, at 19:57, Lelia Struve <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Hi JoJo, and any one else who wants to answer, what is the difference >> between text grabber and prismo? I know different people have different >> views, I have text grabber but not prismo. that is why I am asking. >> >> -- >> Lelia >> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google Group. To search the VIPhone public archive, visit http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. 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