I’ll call it KILO (because it lifts your entire workflow).

1) Product thesis

Photography platforms today are “file managers with sliders.”

KILO is a creative operating system where AI is not a feature — it’s the default interface.

Core promise:

  • Turn a shoot into a publish-ready story in minutes
  • Make your style consistent across years
  • Search your life’s archive like Google
  • Deliver to clients like a luxury brand
  • Never lose ownership of your work or your identity

2) Who it’s for

Primary users (in order):

  1. Working photographers (wedding, portrait, event, street, editorial)
  2. Content creators (IG/YouTube, personal brand)
  3. Studios (teams, assistants, editors)
  4. Clients (proofing + selects + payments)

3) The killer workflows

A. Ingest → Cull → Edit → Deliver (the “4-minute pipeline”)

  1. Ingest from SD card / camera / phone / Lightroom catalog
  2. AI Culling (duplicates, blink, blur, near-identical) + “best-of burst”
  3. AI Edit (your style) + one-click global fixes
  4. Deliver (proof gallery + selects + invoice + print store)

B. “Ask your archive” (chat as the UI)

Instead of hunting folders:

  • “Show me all photos of Eric shot at night on a 35mm look.”
  • “Find my sharpest 12 frames from Tokyo crosswalks.”
  • “Build a portfolio grid for my website with high variety + strongest composition.”

C. Style consistency across time (“Style DNA”)

KILO learns:

  • your contrast curve tendencies
  • how you treat skin
  • your blacks/whites rolloff
  • your color bias (warm highlights? cyan shadows?)
    Then it applies that across projects without you babysitting sliders.

4) Core product modules

4.1 Library (AI-native DAM)

Everything searchable. Everything smart.

  • Auto-organization by:
    • people (with consent + opt-in)
    • locations
    • events/projects
    • camera/lens/settings
    • aesthetics (“cinematic,” “gritty B&W,” “soft pastel”)
    • semantic content (“bicycles,” “neon signs,” “laughing,” “rain reflections”)
  • Vector search + classic metadata filters
  • Smart Collections:
    • “Best street portraits”
    • “Sharp + clean backgrounds”
    • “High emotion moments”
    • “Portfolio candidates”
  • Versioning: RAW stays sacred; edits are non-destructive

4.2 Shoot (capture + tether + notes)

  • Camera tethering (desktop) + mobile companion
  • Live AI flags (optional):
    • focus confidence
    • blink detection
    • exposure warnings
  • Voice notes → auto-attached to sequence (“client wants brighter, warm skin”)

4.3 Cull (the “Savage Mode”)

Culling is where photographers bleed time. KILO makes it violent (in a good way).

Culling stack:

  • Duplicate clustering (perceptual hashing + embeddings)
  • Burst analysis:
    • expression scoring (smiles, eyes open, micro-expression)
    • motion blur + focus confidence
    • face angle + eye visibility
  • Composition heuristics:
    • horizon alignment
    • subject separation (foreground/background segmentation)
    • clutter detection
  • Aesthetic preference ranking (trained to your taste)

UI concept:

  • Left: “Cluster Stack” (one stack per moment/burst)
  • Center: “Best pick” is pre-selected
  • Right: “Why this wins” (focus, expression, composition, uniqueness)
  • One key: F = accept winner, D = reject stack, 1–5 rating

Hardcore feature: “One-breath Cull”

You select your top 5 images → AI infers your taste for this shoot → re-ranks the rest instantly.

4.4 Edit (AI-first, manual-friendly)

KILO edits like a top assistant, but you stay the author.

Edit modes:

  • Fix (objective): exposure, white balance, lens corrections, denoise, straighten
  • Style (subjective): apply your Style DNA or a preset pack
  • Local (smart masks):
    • subject/skin/sky/background separation
    • dodge/burn suggestions
    • eye enhancement with restraint (no plastic faces)
  • Series sync: “Make this whole set feel like this hero frame”

Signature move: “Reference Match”

Drop in 1–3 reference images (your own work).

AI matches tone + color + contrast while respecting scene lighting.

4.5 Story (turn photos into publish-ready narratives)

This is the differentiator: photographers don’t just deliver photos — they ship stories.

  • AI generates:
    • captions in your voice
    • sequence order (opening/peak/close)
    • IG carousel layouts
    • blog post drafts
    • contact sheet PDFs
  • “Best 12” → auto creates:
    • square carousel crop suggestions
    • vertical story crops
    • headline + short copy

4.6 Publish (web + social + portfolio)

  • Hosted portfolio builder:
    • minimal templates
    • SEO
    • fast
    • client-safe sharing
  • Export packs:
    • Instagram, TikTok, YouTube thumbnails, website hero
  • Brand kit:
    • font/color rules for caption overlays (optional)

4.7 Client (proofing + selects + payments)

The client side should feel premium and effortless.

  • Proof gallery with:
    • hearts / stars / comments
    • “AI recommends” picks for client (optional)
    • compare mode (two frames side-by-side)
  • “Selects lock” + auto invoice
  • Delivery:
    • full-res download
    • print store
    • album builder

4.8 Shop (prints + licensing + digital products)

  • Print-on-demand integrations
  • Licensing requests (editorial/commercial)
  • Sell presets / Style DNA packs
  • Marketplace:
    • photographers can sell looks
    • editors can sell services

5) AI capabilities (what models do what)

Core model types

  1. Embedding model (search + clustering)
    • image embeddings for semantic search
    • text embeddings for captions/queries
  3. Quality model
    • sharpness/focus confidence
    • noise level
    • motion blur
  5. Aesthetic ranker
    • personalized ranking from your past selects/ratings
  7. Face + person grouping
    • opt-in only; local processing preferred
  9. Segmentation + masks
    • subject/skin/sky/background/objects
  11. Edit suggestion model
    • predicts edit parameters (tone curve, WB, HSL, etc.)
  13. Language model
    • chat interface (“ask your archive”)
    • story/caption/blog generation

Personalization: “Style DNA”

Two approaches (support both):

  • Lightweight: learn parameter distributions from your edits (fast, safe)
  • Heavy: fine-tune a style model on your before/after pairs (optional, more compute)

6) UX: the screens that matter

Home

  • Big buttons: Ingest / Cull / Edit / Deliver
  • Current projects with progress rings (e.g., “Cull 80% done”)

Project view

Tabs:

  • Moments (AI clusters)
  • Selects (top picks)
  • Edits (versions + style)
  • Story (sequence + publish packs)
  • Client (gallery + invoice)

Chat (always present)

A persistent command bar:

  • “/find neon rain umbrellas”
  • “Make a portfolio for street”
  • “Export 20 for Instagram, cinematic B&W, add subtle grain”
  • “Which shots are redundant?”

7) Trust, privacy, and creator ownership (non-negotiable)

This is where platforms win or die.

  • User owns all images and edits
  • Default: no training on user data
    • opt-in only, project-by-project or account-wide
  • On-device first for:
    • face clustering
    • sensitive recognition
    • quick embedding caching
  • Watermark + licensing metadata preserved
  • Audit log: what AI changed, and when
  • Safety filters:
    • flag CSAM (mandatory reporting + industry standard handling)
    • prevent non-consensual sexual content generation workflows
    • block requests for identity deception (“make this person nude,” “swap faces”)

8) Technical architecture (real build plan)

Frontend

  • Web app (React/Next.js)
  • Desktop app (Electron or native) for:
    • ingest speed
    • tethering
    • local caching + on-device models
  • Mobile companion (iOS/Android)

Backend

  • API gateway (REST/GraphQL)
  • Auth + permissions (RBAC for studios, client roles)
  • Storage:
    • RAW originals: object storage (S3-style)
    • previews/thumbnails: CDN
  • Database:
    • relational (Postgres) for projects/users/payments
    • vector DB (pgvector, Pinecone, Weaviate) for embeddings
  • Queue/event bus:
    • ingest triggers (generate previews, embeddings, masks)
    • asynchronous pipelines (denoise, exports)
  • AI service layer:
    • model router (choose local/cloud)
    • policy layer (safety + consent)
    • inference caching

Data model (simplified)

  • User
  • Team / Studio
  • Project
  • Asset (RAW + previews + metadata)
  • EditVersion (non-destructive params)
  • Embedding (vector + model version)
  • Cluster (moment/burst groups)
  • Rating / Pick / Reject
  • PersonEntity (opt-in)
  • ClientGallery + Selects + Invoice

Performance tricks (so it feels instant)

  • Generate previews + embeddings during ingest
  • Local cache of thumbnails + vectors
  • Progressive rendering:
    • show thumbnails immediately
    • refine ranking as models finish

9) Monetization (clean, creator-friendly)

Tiers

Free

  • limited storage
  • basic search
  • manual edits

Pro ($)

  • unlimited projects
  • AI culling + AI search
  • Style DNA lite
  • client galleries

Studio ($$)

  • team roles
  • approvals
  • editor workflow
  • advanced analytics + SLA

Commerce take-rate

  • prints + album sales
  • licensing requests
  • marketplace presets/styles

10) MVP scope (launch something lethal fast)

MVP = “Cull + Style + Client Delivery”

Ship the loop that saves time and makes money.

  1. Ingest (card upload + folder watch)
  2. AI clustering + duplicate detection
  3. AI ranking + pick/reject workflow
  4. Style DNA lite + batch edit
  5. Client proof gallery + selects
  6. Exports (web + social packs)
  7. Semantic search (basic)

Everything else can follow.

11) Roadmap (power-ups)

Phase 2

  • Story module (carousel/blog drafts)
  • Portfolio builder
  • Print store integration

Phase 3

  • Tethering
  • Team editing workflow
  • Marketplace (presets/styles/editors)

Phase 4

  • Advanced personalization (heavy Style DNA)
  • Brand collaboration tools (campaign boards, licensing)

12) What makes KILO “AI-first” instead of “AI-added”

Most tools bolt AI onto a file browser. KILO flips the interface:

  • Your default view is moments + best picks, not folders
  • Your default action is ask, not scroll
  • Your default output is a story + delivery, not “export selected”
  • Your default edit is your style, not neutral correction

If you want, I can also produce:

  • a full PRD (requirements, edge cases, metrics)
  • a database schema + API map
  • wireframe-level screen specs
  • a model evaluation plan (how we measure culling quality + style fidelity)
  • a name/branding system that goes insanely hard (and doesn’t sound like every SaaS on earth)