But who keeps a food journal? Exactly.
Unless you have extreme note-taking OCD like me, it’s too much of a pain in the ass to write down what you eat and track it all. I use the online food database here to keep my facts straight, but data entry sucks no matter how you slice it.
Here are first-look highlights of the FoodScanner, which launched a few hours ago and is now available…
1. DailyBurn’s FoodScanner is the first and only application that uses the iPhone’s camera to scan the UPC codes of foods and link them with full nutritional information (calories, macronutrients, etc.).
2. With a built-in database of more than 200,000 foods, it is the easiest way to accurately log what you eat during the day and keep an up-to-date calorie and nutrient count. All information is automatically synced with DailyBurn’s sophisticated workout and nutrition-tracking web application.
3. You don’t have to use the new 3GS with auto-focus. It works accurately on all iPhones using the most accurate scanning technology for iPhone – Occipital’s Red Laser.
4. You can also track natural foods (not processed) by searching by name or brand.
Full disclosure: I am an advisor to DailyBurn, but I chose to work with them specifically because I selfishly wanted to have the tools I need to geek out in less time. Here is another favorite new feature: breakdown of meals by protein/carbohydrate/fat composition (http://dailyburn.com/foods once logged in).
Keep in mind that FoodScanner is not a tool for teaching people to eat bar-coded foods. In fact, it can be quite the opposite: an awareness-building tool that makes you less likely to eat crap. Though the manual natural food tracking still requires some automating in the future, the technology is moving in the right direction.
iPhone screenshots can be seen in Gizmodo’s review.
The Tim Ferriss Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world with more than one billion downloads. It has been selected for "Best of Apple Podcasts" three times, it is often the #1 interview podcast across all of Apple Podcasts, and it's been ranked #1 out of 400,000+ podcasts on many occasions. To listen to any of the past episodes for free, check out this page.
Comment Rules: Remember what Fonzie was like? Cool. That’s how we’re gonna be — cool. Critical is fine, but if you’re rude, we’ll delete your stuff. Please do not put your URL in the comment text and please use your PERSONAL name or initials and not your business name, as the latter comes off like spam. Have fun and thanks for adding to the conversation! (Thanks to Brian Oberkirch for the inspiration.)
So, will there be a blackberry version coming? I doubt I’ll be getting an iPhone anytime soon….would love to use it on my blackberry here in Canada!!
Tim, what do you believe has been the most effective method(whether physical or mental) for sticking to your effective/strict diet?
– Jose
It’s because you are putting your business terms in your name, which is getting flagged by people going through comments. If you just use your name per the comment rules, it should show up.
Tim –
Wrong topic to pose this question but do you have a date for when the next book comes out?
Paul
When he held the apple to the phone for a moment there I was like “oh my freakin god.” I felt stupid when he said that we are not quite there yet.
I used to be obsessed a at one point in my life on both workouts and nutrition. I maintain a pretty decent diet. It is now a natural part of my life. I go shopping for food and I don’t even have to make an effort to buy the right foods.
After years of doing eating right for or the simple reason that i don’t want to have stupid illnesses like high cholesterol, diabetes and hypertension, stuff that can be avoided. Eating whole grains veggies and fruits is my natural lifestyle. I have absolutely no need for something like that.
BTW, what can you see on the phone that is not already printed on the label? That application seem like a big waste of time to me, it does not deserve it’s own blog post.
Ha! what a neat gadget! Sweet!
Cheers,
Yavor
tim
I love these new tools you’re sharing!
side note:
Have you ever met up with Jeff Allen since he also lives in SF?
You should meet up with him and interview him about his new book or something
would be preeeetty cool
cheers
hehe i meant the Jeff Allen who wrote Nine Ball, since i just realized there are a million people with the same name
cheers
Yo Tim,
lol. Thanks for the web-based bullsh*t phrase generator. Worked like a charm. Here’s a bullsh*t generator for Facebook and Twitter:
http://www.generatus.com/
Live it up!
Sounds like a pretty effective tool, but I’m the type of eater who doesn’t go so far as to count calories or grams of saturated fat…i just stick with what I know to be reasonably healthy. My biggest issue is eating out, which I do a lot, but its generally impossible to tell what the nutrition content of a meal at a restaurant is. Does dailyburn have a plan to integrate restaurant meals into its database? Are there any other tools for this?
Dear Mr. Terriss,
My name is Carolina and I work as a reporter at the Brazilian magazine Galileu. Galileu is a popular monthly magazine about science and technology (a little bit like Discover, Wired and New Scientist), which belongs to the biggest media group in Latin America, the Globo Organizations. It is the second largest selling magazine of this kind in Brazil.
We´re are producing an article about the modern life and how it has turned people´s life crazy and stressful. The article will talk about how tecnology has changed our lifestyle, how people always want to know everything is going on, reading any news, always plugged.
So, the article will gonna ask: is it time of slow down? Shouldn´t we make less things at the same time?
It´s very important for us to have your opinion about that.
Could you, please, give me an interview?
We can talk by phone or email. Just tell me what do you prefer.
Thank you very much.
Best regards,
Carolina Monteiro
Reporter – Galileu Magazine
Hi Tim,
I see your tweet yesterday about Stephen Key.
I’m wondering: why now his services and why now?
I’ve been wondering if the training is worth it– the “1k investment.”
Any thoughts or personal miracle testimonies?
Incidentally, do you ever watch Shark Tank or Dragon’s Den? What do you think of kevin o’leary?
Will
Aren’t you an investor in DailyBurn?
Yes, indeed. I’m both an advisor and an investor, hence the “full dislosure” in the post itself.
Best,
Tim
Honestly as an IT guy who loves his iPhone my intial thought was very cool, but as a health food nut who buys most of his food at Trater Joes or the farmers market I began to realize that this application would most likely be a complete waste and perpectuates the horrid eating habbits that Americans have. Eat organic and live! It you are trying to watch your weight my vote is for the Lose It! iPhone application….
Shawn, I disagree. If you’re talking about pure FoodScanner I get it… I’m super pleased with DailyBurn app though. It is interesting to look up stuff though – it deters me more than I would be without it.
I’m not perfect, of course. 🙂
When I get off track with eating due to vacation, long hours working, or just general chaos with a toddler, I keep a food journal for a few days. I would definitely love this application to track my habits and maybe even try to prevent the bad ones. It doesn’t mean being crazy with your food choices or starving yourself, but rather just being aware. I don’t like spending time writing stuff down – so if I can scan my food – that would be a huge timesaver.
Thank you for sharing this new tool!
Also, I recently finish your 4 hour work week book and loved it!
This is a lot better than other iphone apps that required you to search for the information. There are so many different food items one can possibly eat in one day, this saves a lot of time for those who want to eat less and move more to burn calories and lose weight. There are over 100+ fitness applications for the iphone. I look forward to trying this one out and adding it to my list of fitness solutions for busy people.
Tim,
Following on from tracking food, can you recommend any (mac) software or alternate method of tracking personal metrics such as time spent online, sleeping time, daily mood and daily alcohol consumption etc?
I’ve searched the web and havn’t found much at all.
Cheers,
Tim Coghlan
Hey, cool app! Too bad it doesn’t work outside the US. This would’ve been a useful tool to have for foodies/health conscious people like me.
You might be interested in the medical advice / self tracking web site https://www.keas.com/ (not affiliated to me).
Regards,
tamberg
Iphone ruules. nice video
That’s a pretty cool tool – though the bar code part of it is still a challenge (yes, I know it’s not made to teach you to eat that stuff 🙂
I run a food photo-sharing site called nom.ms (url on my name), which involves just taking pictures of the food you eat and tweeting them out. So far, the users seem to find it a lot of fun. Though it definitely doesn’t count calories for you, sharing pictures of the food you eat does make you more aware of your eating habits – while seeing pictures of food other people eat gives you some idea of where you stand. So, it might be cool to see a social aspect to this app.
I don’t have an iPhone… but this app sounds awesome. Right now I’m typing all my food into a program on Facebook. It words, but this looks so much faster.
Will this program work in Australia?
This is a great idea, and you will make a lot of money.
I know this because I know someone who wanted to develop this exact thing, but as a standalone device. the fact that you guys combined it with an iphone just shows that you are very bright
best of luck
the livestrong app is solid too. the daily plate part finds most foods and dishes easily.
nice app. i hope it will be a good “friend” for them who use it.
Hey everybody… We released FoodScanner 1.1 yesterday with some cool new features, usability improvements, etc.
Also, FoodScanner is now available in Canada!
Enjoy your scanning…
[…] Tim Ferris article about the iPhone food scanner Share and Enjoy: […]
Hi Andy….
Any news on coming to the UK market..?
Thanks
John
I would imagine that within 6 months, there will be at least a few imitators of this application on a variety of platforms. This only tells me that while this app in particular may be an innovator or “the best” for now, it will lose its competitive advantage and sales of the app/total revenue will level out.
With this assumption, wouldn’t it be best to invest more in companies that are open to the potential of capturing a larger portion of the mobile app market?
http://www.businessinsider.com/greylock-raises-575-million-in-six-weeks-2009-11
Are you just an “advisor”? I thought you also invested in this company, which you did not disclose above…
I picked up this app after reading this post. I’m a UX designer and have spent quite a bit of time designing and building iPhone apps. The technology behind the scanner is great but unfortunately the project team forgot that humans will be using it.
I believe the app has potential, and I want to frame my critique as constructively as possible.
Data caching – don’t make me wait for each day to load when skipping backward or forward. This data should be cached – I mean we’re only talking about formatted text and a reference ID.
Also, your users are humans – creatures of habit – and our diets reflect this. If I have a carton of eggs in my fridge I’m going to be manually searching (or skipping backward and reloading previous data) to add ‘eggs’ every morning. I found that about 75% of my entries were duplicates. It would be great if these items were cached on the phone and offered with some sort of intelligent input method, like AutoComplete. Again, we’re only talking about some text and a reference ID. The value offsets the storage use.
My last concern is that DailyBurn has another app in the store where I can see the results of my consumption and track workout/cardio activity. I downloaded this app as well ONLY for the calorie-breakdown tracking so I can see the additive results of what I enter with the Food Scanner. It would be really nice if the Food Scanner feature were just a paid upgrade from the initial app, or if the Food Scanner atleast reused the calorie-breakdown view.
I’m not simply complaining about the design… These few simple issues are deal-breakers with regard to long-term adoption and continuance.
Great comment. I’ll pass this on to them. Thanks!
Tim
Dustin,
Thanks for the comments.
Re: input… next update (should be in the store any time now) will have favorites so you can easily get to the foods you eat frequently.
Calorie breakdown in FoodScanner is coming too.
Best Regards,
Andy Smith
Heads up Tim, video was taken down.
[…] this, create an index of products, similar to the indexes of foods at sites like StillTasty and DailyBurn. Instead of expiration dates and nutritional information, though, this should walk users through […]
[…] you need more details or want to part with more money, you can always buy iPhone apps or join DailyBurn.com, which looks cool, I just haven’t wanted to shell out a yearly subscription fee at this […]
This event is really great!
thank you
Hmmm…..I eat very little packaged food, so I don’t really see how this would be useful. How do I add in the carrots, lettuce, celery, homemade yogurt, etc.? I’d really like to see someone develop app that works effectively with the exchange system – track carbs, fruit, veg, protein, fat…. Doesn’t anyone cook anymore?
I loved the daily burn tracker. I used the free version for 4 years. Did you pay to play or are you using something different now?
Nice cool software