Do you end up writing “Do Not Erase” on whiteboards to save critical notes? Is your audience losing focus on your presentation because they are busy taking notes from the whiteboard?

The solution is a sleek application called ScanR Whiteboards. This software allows you to take a photo of your whiteboard, create a PDF enhanced version of the picture, and send it to your email as a PDF attachment automatically. The software works great with several options such as a regular digital camera, or using your built-in camera on your smartphone. I started using this application when it was in beta several years ago, and my clients kept asking me about it. Recently, I got the question again, so I put together some information below.

I love using the application simply because I can tell my audience that they do not have to take any notes. This not only generates relief among my attendees, they are also more receptive to my presentation as they will not be focusing on my presentation and note-taking at the same time. They can just kick back, relax and enjoy the presentation. I should mention that it is a great way of capturing notes from brain-storming sessions using one or more whiteboards.

The application works on most smartphones, as long as you have a 1.3 MP camera, which is required to capture images with enough quality to generate a PDF-enhanced version of the image. See this link to check if your phone works with the application. The cost for a license is negligible for $19.95 on Handango. To use the application you also need to create an account on ScanR’s official site.

Once installed on your smartphone, using the application is easy. You start the application and take one or more shots on your whiteboard. The application then automatically connects to a public ScanR server on the internet, uploads the image(s), enhances the picture(s) using a simple picture enhancement algorithm, and generates PDF versions of the image, to finally send you an email with the PDF attachment(s). It is all very easy! It helps if you have the unlimited data plan so connecting to the internet often will not generate additional charge. However, the application works great for with or without the unlimited data plan as it holds the outgoing images in a pending folder, so that you can choose to bundle all your images and send them out at a later time.

The email from ScanR automatic server, contains a thumbnail view of your attachment, so that you can identify the image you are looking for, in case you have several emails from ScanR in your inbox. Here is test picture taken from my whiteboard using my Treo 700W running Windows Mobile 5.0.

<click image for full size view>

As you can see, the quality is quite good.

Other uses of ScanR

• Save notes from presentations, meetings, classes
• Create digital copies of prototypes, designs on whiteboards
• Digital copies of whiteboard notes are more “readable”
• Quickly save notes from brain-storming sessions
• Stop writing “Do Not Erase” no whiteboards

Important Notes

• Once you have created an account on www.scanr.com, make sure to edit your account settings so that Email Delivery is turned ON. Otherwise, your emails will only contain a link to view your image or PDF online.
• Setup your built-in camera to use the highest possible resolution to ensure high-quality image capture
• If you have a storage card plugged into your smartphone, make sure to save ScanR installation file on it. This way you can re-install the application if you are on the road and you for some reason had to do a hardware reset on your device.

Enjoy

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