Using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) AI reads number plates in parallel or as an alternative to scanning IDs. For events like marathons and mountain bike races, it is impractical to hand out or scan IDs, but we can use OCR to read the number plates of the runners/riders and send them a link to their gallery of images. OCR is enabled and configured at the event level in the Console.
There are two main things that you will most likely need to use in conjunction with OCR for a good user experience:
Attendees: a pre-populated list of attendees/participants and some form of contact for them e.g. cell/mobile phone number which is uploaded to the Console before the event.
A Regex: a dataset used to let know the OCR what to expect; also used to check/improve the results of OCR.
Once configured correctly, you should be able to photograph a runner/rider as they pass you (with a visible/readable number plate), the images will upload and that contestant will receive an SMS or email with a link to their gallery.
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Note: This is not a simple turn on/turn off like most of our features. If you wish to use this feature, please read this User Guide and then contact the Support team (sooner rather than later) for help. |
Enabling Optical Character Recognition
OCR is enabled per event on the event page in the Console.
- Make the integration available to your events by first going to your Member page. Click your name in the top right-hand corner and click Member from the menu.
- Select the Integrations tab; this is where you can add and remove active integrations on your account.
- Click the green New Integration button, select OCR 123 from the list and click the green Save button.
- If you are unable to select it, reach out to the support team on Slack.
- Once added, go to the event page and select the Integrations tab, click the green Add button and select OCR 123 from the list.
- Once you enable Use OCR, a new setting will appear titled OCR Regex. By default, our OCR is set to look for any number between 2 digits long and 5 digits long.
- Without a regex: If your event has number plates that are 5 digits long, but the photograph only shows the last two digits of somebody's number plate (e.g. xxx25) the system will read 25 and add it to the gallery of attendee number 25.
- With a regex: We can set a minimum number of characters that need to be detected before a match is confirmed, or maybe the number plate also uses numbers and we need to let the OCR know to expect that... basically, it's complicated, but a Regex makes everything better - only if done right. Please contact us for help building a regex for your event.
So far, we've configured the event to be able to use OCR to recognize number plates, and the console will be able to sort the images into galleries, but we still need a way to tell the individual how to access their gallery of photos.
To do this, we will use the Attendees function. You will need to be able to acquire a list of all participants and some form of contact information and upload it to the Console. You'll need to work with the event organizers to make sure that their privacy policy allows for this to happen. Again, contact us for assistance regarding Privacy Policies, etc.
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Note: OCR is AI-based and is therefore not 100% accurate. To give the OCR AI the best chance of accuracy we will give you recommendations to make sure that your images are going to be of a sufficient resolution and your photographers are mindful of their positioning, so that the participant's number plates are a reasonable size and fully visible - which will allow the recognition to make reliable matches. |