How to Bring Photos to Life: School Photo Shoot with Augmented Reality
Artphoto is an app to arrange school photo shoots and deliver digital photos to parents. It has been created as a startup for a company of the same name. The app runs on iOS and Android.
Task
Develop an app for arranging school photo shoots and easy distribution of processed digital photos.
Solution
We’ve developed an app for our client to publish photo shoots, where parents can view the photos of their children and pay for them.
You can bring photos to life, if you wish. When the photo is processed, a QR code is added to it. If you scan this code on the printed photo using the app, a pre-recorded video will appear in place of the image.
Development Process
The concept. We were approached by a company that took photos of students and created class books. The customer wanted an app that would allow parents to view the photos from the photo shoots and, if necessary, arrange them into a hard-copy album. All payments should also take place in the app.
Photo studio managers/representatives should talk about the app in schools and offer their services. Teachers sign up using a QR code received from the managers and invite parents to the app using their own QR code.
Augmented reality (AR). Parents can also order a “live” photo.
How we use augmented reality:
- During the photo shoot, the photographer additionally shoots a short video: how children smile, wave their hands, run, turn their heads and so on.
- When processing the selected photo, the photographer adds a QR code to it.
- Parents scan this QR code from the printed photo using the app.
- The app plays a pre-recorded video in place of the photo, bringing it to life.
User roles in the app. You can register in the app by invitation only. These are issued by users with specific roles. There are three roles in the app:
- Managers invite teachers to the app and have access to the admin panel.
- Teachers represent their class and invite parents to the app. Only invited parents can view photos of this class.
- Parents can view photos of their children.
Business logic. Teachers apply for the class photo shoots in the app. The company’s managers respond to the requests and settle the price with the teachers. After the photo shoot, the photographer sends a link to the parents invited to the “class”. The parents can view the watermarked photos by clicking the link. The parents then choose the best photos and, after the payment, receive a link to an album of the photo shoot without watermarks.
The parents can also order printed photos or album.
The Hardest Part
This was our first experience with augmented reality. The process was not complicated, but it was new to us.
How we solved these tasks
We studied the documentation and looked at how other augmented reality apps work.
Technology Stack
Yii2
PHP
iOS on Swift
Android on KotlinResults
After the photo shoot, all parents invited to the “class” receive links to preview the photos and, after the payment, the parents receive links to the complete photo albums.
Parents can order “live” photos. During the processing, a QR code is added to such photos. The users can scan the code from the printed photo using the app. The photo will become “live”: on the screen you will see a pre-recorded video.
You can also order printed photos or arrange them in an album.
A QR code is added to the chosen photos. When the user scans the code in the app, the photo “comes to life” and a short movie from the photo shoot is displayed instead. It looks like a “live” photo from Harry Potter.
