How to search for text in photos or scanned images

Phil Libin, CEO of Evernote, showed us at the DigitalNow conference how you can search for text within photos or scanned images. Evernote allows you to capture information in any environment using whatever device or platform you find most convenient and makes this information accessible and searchable at any time, from anywhere.

In this example, a photo of me with LinkedIn co-founder and vice president Allen Blue is dropped into Evernote. I didn't add any tags or descriptions to the photo. Because my name badge was visible in the photo, I simply use Evernote's search function to locate it. If you look closely, you'll see that Evernote actually highlights the text in my name badge.



Another example is this business card. Because I don't have a scanner, I take a photo of the card and simply add the photo to Evernote. Again, I don't waste time typing in tags or descriptions.

So let's say 10 months later, I want to call the managing director of national accounts for a membership database company that I met at the meeting. And I don't remember his name nor his company, but I did recall he's based in Vienna. So when I search on "Vienna" I find the photo of his business card with all the contact information.