Identify plants using Photos on iPhone.

1. Using iPhone's built-in Visual Look Up:
   1. Make sure your iPhone is running iOS 15 or later.
   2. Open the Camera app and point it at the plant.
      1. Alternatively, you can use an existing photo in your Photos app.
   3. A small white info icon (i) might appear over the plant in the viewfinder. Tap on it if it does.
   4. If the above method doesn't work, open the photo in your Photos app.
   5. Tap and hold on to the part of the photo containing the plant.
   6. If your iPhone recognizes the plant, a pop-up with information including its name will appear.

See the pic below (iPhone 12 Pro iOS 17.4)

Where are you located?

Here is how Visual Look Up is supposed to work:

• Use Visual Look Up to identify objects in your photos and videos on iPhone - Apple Support

VLU doesn’t always correctly identify images, if it even detects something, too. It is often confused by some cats.

Visual Look Up availability is limited by language:

• iOS and iPadOS - Feature Availability - Apple

And further by language and location:

• https://eclecticlight.co/2022/03/18/which-of-montereys-features-arent-available-where/

Also potentially useful for identifying plants and vegetation here, but unrelated to Visual Look Up, is Pl@ntNet:

• https://identify.plantnet.org/

Technical background on Visual Look Up:

• Visual lookup technology - Apple Community

IdrisSeabright wrote:

I've used one but don't remember the name. It was very fussy. You needed to put the leaves on a white background. Who wanders around outside with something for a white background?

You are already carrying what is needed to get a virtual white background.

Would y’all like a brief tour through Photos?

The following maple leaf image was borrowed from Wikipedia, and imported into Photos on iPad:

(With a fairly typical dappled forest background, too.)

To get a white (or black or other) background for the foreground in most images, in Photos, long-press on the foreground item (leaf), and Photos will lift it from the background:

(the next image is a screenshot, the lighter green leaf is the lifted item currently being dragged and shown offset from the original leaf to the upper right, and the rest of the image was dimmed. note: this screenshot image was cropped to get its size under the ASC posting limits.)

Here is how to copy just the leaf (again, cropped):

Paste that on whatever background you want:

(Here is that lifted leaf, pasted into a handy new black-background Note in the Notes app, cropped.)

And for completeness, getting back to the original Visual Look Up posting in this thread, here is Photos recognizing the leaf, too:

(again, cropped for posting)

Above from iPadOS 17.4.

Lawrence Finch wrote:

I didn’t either. I have 3 apps that do this very well, but one has a pretty expensive subscription (PictureThis!) Also Planty and PlantNet) which are free.

I've used one but don't remember the name. It was very fussy. You needed to put the leaves on a white background. Who wanders around outside with something for a white background?

I didn’t either. I have 3 apps that do this very well, but one has a pretty expensive subscription (PictureThis!) Also Planty and PlantNet) which are free.

Happening here for me just fine.

There's always the possibility the plant in the photo cannot be identified.

If there's extra info for the picture like a plant ID, the info icon should have a small star and a the I will change to a small leaf to signal it was able to identify the plant. If no leaf symbol, or no star, it may not have been able to identify it.

Its not guaranteed it will identify whatever is in the picture every time.

PictureThis is the best, but it’s like $25 a year, and isn’t fussy at all.

Distantly related, there are several apps to identify birdsong. Merlin Bird ID is the best; it can listen to a lot of birds all talking at once and identify all of them. The Audubon is also excellent. Both are free, but “encourage” contributions to the organizations that provide them (Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, and Audubon Society).

Lawrence Finch wrote:

Distantly related, there are several apps to identify birdsong. Merlin Bird ID is the best; it can listen to a lot of birds all talking at once and identify all of them. The Audubon is also excellent. Both are free, but “encourage” contributions to the organizations that provide them (Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, and Audubon Society).

Oooo! I'll have to try those. I'm horrible at identifying bird songs other than a few basic ones (e.g., cardinals, crows, robins, loons, mourning doves, ducks, and geese).

MrHoffman wrote:

IdrisSeabright wrote:

I've used one but don't remember the name. It was very fussy. You needed to put the leaves on a white background. Who wanders around outside with something for a white background?

You are already carrying what is needed to get a virtual white background.

An excellent tutorial! I believe that the last time I used that app that required the white background, I didn't have these options. But I will keep them in mind.

Nowadays, a virtual white background may be needed.

..While in bygone days, users of the Zone System carried

'Grey Scale' card, in 'gear' packs; with many heavy lenses.

Some of that, I still have ~ but don't travel with it anymore.

.Birds and ornithology were among a dozen natural science

areas of acquaintance due to parental avocational interests.

For use primarily with Black and White, pre-processing; in

the field where you can pre-determine outcomes of Film.

.Of things learned in my youthful years; so many how-to's.

Color transparencies were useful to capture true-life hues.

A portfolio of 35mm never digitalized exists in binders here.

PS: other plant histories were sources of medicine.

Before revisions Erowid site was very cool..

https://www.erowid.org/herbs/

Erowid Herb Vaults : Images

https://www.erowid.org/herbs/herbs_images.shtml

https://www.erowid.org/spirit/

💮..Various flora status levels require further study..🐝

Oh, wow. I didn't know about this feature!

Hello~ It’s a cool feature! I use it often and it identifies animals/birds as well. It is nice when taking pictures at a garden or park!!

~Katana-San~

I learn so many cool things hanging out here!

IdrisSeabright wrote:

Oh, wow. I didn't know about this feature!

I use it a lot with various plants on our property and for birds too!