Hosts & Moderators
Hans Hartman
Co-chair Visual 1st
Principal
Suite 48 Analytics
Alexis Gerard
Co-chair Visual 1st
Strategic Advisor
Suite 48 Analytics
Bruce Watermann
Founder,
Executive Consultant
PrintReady Network LLC.
Keynote
Hans Hartman
Co-chair Visual 1st
Principal Suite 48 Analytics
Alexis Gerard
Co-chair Visual 1st
Strategic Advisor
Suite 48 Analytics
Profiting from major technology transformations – how about AI?
Today’s thriving photo and video industry is the result of major technology transformations over the past 30 years. We’re now in the initial stages of another such upheaval, driven this time by Artificial Intelligence, and it’s shaping up to be the most pervasive and revolutionary of them all.
Understanding the dynamics of how the internet, digital cameras, smartphones and other major technology disrupters reshaped our industry teaches us lessons that can help plot a course forward. We’ll take a deep dive into that strategic thinking.
Fireside Chats
Ilke Demir
Sr. Staff Research Scientist
Intel Labs, Intel
Fighting the flipsides of AI – with AI
Synthetic media and deepfakes are getting more sophisticated and imperceptible by the day. Their photorealistic prowess is drawing attention – but also raising grave concerns in frauds, ownership, impersonation, and misinformation. Meanwhile, researchers are working to address these issues through next-generation AI technologies to detect deepfakes and to protect media provenance.
How can the battle against malicious deepfakes be won? We are excited to dive into this question with Ilke Demir. She will share her uniquely informed perspective as the lead of Intel’s Trusted Media team, where she is at the forefront of developing a range of technologies for manipulated content detection, responsible generative AI, and media provenance; blooming the research into world-changing products to create a trusted online future.
John Fisher
Sr. Director of Engineering
Google Photos
Google Photos –
the challenge of “Anything is Possible”
You’ve amassed over 1 billion users worldwide, and your top-flight engineering team has access to a trove of cutting-edge company-owned technologies, including machine learning, that they can leverage to develop almost any imaginable innovative photo or video product feature. So how do you decide which ones to go for, and which ones to pass on? And, most importantly, how do these strategic product innovation choices support your customer-focused mission: “A home for your memories so you can save and share what matters?”
These questions are core to the job description of John Fisher, head of the Google Photos engineering team in charge of developing Google Photos’ photo & video storage, reminiscing, sharing, editing, and printing features.
We look forward to learning how Google Photos thinks about innovating strategically at scale and develops AI-powered features to make engaging with your photos easy and fun!
Sami Niemi
Partner
Spintop Ventures
Sami Niemi:
On going From cameraphone app startup to Nokia and Microsoft – and becoming a successful VC
Our Show & Tell Award judge Sami Niemi takes us through his remarkable journey which started with co-founding Scalado, one of the most innovative mobile imaging app developers of the “cameraphone” days. That company sold more than 1 Billion licenses worldwide to OEMs and sensor/chipset makers, and was acquired by Nokia in 2012.
Sami went on to directing imaging products at both Nokia and Microsoft.
He now practices his passion for technology innovation as partner in Spintop Ventures, a Sweden-based VC firm and investor in photobook publisher Once Upon and a range of innovative tech startups. What has he learned from this journey? And what’s next?
David Crandall
Executive Director
School Photographers
of America
Rejuvenating a legacy industry through Innovation – Test case: School photography
Many photo industry associations have faded away in recent years, but a relatively new one has arisen in the school photography industry and greatly benefited it: The School Photographers of America.
The organization has re-energized a long-established industry by promoting innovation, advocating for school photography-positive legislation, and encouraging community engagement and assistance.
David will discuss the “secret sauce” that has moved school photography forward, maintaining and increasing its relevance to today’s – and tomorrow’s – customers.
Panels
AI image curation 2.0 – when AI-based auto-tagging is so yesterday
Yes, AI lets you auto-tag and find the beloved cat, partner or food item featured in all your images, but we’re rapidly moving beyond these early machine learning implementations. How about AI-powered apps that automatically find the best photos in the clutter of your camera roll? Or do the same for video scenes? Or proactively suggest viewing specific photos or videos at times that make the most sense for you? Or tech that curates your images based on your personal visual preferences? Or mimic how your brain recognizes visuals, while considering how humans register peripheral visual data?
The list of AI image curation innovations is endless – and keeps growing. We very much look forward to hearing from trailblazers in this area about what can – or should come – next.
Michael Liou
President, Corporate Strategy & Development
Chooch
Jae Lee
CEO & Founder
Twelve Labs
Israel Shalom
CEO & Co-Founder
GoodOnes
The future of stock photography ain’t what it used to be
While once associated with high-quality – but at times stodgy – photos, the stock photography market has rapidly transformed into one that not only caters to emerging use cases and customer segments, but also leverages technology innovations that have made their mark in the broader tech industry.
Think about offering more authentic real-life photos, addressing customer needs with a range of media types (such as video, animations, vector art and 3D imagery), or supplementing stock content with design tools as part of end-to-end content creation solutions. And of course we have the elephants in the room: AI-powered image search and discovery + Generative AI for creating or modifying imagery in new and exciting ways.
If there’s one topic in particular we plan to zoom in on with our esteemed panelists it’s this: how could these transformations and innovations in the stock photography market be leveraged throughout the photo & video industry?
Sarah Casillas
Senior Director of Content,
Adobe Stock
Adobe
Joaquin Cuenca Abela
CEO & Co-Founder
Freepik
Michael Francello
Director of Innovation
Shutterstock
What’s next for the photo printing market – Today’s consumers are digital, online, and do video. Now what?
Photo printing has always been an important – and for most of our industry’s existence the single most important – use case for monetizing consumers’ need to share and preserve their visual memories. But we all know what happened: digital photography, online photo sharing and short-form video now serve the same needs and have long been heralded as causing the impending demise of the photo printing industry.
Still, the photo print industry is very much alive and kickin’. Its keys to success? Having learned to tap into emerging customer behaviors (how about teens plastering their walls with retro instant prints, and millennials doing the same with personalized and changeable wall décor tiles?), while leveraging the latest technology innovations, ranging from smartphone camera and photo printing advancements to AI-powered photo curation and generative AI.
Jordan Moore
VP Marketing and Product,
Chief Privacy Officer
Edge Imaging
Bill Testa
CEO & Founder
Frintz
Andrew Laffoon
CEO & Co-Founder
Mixbook
AI image creation – exploring where boundless creativity could take us
With today’s AI image generation innovations coming to market in rapid fashion, it’s clear that the creation and enhancement of photos and videos will never be the same again. There’s text-to-image, image-to-image, B&W-to-color, boring-to-smiling, old-to-young, fuzzy-to-sharp, lowres-to-highres, photo-to-video, English-to-French. And v.v.! And more!
Needless to say, questions abound. What defines a deepfake in this day and age? And should we care? And how can all these AI image creation innovations be used –for fun, for artistic expression, for reliving precious memories in new and exciting ways? Or for enabling businesses to infinitely personalize their marketing, at a scale and with marginal costs that were unthinkable just one year ago? And where does the “original image creator” – the photographer – fit in this fast-evolving landscape?
Davide Righini
CEO & Co-Founder
PiktID
Eray Basar
CEO & Co-Founder
IMG.LY
Mike Tringe
CEO & Co-Founder
CreatorUP
Show & Tell Demo Judges
Andy Kelm
Managing Director
Palmarés Advisors
Anna Dickson
Group Product Manager
Google
Sami Niemi
Partner
Spintop Ventures
Robert Blumberg
Managing Director
Soquel Group
Show & Tell Presenters
Birds of a Feather Roundtables
Driving customer loyalty and retention via merchandising. Moderated by Gooten.
From Photo to X. Moderated by The Customization Group.
Going beyond photo: Personalized products with rise of Generative AI. Moderated by Printbox.
Introducing AI-based solutions to photo printing partners – what are the opportunities and challenges? Moderated by Viesus.
AI meets workflow: Accelerating creativity & business success. Moderated by Zenfolio.
With AI increasingly solving photo curation, what is the value of human touch? Moderated by The Photo Managers.
Leveraging the value of Free: Fully free, freemium, free trial. Moderated by Frintz.
