talkingpics: the iphone's first real research app

I've been paying close attention to the applications being developed for the iPhone in the hope of finding a few that take full advantage of the device's unique strengths.

I found one today. Dan Rockwell's article iPhone's first real research app for Lextant reviews an app called TalkingPics that allows you to take a picture an annotate it on your iPhone.

Big frickin' deal, you might say. Dan responds:

Big frickin’ deal, eh? Well, yes, actually it is. There’s no other app on the iPhone that does this, and more importantly, it’s not as cumbersome as traditional audio and video capture methods. It’s a great way to capture what the participant is talking about, and then provide additional context to that image — what’s right or wrong about a product; what needs attention in a store; etc. Simply take a picture, and then record an audio snippet describing it.

For the researcher presented with lots and lots of information, the ability to synthesize visuals and audio annotation is a powerful tool. And as Dan notes:

As an added bonus, TalkingPics also lets you audio annotate locations on a map, which makes it easy to connect who said what where.

So if you were on a walking tour of a city, saw something neat and wanted to take a picture of it, mark it on the map and capture your thoughts about it all in real-time, TalkingPics allows you to do that.

I think this app has value for everyone with an iPhone, not simply the research-inclined.