App uses digital images of a healthier you to keep you moving

A month into the start of every new year, a lot of us are still working on our list of New Year’s resolutions. With full intentions of hitting the gym regularly, getting out to walk or run, slowly many of us taper off, getting swamped in the endless responsibilities of our everyday lives, until we realize the year is almost over, and our gym membership has gone basically to waste. 

EnvisionBody, created by Salina Ray of Tampa, chief executive of the augmented-reality platform, is an app that’s sole mission is to motivate people to exercise and eat healthy using augmented reality (AR) and artificial intelligence (AI) year-round. Using this app during workouts will allow users to see themselves in real-time as a more fit version of themselves, motivating them with the results that could come as they continue to push their body. 

“Before and after images have been used for years to sell products or services because that is what motivates people to take action,” says Ray. “We should leverage AR and AI to bring the outdated use of flat, boring before and after still images to life by using high-level technology that is available to us.”

Unlike other fitness connected devices that are used today, EnvisionBody will use your BMI and other data to display an obtainable version of yourself as your heart rate intensifies with your workout.

“To affect someone’s intrinsic motivation, you have to influence and move them emotionally. Imagine if you have been overweight your entire life and all of a sudden you are able to see yourself with a healthy attractive body image. That is extremely powerful,” Ray says.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 40 percent of Americans are considered obese. Data from 2016 shows that more than 1.9 billion adults, 18 and older, were overweight with 650 million of these people obese. With worldwide obesity nearly tripling since 1975, Ray explains that the data within itself shows the extent to the number of people struggling to stick to an exercise routine and healthy eating habits. 

With the goal to get this app up and running within a year, Ray is currently speaking to several large enterprise companies to form a partnership in building the company in exchange for part ownership in EnvisionBody. The app and its founder were recently featured in The Washington Post.

Regarding long-term goals, Ray sees this app interfacing with large companies’ apps. “Someone picks up their phone and opens their diet companies’ app and looks into their phone as if taking a selfie and instead they can see instantly what they will look like in real time if they reach their goals of the diet plan,” Ray says. 

Although technology in some regards has caused this problem of obesity as we settle on the couch after sitting in an office all day, Ray explains that they instead are looking to use technology to help us get out of this crisis. “And we should,” Ray says. 

For more information, visit EnvisionBody or email Salina Ray.