Monday, January 24, 2011

QR Codes - Scanning Study

I recently came across a poster that had three QR codes advertising three different educational events for teenage boys; Martial Arts, Boxing and Cross Training. You don't often see three QR codes on one advertisement. I was curious as to what the interface consequences would be if I took a scan of all three at once and then two at a time. I was using the QR Code Scanner Pro by The Jared Company. I held my BlackBerry Torch 12 inches away from the poster each time I scanned it. I took ten scans each time (three sets of ten) and the mobile web sites that launched were as follows:

Scanning all three at once:
Martial Arts - 1
Boxing - 9
Cross Training - 0

With this test, I placed my image screen so that the three were evenly lined up across my BlackBerry screen. It seems that the scanner picks up the middle of the screen 90% of the time. I'm not sure if the scanner technology scans the complete screen on my BlackBerry Torch or just down the center. The fact that it picked Martial Arts once could be because I accidently held the BlackBerry more to the left.

Scanning the two QR codes on the left:
Martial Arts - 2
Boxing - 8

Scanning the two QR codes on the right:
Boxing - 8
Cross Training - 2

The interesting thing about these last two scan tests is that both QR codes were lined up evenly in the middle of the screen, yet it still scanned the Boxing QR code most of the time. Is there such a thing as a "stronger" QR code? Anyhow, this test definitely tells me that you need to place the scanner image screen over one QR code at a time. Otherwise, you might find yourself taking multiple scans to get the mobile web site you want to view.


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