CAM-502
The tray is empty and the guest is already standing there
Ten fifteen in the morning, the end of breakfast. Four trays on the central island are nearly empty, their rims dirty; the counter has crumbs, used plates and spilt food on it, and pastries and pieces of fruit have fallen on the floor around it. One guest stands waiting with a plate in his hand; two more circle the island looking for whatever is left. At the back, the service station is still staffed. IRIS sees the tray with no food in it, the dirty counter and what’s on the floor.
Turn on IRIS Vision
AI-generated image
What IRIS understands
What it recognizes in this scene
- trays run out and dirty
- buffet island
- scraps and used plates on the counter
- food fallen on the floor
- guest waiting with a plate in hand
- guests looking for what is left
- service station at the back, staffed
- lounge seating area
What this camera measures
An alert says something’s happening. The reading says how much.
- 4Trays run out right now
- 9 minTime of the one empty longest
- 5Guests at the island
- 6Items fallen on the floor
- 10:05Time of the last refill
The figures on this screen are an example from the illustration, not any client’s measurement.
The rule
You decide once. IRIS applies it always.
If
a tray has been empty for more than five minutes with guests in front of the island, or there is food fallen in the walkway
Then
- alert whoever refills, with the station and the tray that has run out
- alert cleaning if what is there is food on the floor
- record the time each tray ran out in the breakfast log
The instruction that set it up«Tell me when a buffet tray has been empty for more than five minutes with guests in front of it, or when there is food on the floor.»
What changes
What changes for the manager and the front desk
Ten fifteen, the end of breakfast. A guest has been standing at the central island for half a minute, plate in hand, four empty trays in front of him. Breakfast is what shows up most in reviews, and what sinks a review is almost never the food: it’s walking up and finding the tray empty. With the alert, the kitchen assistant comes out with the tray before the guest turns away. The floor is a separate matter and goes to cleaning: food in the walkway is somebody slipping. And knowing the time each item runs out, day after day, you buy and cook better: fewer gaps at the end and less food thrown away.
What people usually ask
Does IRIS know whether the food was any good?
No. IRIS sees the empty tray; it doesn’t know whether the food was any good. It sees that there’s nothing left in it, that the counter is dirty and that somebody is standing there waiting, and it alerts whoever refills. What was in the tray and how it tasted is for the kitchen and the guest to know. Taste isn’t measured with a camera, and we aren’t going to say otherwise.
Does this tell you how much food gets thrown away?
It tells you what time each item runs out and how often a gap is left with people standing in front of it, day after day. With that you cook closer to what’s needed, and what’s left over at the end goes down. But IRIS doesn’t weigh food or count portions: the kitchen does that. They are two different figures and they read better side by side; combining them is the hotel’s decision, not IRIS’s.
Does food on the floor raise an alert too?
Yes, and it goes somewhere else. A pastry in the walkway of a busy buffet is somebody slipping, so that alert goes to cleaning and not to whoever refills: two different jobs, and at that hour nobody is watching a screen. IRIS sees that something has fallen and where it is; it doesn’t know what it is or who dropped it, and it doesn’t need to for someone to go and pick it up.
Other cameras
- CAM-495 · The check-in line decides the review they are going to write
- CAM-496 · Forty guests crossing the plaza, and reception doesn’t know yet
- CAM-497 · Nineteen people waiting and a single desk open
- CAM-498 · The breakfast room is full and the line never gets past the host stand
- CAM-499 · Eight minutes uncleared, and guests are waiting for a table
- CAM-500 · Four guests standing in line and five tables set with nobody at them
Simulation · how IRIS works
No extra alarms here. Just what needs looking at.
Not a recorded video, not an explanatory drawing: a summary of the real screen, with a different case every time it starts. There’s a lot more behind it.
- Checks the whole system
- Flags what is failing
- Puts it on one screen
Next step
Who watches an entire highway?
10 cases: 8 raise an alert when something happens and 2 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
Who watches a whole station at rush hour?
17 cases: 11 raise an alert when something happens and 6 only measure. You see each image as it is, and then with what IRIS understands on top.
And the best part
Ten cameras or four thousand:not one of them goes unwatched.
The day IRIS starts, they all start: the ten in a school or the four thousand in a whole network. And it only raises its hand when the thing you asked for happens.
Tell us your problem and we’ll say whether IRIS understands it, or not yet.
A person answers, the same working day.