Transcription

• Speaker #0

  In the past, to do a fashion photo shoot, you have the model, you have the makeup artist, you have the stylist, you have the production manager, you have the lighting guys. There's a lot of people and a lot of cost. And now, so basically what you're saying is that I either choose a model from your stock library of models or I can shoot. my own model and then I just need to shoot the individual pieces of clothing or accessories and then I can interchange these at will. Is that kind of how it works?

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. We try to simplify it as much as possible and the input image can be very simple. It can be taken by an iPhone, you know, like just like a very simple image. You can select the model from the library or describe what kind of a model that you would like to see as well. And like consistent poses, backgrounds, injecting like all the details.

• Speaker #2

  Who owns the copyrights? I've heard different people say different things. What's the key to getting the quality that you're getting? I mean,

• Speaker #0

  anybody can go to a lot of these tools and create images, but the quality like looking on your website here is really good.

• Speaker #2

  Farrar, Kevin.

• Speaker #0

  What's up, Norm? My good old buddy. How you doing, man?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, we haven't done this in a little while.

• Speaker #0

  Well, we do it every Tuesday. Well,

• Speaker #2

  we do. We do it every Tuesday.

• Speaker #0

  We actually put an episode out every Tuesday, but some people don't realize we record these in batches, so sometimes it's not the Tuesday that it actually comes out that we actually record it, but that's all good. Since we last recorded, you've been doing a few things. I've been doing a few things. I guess, I'm sure we smoked a few cigars since then.

• Speaker #2

  Oh yeah, yeah, and the Big Smoke Miami, which you missed. Sorry about that.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, I was in London smoking a Bahiki. When you were at the Big Smoke in Miami, I was in London. Because I can't get that in the States. Bahikis, for those that don't listen, Bahikis are a Colombian cigar that's actually, um, well, I'm sorry, why did I say Colombian? Cubans, they're a Cubans cigar. I guess I... lived 10 years with a Colombian on my mind. Cuban cigars that are very expensive and very hard to get. In the United States, you can't buy Cuban cigars. So I was in London, so I went to a little lounge. And London happens to be one of the more expensive places in the world to actually buy cigars, as I found out and Norm had warned me. And so I spent a pretty penny for about 700 bucks, I think. 700, 800 bucks for a single cigar. And you know what? It was actually really good. It's not something I'm going to smoke all the time, but it's something that was really good. And you know what? Since you're such a good buddy, Norm, I actually brought you one back too.

• Speaker #2

  Get out of here.

• Speaker #0

  I have two of them. They're the smaller ones. I smoked the bigger one. But there's the three. You get the $400 one. Oh, all right. Next time I see you, which I don't know, maybe in August for Market Masters or something like that, I got a treat waiting for you.

• Speaker #2

  I'm on a flight tonight.

• Speaker #0

  Maybe, but you know, have you seen though what's happening with images lately out there? Have you seen like the new codex thing that OpenAI put out and what you can do with images? And you know, when Nano Banana 2 Pro, I think, came out like six months ago, everybody was jumping up and down going, this is the best thing since sliced bread. Now everybody's like, ah, Nano Banana Pro 2, that's child's play. Now look at this codex thing from OpenAI. It's just, it seems like images and video. in the AI world are just moving at a rapid, rapid pace on what you can do.

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, our guest, I was doing some research, you know, usually we come on and we just rapid fire questions, right? But I decided I'm going to do some real like research on the website. And it was phenomenal. Wait till you see the photography and the images that you can drum up with AI now from her site. So we'll get right into that.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, we're going to be talking about imagery today and images and how, what you can do with AI to create your image stack. And so we have someone coming on that has been doing this for a while. She's Ivy League educated, helped grow a couple of other companies, and now she's got a company called Savannah with one N, Savannah.ai. And they're doing some images, so we might as well bring her on, Norm. See if you can pronounce her name. that's what

• Speaker #1

  the 21cc i'm gonna give you that shot well here's zara so you saw you did pretty well i think it's good to me yes but i got your first name right yes okay and how do i say your last name so i saw yeah all right perfect i'll throw my head out how you doing zara nice to have you i'm good thank you so much i'm very excited about this podcast thank you so much for inviting me oh you're very welcome you

• Speaker #0

  going on in imagery out there right now i mean what's just just for those that are listening that you know it's always surprised me there's about half the audience that's always like ai is the greatest thing since since sliced bread and the other people are like ai sucks don't use ai it's really bad it's horrible it's a fad or a trend bad it's a trend it's taking away jobs so photographers and stylists are going to go out of business so what's happening though and what's your opinion of you Not necessarily your tool and what you're doing, but just overall the whole AI environment right now.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, I mean, it's a pretty fast evolving, really fast changing environment right now. Things are growing, getting advanced exponentially. We've never seen this kind of a pace in any kind of technology before. So it's really, really fascinating. But yes, it is also frustrating in a lot of the like kind of areas that we need to be careful about. But yeah, in just in general, like things are going like really fast. And in terms of image generation as well, the quality has like surpassed like a really high level. So it started to take... place like in more real life like cases uh like industrial examples uh like it started with more like kind of memes like more you know like fun images content but nowadays like um as you mentioned like a lot of the models are super advanced right now so it is being used for uh like real use cases by brands by a lot of companies by advertising by um a lot of visual production related projects.

• Speaker #2

  When I went over to your website and I saw the models and then the different clothing that they were wearing, you can't tell the difference. It's 100%. You cannot tell the difference. It's crazy where it's gone.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  You see the one with six fingers, Norm?

• Speaker #2

  Oh, yeah. And the girl's hand.

• Speaker #0

  Remember those days a couple of years ago?

• Speaker #1

  do something that'd be like some deformity somewhere but yeah those days are gone i think yeah that's for sure it's been like pretty hard to like distinguish it if it has real like actual image actual human model or if it's uh generated by ai um and then yeah we've been working with uh like fashion companies apparel clothing brands to basically help them um to do like their photo shoot processes much more kind of efficient, you know, like cost effective also. And then helping them like to, to like streamline that process to make their lives easier.

• Speaker #2

  You know, right now, go ahead. I was gonna say right now, the prompting, you know, sometimes it's still this long, right? With your system, it does it chop the prompting down in half? Or is it still you got to write a book?

• Speaker #1

  No, yeah. So the default is actually there is no prompting at all. It's we basically, so when we started this platform, we worked with a couple of design partners, like big brands, like pretty closely, and then understand their pain points, their like main workflows. So we basically like created more automated solutions in the platform, particularly designed for their, you know, like daily. like needs. So that's why they actually don't need to write any prompt. Like they usually just upload a clothing image, let's say it's all template based. And then they select the model background. And then they can inject like, integrate their own branding, like visual DNA as well. Like, you know, background color lighting, like these kind of details, and then it generates the results like ready to be used for their let's say, online shopping, like

• Speaker #2

  uh online visuals for their website landing page social media kevin did you hear i i was outside having a cigar yesterday and i was watching uh some news cast and um anthropic is

• Speaker #0

  being evaluated at a trillion one trillion dollars yeah yeah yeah that yeah a trillion dollars and then uh elon musk is about to be the first trillionaire once spacex goes uh um does their IPO. But yeah, so it's crazy what the valuations are happening on here. So on Savannah, though, you spoke mostly feature, it's mostly focused on apparel and clothing. Is that correct? Or does it do other things? But I'm looking at your website. It's primarily like models and clothing. Is that what your your niches and your focus is?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, that's like the main focus, I would say that's where we started applying the solutions. But then we've been also expanding our focus onto like makeup, beauty, a lot of accessories, jewelry companies, and also home goods too, including furnitures, rocks, carpets, or so.

• Speaker #0

  So do you have a background in fashion or anything? Or where did you, where does this come from?

• Speaker #1

  Not directly, but yeah, I used to work at consulting before. And then during that time, I had the chance to work a couple of like fashion companies, retailers, globally. back in Turkey, in Europe, in Milan, in Singapore. So I got to observe and see their processes and kind of like pain points across their operational processes. That's where it came from to me.

• Speaker #0

  So let's walk it through a photo shoot. So in the past, to do a fashion photo shoot, you have the model, you have the makeup artist, you have the stylist, you have the production manager, you have the lighting guys, you have the set. You have someone's got to do all the wardrobe management, the steaming of it, everything. And then you have studio or location. And so there's a lot of people and a lot of cost involved in doing that. Norm and I both have been involved in that kind of stuff in the past. And now, so basically what you're saying is that I either choose a model from your stock library of models, or I can shoot my own model. And it looks like a lot of these on your website are on a white psych background or something. I can shoot the model. and then I just need to shoot the individual pieces of clothing or accessories on a flat background or have a tool do that or do it in a little light studio or something. And then I can interchange these at will, basically, in different poses, different backgrounds, different situations for the seasons or for the type of customer that I'm targeting or whatever. Is that kind of how it works? So you upload a bunch of pictures of shirts or bracelets or shoes or whatever it is. and then you upload. You say this is the model and then it just puts it all together.

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. Yeah. We try to simplify it as much as possible. And the input image can be very simple. It can be taken by an iPhone, you know, like a phone. Just like a very simple image, I would say. Or some of the brands that we see, they use images from their factory, from the sample products, for example. It doesn't have to be like only, you know, like flat or like a clean background. It can be put on a mannequin. It can be put on a table or so. And then you just like take a picture of it, upload it. And then, yeah, you can select the model from the library or describe what kind of a model that you would like to see as well. And the focus is mainly creating like the PDP product detail page visuals and like consistent poses, backgrounds, like injecting like all the details together. And not only like for like one product, like one SKU, but the system is designed in a way to basically able to produce all these images for like tens, like hundreds of SKUs at once.

• Speaker #0

  Hey, Norm, I've got a quick question for you. I'm trying to manage all my affiliate and creator programs from Amazon, from Shopify, from Walmart, but it's just a freaking mess. I mean, I've got. Reporting coming from here and there is all these different Slack messages. Do you know if there's like a unified dashboard where I can do this all in one place?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, absolutely. And you're right. It is a mess. A lot of brands are complaining about that. But there is a place that has a solution. It's called Levanta. And they let brands recruit partners, track performance, manage payouts, send product samples, and even run creator programs across every major marketplace. All in one place. And guess what? Brands can spend less time on tools and more time making profit.

• Speaker #0

  Is that the one that you sent me a link for, like a 10% off coupon, a gold or enterprise plan a few days ago?

• Speaker #2

  You got it.

• Speaker #0

  Oh, cool, man. I think I've got that link here. Was it Levanta.io slash Misfits?

• Speaker #2

  Yep, you got it.

• Speaker #0

  L-E-V-A-N-T-A. dot IO forward slash misfits. Awesome. I'm gonna go, go hit them up right now and get that 10% off.

• Speaker #2

  Perfect. Me too. You know what this reminds me of? Back in 1995, just prior to that, when you had to go and install a computer program, you had the batch file and the config file. And if you installed it improperly, it would slow down your computer. It was a nightmare. And then 1995 came around and it was plug and play. And it was just so simple. And I think that's where it started. for back in 2020, 2023, you still had to create these big config files, prompt files. And now what you're doing, it sounds like it's more of just a plug and play.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, it's true. The goal is like to basically provide that like batch generation as easy as possible to the brands. Because, I mean, a lot of the current platforms, they do like single limit generation, you know, like their point solutions. and you know You have to write a lot of prompt, things like that. But it's not very easy to create hundreds of product images, like same high quality, consistent results. So yeah, that's where our platform comes in to help with that, basically. Once you configure, like set up the requirements, you get all the results in a batch. Yeah, very fairly quickly, easily.

• Speaker #2

  So you're good. Sorry, Kevin, I was just going to do a follow up. How is your technology different than all of these other AI platforms out there right now that are producing photos?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, so we have our own custom trained model, particularly for clothing. Actually, we have our own data set and then we've been working on it for a while now. But also at the same time, we build certain pipelines for particular solutions like particular projects. functionalities. So we are also using lots of different models too. But the key is like the basically the source, like the key secret is basically to be able to create that workflow. And that gives the best results for different use cases and for different types of products. Like for example, creating a flat lay ghost mannequin, it's a different challenge. Versus creating like on model images is different. And for different product categories, they have like lots of different details as well. We do a lot of design related workflows too. So it's all about like finding the best solution and then piecing them together and then creating like a robust custom workflows for the user. And then you need to also know, you need to have like the domain kind of knowledge expertise, like to understand what they actually need. So it can become like repeatable and quite convenient to use.

• Speaker #0

  So look, I could go do this with ChatGPT right now. I could upload a picture of a shirt and a picture of a model and say, put this dress or this shirt or blouse or whatever on this model and put it on a beach. But that's one off. But to do that at scale, and that's where your agentic stuff comes in and across a whole platform, across a whole bunch of different media assets, that's another animal. So that's what you come in and automate. And then it sounds like. You're kind of like the Poe.com or the Higgs field, Poe.com for text, where you use Poe and it goes and uses different models behind the scene depending on the need. And then, or Higgs field that uses different video models depending on what you're trying to achieve. So your agentic system kind of figures out this is the goal. We need to use this model for this, this one for this. And it puts it all together and creates the type of imagery that we see on your website that's pretty good. Is that basically the general gist?

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. Yeah, exactly. You summarized it really well. Yes.

• Speaker #0

  And so, so that's, that's what makes, cause I've always been, I've always said that there's a lot of people out there that are in the video or image tool space. And every time a new LLM, you know, cloud 4.8 comes out and it's all of a sudden going to have video in it. I know, sorry, image creation, which it doesn't have right now. If it does, I'm just saying, if it does, that puts a lot of like a thousand companies out of business, but that's not, not what you're doing. What you're doing is the more of the, let's do this at scale and, and. And. make this a production machine type of thing, right?

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. Like, think about, like, there are brands that we work with. I mean, like, there's so many of them, like, all around the world. Like, they, you know, like, fast fashion retailers or, like, you know, they produce, like, you know, hundreds of products. Like, they launch, like, one of the companies, like, that we work with, they launch 500 products on a weekly basis, including, you know, like, women's, men's, kids', home goods categories. and it's not possible to sit down down and then like upload every image of the product being launched like and then you know like add prompts like one by one so it's it's becomes like a nightmare and it's actually at that point it's kind of easier to do just a normal photo shoot from scratch uh the physical process basically uh which is yeah which is like a big operational hassle for them already and um we You basically automate that in the platform as you described. And... This is also just like the starting point like for our like company. And so we start working with the companies like the brands within that, which is creating a lot of cost saving to them like up to like 78% and also like speeding up time to market to like instead of like spending weeks like they can launch their products like literally in a couple of minutes to hours. And then the next step is also deploying these visuals. via backend to their websites, again, like hundreds of products. And then we also run sales related like performance analytics on top of these two, which is like the ultimate goal is like to create like a more like a dynamic storefront for, you know, like either small, medium sized brands like marketplaces, because they actually have a lot of information data, and we can help them to utilize that. in order to create more personalized experiences. On the shopping websites, via email, marketing, things like that, that's where we are heading towards.

• Speaker #0

  So you could do stuff where, like I know Sheen, I think they do some of this. They don't even have the product. They just would create an image. It's some sort of swimsuit top, and they want to do 50 different colors. Instead of having to manufacture 50 different colors, They'll manufacture 50 different designs and colors, put them all up and see what sells. And then one of their factories in China will manufacture that. As soon as the one with pink and blue stripes sells, they make it versus having to do it in advance. Is that tool be used for that kind of stuff as well? Or is it used for that kind of stuff?

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. Like in terms of colors, in terms of patterns, in terms of, you know, like how they present the visuals as well, like in terms of models, poses. different types of like backgrounds and settings like we can analyze like all these uh and then like basically provide them the best uh like suggestions like how you know like to to maximize like their um like sales performance that's like yeah what we are building and then testing and they can do a lot of ab testing uh within this kind of a platform as well um yeah do you I find it's not all about the clothes.

• Speaker #0

  necessarily in the accessories that actually sells it but it's also a lot of the in the ab testing it's the model's expression or if her hands on her hip or at her side or if she's facing left or facing right or slightly do you find that those little idiosyncrasies can make as big a difference as

• Speaker #1

  the color or the look of the outfit yes exactly it's a it's like a it's a complex uh problem and there's like so much details in it uh and then that's yeah that's what we are basically working on right now. That's like the more difficult problem, but we need to start working with the customers to help them automate the existing process. And then on top of that, providing them more refined and more like on-brand specific solutions, like improvements in terms of the visuals.

• Speaker #2

  But I guess this could probably be on the

• Speaker #1

  customers part as well like just split testing yeah for sure yeah i mean it's a self-serve platform like they can generate literally anything they want based on their also you know like um like insights like i mean they know their customers the best so like they can definitely like create different types of models etc like types of the background settings and then they can definitely test it. And what we are doing is like, to achieve this in a more automated, like more technical way. Instead of like them testing things out like one by one, we will be able to provide a system to them that runs it for like, again, like hundreds of products for them. And then it will also become like, for example, Some brands also, they come to us, they're like, oh, our customer profile is like, we basically want to expand our customer profile into like more Gen Z, younger generations. Like, how can we attract them? So, and then, but they want to keep their current audience too. So what we can do is like based on every online visitor profile, whomever like visits, browse the items, we can identify some of the characteristics. And then we can personalize the models, for example, based on the visitor, based on their information or so. So, yeah, that's where we are kind of like going towards in terms of personalization, localization as well. Like a lot of the like fast fashion retailers, they like do one photo shoot or two. And then they show like the same model, same images like across all the countries that they sell. 40 50 countries or so like when we check them but because they don't have time or budget like to base to to localize those visuals for different uh big markets like let's say for middle east for europe for asia like even like sometimes i speak to some um some like teams in europe they're like oh we need to our focus is in germany but we need to show different models in spain like even like in like certain areas like it becomes like more differentiated. So yeah,

• Speaker #2

  I know what you're thinking. I know you are grinning, looking at me talking about that, thinking you have a model like me, right? My generation, the fossil, the fossil model with a beard. You can say it.

• Speaker #1

  I mean, yeah, you can, anyone can see any type of model.

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, that's, that's what a

• Speaker #0

  The power of AI that I think a lot of people underestimate is what you just said in marketing. I think it's one of the most powerful tools. Norm and I have a company called Dragonfish where we're doing a bunch of image and text-based stuff. And the amount of content that we can spit out at scale very fast is just ridiculous. And what you said with going across 50 different marketplaces, the models need to look different. Even within the same marketplace, if I'm selling a T-shirt, the black shirt that Norm is wearing, I need it on an old guy like him. I need it on some grunge-looking hippie. I need it on a 17-year-old runaway-looking person. I need it on whatever. And you can just do that. And so that way, all the targeting on the Facebook ads or all the targeting on the website is aimed at. So when someone comes there, like, that's me. They see themselves. They don't see, like, that's some pretty stick figure model or whatever that they can project themselves into that.

• Speaker #1

  person that they're seeing that that's someone like me and you can do that at scale that you could not do in a photo in a in a studio exactly exactly it's because it's not scalable but right now there is a solution to be able to do that like to basically create more culturally resonant like assets and then so that it would become more um yeah relevant to the to the audiences and yeah even like in terms of like styling for example for different types of like Thank you. As you do more purchasing, more shopping from a particular brand, they know your taste. And so they can actually come up with more styles, combinations of their collections based on what you actually like. So instead of you try to piece things together. So it will get there basically. Well,

• Speaker #0

  if I was a fashion retailer, on my personal website, if I was selling, I would actually Once I've identified who you are and I know that avatar, the next time you log into my website, you're not going to see the standard photos. You're going to see I've got 10 different photos of the black T-shirt that Norm's wearing. And if I know that you're a guy like Norm, you're going to see guys like Norm all throughout the website.

• Speaker #2

  That would be quite the website, Kev.

• Speaker #0

  That would be. Or I know that Norm loves cigars. You might see a guy. No. in a lifestyle picture smoke a cigar you know fishing or whatever it may be um so that that's the power of what this what this is but what do you say to the people though they're like oh that's ai you're tricking us i

• Speaker #1

  mean yeah like um brands the companies they shouldn't trick their customers uh like you know they need to obviously like disclose it if they use ai um But a lot of the brands, they use it. We see it from the biggest brands, like the retailers, when they use it for their PDP or so, or for campaigns, like more editorial visuals. But I think, yeah, the laws, regulations... Should definitely like keep up with the advancements happening. So there wouldn't be like much of the, you know, like gray area. So in terms of like, you know, like everyone would know what they need to comply. But yeah, so that's like, I think like that's happening hands in hands.

• Speaker #2

  You know, with these new, with the AI generated images, a lot of people are trying to take off the watermark. or they're just not disclosing. And that's, first of all,

• Speaker #0

  Google, that's against their terms of service. So you got to keep that on there. Secondly, I believe it's the law that you have to tell that somewhere on your website, say that the images are AI generated.

• Speaker #1

  I'll think it's a law in the US. It might be in Europe. But what Google has just done, they just announced at the most recent conference, is they're actually watermarking, not watermarking, like encoding that this is made with AI. So it's a new standard. that they're trying to get everybody to adopt that actually you would embed in the images. So it's like, it's embedded. You can't take it out. You can't go in Photoshop and like right now on Nano, but on now, but now on Gemini on now, but now you can take out the little diamond. That's like the little Walmart. You could, well, watermark. You can actually take that out, in Photoshop or something, but they're doing something where you can't. And so you're going to be able to just mouse over something and like, yep, says created with AI and you'll know instantly. That's one of the things that's, that's coming up. I've seen studies where if you say, there was a study I had in my newsletter, a scientific study, where they said if you say this product was designed with AI, it actually hurts the conversion. Versus even though a lot of stuff is designed with AI, if you say, you know, designed with AI, it actually can hurt conversion. So it's going to be interesting to see where this goes, but I think it's widely accepted, and you just have a small minority who are a little bit... a little bit against it. It's more the, you know, some of the creative types, like the photographers and models may say, this is not, this is putting us out of business. But at the same time, you still need the base models. So you still need, you know, you need the Turkish girl, you need the Spanish girl, you need the German girl, you need some base stuff. And I guess AI could actually create these base images now too without you actually having to pose. But so it's an interesting time where we're going.

• Speaker #0

  Who owns the copyrights?

• Speaker #2

  Well, whoever generates the image, they own it. They own the copyright of that.

• Speaker #0

  So if I'm generating something on Gemini or Nanobanana or whatever platform, because I've heard different people say different things, that the platform, the LLM owns it, or no, you can just go and publish it and you own the copyright.

• Speaker #2

  Well, like, I'm not an expert on this, but as far as I know, like, whoever generates the output, they own it. But, I mean, of course, like, as long as it's not someone else's, like, digital, you know, like, identity or, like, likeness or so, which is, like, obviously not, like, yeah, ethical use. But I think like, yeah, if you just like. create, you know, like an on model image and the model is like fully AI generated. And then you own the product as well as a brand. And then that picture belongs to you.

• Speaker #1

  I think actually in the terms of service for like Google and somebody in OpenAI, I know OpenAI was this way a couple of years ago. They technically own the rights to it. And they're assigning you a sub. If you look at the redefined print, they're assigning you the rights to use it. But ultimately, they own it. If they created it... But obviously, you know, likeness, people own their name, image, and likeness. They're NIL. So that's different. You can't make a picture that looks like Brad Pitt and then pass that off as Brad Pitt. But I think in your case, since your tool is actually a collage or a combined creative of multiple tools, it sounds like, that you're actually creating something original. I'm not, like you said, you're not a legal expert, neither am I. But I would think that since your tool is creating something that's... Using different tools to create different aspects and different parts for different reasons. It's probably more likely that the legal rights probably reside with the creator versus the tool that's underneath it. But I don't know that for sure, but that would be my hunch. But that's always an interesting thing because you have, you know, as you probably know, if you create good images, you get knocked off. I mean, Norma, I've both experienced this in the Amazon world where we... create in the past we would spend five ten thousand dollars on a nice photo shoot and then the next thing we know our images of our model holding the exercise device is all over china and all over websites in china and maybe swapped out with a chinese face or something so that that's always uh that's always an issue when it comes comes to images and like it's easy to copy and yeah i mean even with google with their new way with they're going to embed something all you got to do to get around that is take a screenshot. take a screenshot, it creates a new image. And so it doesn't carry over. So there's always workarounds. But what do you, what, so what do you, where do you feel this is, this image stuff is going? Do you think this is going to get bigger and more brands are going to start using this at scale to just knock out massive stuff? Or what are you seeing behind the scenes at Savannah?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, I mean, to be honest, like in the next couple of years or so, But... this kind of like exponential like growth uh like the the advancements happening um i think this is just gonna become like default solution uh like norm and and yeah there won't be like i think like many photo shoots happening or like photoshop or like you know like more manual editing tools or so out there like everything will be like quite, you know, like a lot of those like fragmented tools will become much more like streamlined in one place, because it's, it's a big like process right now. Like, you know, I mean, you mentioned that, like takes weeks to, you know, like organize everything and then get the results, like the post processing, retouching, like a lot of like, you know, manual steps involved. And then but what's happening right now is like, all these like steps are being combined into one point. platform um i mean that's what we're doing but it is going to become more common and like kind of the the yeah the just main solution that's how i see uh because yeah i mean it's just like it just makes a lot of sense to use the solution like yeah hey norm do you know any sellers out there that are Just...

• Speaker #1

  burned out doing this e-com game?

• Speaker #0

  You know, I know a lot of people that have talked to us, you know, when we go to events. It's not only that, they don't know where to start.

• Speaker #1

  Who would you recommend they talk to?

• Speaker #0

  The first one that comes to mind is Quietlight Brokerage. And here's why. They're going to build you up. They're going to understand your company. And at the end of the day, you're going to know how to maximize your valuation. So the very first thing you need to do is go and get your free confidential. evaluation at quietlight.com. They're going to ask a couple of questions. You're going to meet up. It's one-on-one with somebody over there and then, you know, let the games begin.

• Speaker #1

  Awesome. What was that website again?

• Speaker #0

  It's quietlight.com.

• Speaker #1

  Awesome. I'm going to head over there.

• Speaker #0

  Your platform, first of all, it's affordable. So you don't have to be a huge brand. to be on your platform. And secondly, I don't think we've talked about video, but you also have the ability to produce video.

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, correct. Yeah. We provide videos, too. So any type of like visuals, like static images can be transformed into video. And then we provide templates for that, too. And then mostly like in fashion, it's been mostly like the model models like turn around themselves. or like you know walking towards camera like kind of like standard movements like five second ten second or uh it's been very popular for just like invisible mannequin of the product and then you know like it does like 360 like kind of turn around it um so i mean even like just you know like creating like flatly or like this ghost mannequin visuals like brands like pay a lot of like money like to just like, you know, get those visuals, but Right now, like in the platform, they can do it like a dollar or so. And then, you know, like per product and then they can get their entire collection like for like a very small budget. And it's always like at their convenience, like whenever they want to use it, you know, like with just like one click, literally they can get it done. Yeah. So it's also pretty accessible and affordable. Yeah. Per image is like it's pretty. Very low pricing.

• Speaker #0

  A buck. A buck. And like, I'm an old guy, like a fossil. And I remember, Kevin, when we had photo shoots, like when we used to do photo shoots, it could cost thousands of dollars. You know, you'd have to rent half studio for a day or half a day. It was nuts. And now a buck.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. It's crazy. It's crazy. So did you raise money for Savannah or are you self-funded?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, we raised some money, like pre-seed, kind of like, yeah. Angel investors are involved as well, yeah.

• Speaker #1

  So what's it, I mean, you're a woman in a world that's dominated by dudes, in the AI world, in the fundraising world. So what, it's refreshing to see a woman that's actually leading a company and leading in this because it's, there's not a lot of them. Do you find that that's a difficult or uphill battle sometimes or they don't take you quite as seriously? or that you don't know what you're doing or whatever? Or what's the challenges that you've had to experience as a woman in a heavily male-dominated realm?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, I mean, like in any industry or in any of the jobs that I worked, yeah, women are like, yeah, it's mostly like male-dominated. It was the same case for consulting. It was the same case like for the previous startup that I used to work as well. So, I mean, like, yeah, I'm definitely not the stereotype, like kind of founder in AI. But I do have the very relevant experience, like coming from the consulting, like the kind of more fashion angle. And then later I worked at this AI startup for about like four years from the kind of beginning, like from the founding team to the exit. their company got acquired like last year uh by one of the largest media companies so um yeah i mean definitely like i think a lot of investors they see you differently a lot of the big kind of like very famous uh female founders they also explain like their experience kind of like oh like when are you gonna get a child like you know like things like that are you married you know like they they made you They tend to ask like more personal questions, like to see, you know, like to try to predict the future of the company. If you are, you know, like as motivated as like the other, you know, like male peers, I guess. Yeah. So it's definitely not easy, I would say. But like as long as like you show the, you know, traction and then. your relevant experience, expertise in this space. And also the vision, obviously. It's, yeah, it's how you do it. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  Are you out of Silicon Valley?

• Speaker #2

  We are based in New York, in Manhattan. Yeah. And yeah, I have a CTO here as well. My co-founder. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. I mean, you went to Harvard, right? You got your MBA from Harvard? Is that correct?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, correct.

• Speaker #1

  There's some people that say you go to Harvard for the education, but that's a very small portion of people. Most people say you go to Harvard for the network. So have you, have you, have you, do you agree with that statement that the most valuable thing, yes, Harvard's a good education. I'm not denying that, but the most valuable thing is the network that, that comes out of going to a school like Harvard or MIT or Stanford or something like that. Would you would you agree with that? And how has that helped you in what you're what you're doing?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, for sure. I mean, it's definitely, you know, like you get to like connect with a lot of people in that certain circle. And it's I mean, the school itself is like, you know, it's all about like case study, like like case method. And like it's mostly, you know, like everyone does their own prep and then comes to class and then, you know, like. you discuss the case and then everyone has a different sort of background and experience uh so you actually get to learn from each other from the kind of like more academic perspective but also the whole experience is designed to to socialize like to meet as many people as possible and and yeah it's kind of like creating you know a sort of club in a way that you know like it opens doors to you like you can um Reach out to people, you know, you can, there is, it's a big community for sure. Like, right after MBA, I moved to New York, and then you get to still meet a lot of people. And, and they're helping there, you know, like, they want to help you. It's, it's definitely it's, it's, yeah, it's a big community, for sure.

• Speaker #0

  Where, where do you see this going? Like, two years ago, I never thought I'd see. imagery like I'm seeing now. Where do you see this going?

• Speaker #2

  Um, I mean, yeah, for me, so basically how I came up with this was, was like at the previous startup, we were building a generative AI solutions, mostly for media. We work with a couple of big actors like Tom Hanks, Kelly Riley, Robin Wright. The movie was called Here and the director was Bob Zemeckis, the director of Forrest Gump. So they wanted to experiment with things. with AI and that's how like sort of like I got into this like more image video generation like world and I got to you know like experience the impact of it the power of it like instead of like spending years and a lot of manual work like really big budgets we were able to like deliver a lot of the really like high quality de-aging up. stuff like for example tom hanks was acting himself as like 67 years old in studio and then on screen he would look like 20 years old for the flashbacks in the movie 30 years old like he was like you know driving all the mimics gestures like it was his performance but then he would just look you know 20 years old 30 years old or so it was real-time technology um so that was a big project Like, I mean, we did like half of the movie for that. for four actors we made uh their younger versions and that was huge and then we've done like a lot of like similar projects like this too and then i was like this is happening this is a pretty big space uh like producing like hyper realistic um like content and and then after yeah we sold the company i started to look into you know like markets and obviously like ecom fashion retail art. huge uh like markets and kind of like known as slow to adapt like slow to kind of like apply new technologies innovations um and then yeah we've started working with a couple of brands literally just like you know reaching out friends in this space um and then we've started building solutions for their particular workflows and it's been yeah it's been a really big momentum And every month or so, like every couple of, you know, like since last year, in the last two years, the interest, like the, you know, like a lot of the brands, they are like really, really interested. And they want to actually like integrate to their current like daily workflows. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  What's the key to getting the quality that you're getting? I mean, anybody can go to a lot of these tools and create images. But the quality like. like Norm was saying, looking on your website here, is really good with the lighting, the shadows, the little details, the fine lines in the hair and where it's integrating into the sunglasses and all that kind of stuff. What is the key? You don't have to give me your secret sauce, but what's the secret sauce? Is it in the prompting? Is it in the knowing all the technical side, like you're coming from this movie world where you had to create stuff that looked really good on a big screen or what's the What's the key to actually making your stuff differentiated?

• Speaker #2

  I think, yeah, it's creating particular pipelines, like solutions for each of the use case. As I mentioned, creating a model image is one challenge. And then it has a lot of technical details in it, like the skin texture of it, like how the... You know, like how you create an AI model, how you render that item on the model, how you create the background, how you combine all these pieces together, how you also kind of blend companies, like the brands, like kind of the visual aesthetic into it. So it's actually like it's not easy. It's you need to like, yeah, work on it. And then, yeah, it's basically finding all these like challenges. um difficulties like logo refinement is another challenge for example uh we basically like find all these like issues working with our customers like very closely and then uh piece by piece like we basically it obviously like what what the platform today is very different than what it was last year so we are like shipping features like literally on a daily basis um you It's all about being very on top of what's happening in the industry and then also what's the actual need for the customer and then tying them together. And it doesn't happen easily. Yeah, it's a lot of technical requirements. We have a very strong engineering team. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So what happens with fonts? I know with some LLMs that I'm working with and other apps, that sometimes font, either on the shirt or on the logo, will fall apart. Now, how does font affect images on your site?

• Speaker #2

  Like the font on the logo? Yeah,

• Speaker #0

  if I were to... It doesn't even have to be on a logo. It could just be a saying. Just give you just an example. Coffee cup. There we go. Says Hawaii. Okay. And if I were to upload this image, sometimes it would look like, I don't know, it just running into each other or it would break apart. Yeah. And that happens a lot still today. I will deal with a lot of non-alcoholic spirits and they're very, very particular. And the font is very fine. And nine out of ten times, I got to go back and redo it and redo it. Now, would I have to worry about that using your app?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, we do have a particular solution for that. Like most of the times, as long as the input image reflects the font, you know, like in a good light or so, we can create that.

• Speaker #1

  pretty accurately uh yeah it's it works pretty well you might have a new client yeah okay we can do a live demo with your arm i told you you gotta quit doing these pictures of you and speedos you gotta quit that because that's just grossing the people out you i know you want to do one in a pink one and a blue one and a green one but you you can't with a little uh bracelet on your hand but you you can't do that man you can't do better than you in the thong And we'll stop it there. Yeah, you don't want to paint that picture. So you said furniture and fashion are the two big things. But when we were talking earlier, you said that you're actually reaching out to some people in the Amazon e-commerce world and trying to get some of those guys that are that first. So is it just the fashion and furniture type of stuff there? Or you can pretty much do any kind of lifestyle pictures? Models holding something or using something or a girl holding a power saw drilling into the wood or what? What's your what's your targets or goals there?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, actually, like we so we started like just working with fashion companies. But then we were like checking like who is like signing up or so like who is like using the platform. We actually started to notice like a lot of different like product groups are coming into the platform like the companies. um it's literally it has any anything any product category like red light therapy mats to like you know like the masks to um like yeah a lot of like home goods stuff uh it is like yeah it can be applied to really anything um but we just like we provide very much more like automated solutions for particular groups but any uh product group can be also yeah

• Speaker #1

  uh generated in the system yeah so if i come to you and i i want to run facebook ads in 40 different countries and i want i have my red light therapy mask and i want to run in 40 different companies countries but i want the ads in turkey to be a look look a to look turkish like a turkish woman i want the ads in lebanon to look like a a lebanese woman i want the ads in germany to look like a German woman. One of the ads in... Columbia to look like a Colombian. I can, do I need to have 50 different models of those countries or you have all those models and those ethnicities I could just pick. And then I can just say, okay, here's my mask. Here's a product shot of my mask. Here's the 50 countries or the 50 models. I go select them and then just hit a button and then boom, it's all. And I did set the dimensions and the size and the back, whatever the other variables are. And then a couple of minutes later, I have, I have those entire...

• Speaker #2

  things to download is that basically that cost me 50 bucks you said dollar an image or something or whatever it is yeah pretty much yeah exactly so we do provide a like a diverse model library that you can select from like female male models kids models as well uh so you can select any of the you know like size age ethnicity any of the you know like characteristics that you would like to create uh just like one by one you select them and you can select like different poses too from the templates and then yeah you get the results like literally in in like maybe for the 50 of them it will take maybe like 20 minutes or so max yeah

• Speaker #1

  Are these models AI-generated models that were generated from scratch by AI, or are they real people that you paid and they licensed the way their image to be used for this?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, so right now they're all fully AI-generated, but we are planning to move to that direction as well. For example, working with model agencies, we can make agreements with them. So if, you know, like any model would like to, you know, create their own digital, like. you know, version, like avatar or so, we can, you know, like include them. And then every time they are, you know, like, like image is being used, they basically make money out of it. So we will, we are like, in the process of like making that type of partnerships too. And also, like, for example, if brands like, you know, or let's say like, if you want to use a particular brand for your own visuals, you can also actually... upload that image, obviously by making your own agreement with that model. And then you can technically create that particular model images too. But yeah, so far in the platform, like all the models in our library are all AI generated.

• Speaker #1

  That could be a huge market with creators. If I'm a big creator and I got 10 million followers and I want to do, I want to license my image out to all these brands, but I don't want to go stand and do photo shoots and all over all over the world, but I can authorize them, you know, to actually use my name, image, and likeness for a fee. That could be a huge business. And then other brands, if I'm, if I'm a Nike and I want to work with this one creator, I don't have to go to the creator and say, Hey, can I, I could actually go to a middle person like yourself. You're an agency and you have agreements and like, yep. You can use Susie Smith for $10,000 for this ad campaign if you want, and it's all right there. That could be a huge opportunity on both sides to actually leverage authority, brand, and everything all into one. Is that something that you guys are playing with?

• Speaker #2

  Yeah, definitely. We are making some plans to get there, and we're already in some conversations with some of the agencies. And there's actually a lot of demand on that side too.

• Speaker #1

  from from them like from the models uh or so too because and some of them actually they want to create their younger versions uh of course yes that's your trick norm when you do your speedos just the younger the younger norm when you're back when you were wrestling you're looking good yeah

• Speaker #2

  so there are some there's some like interesting use cases uh which is like which is happening. Yeah, for sure.

• Speaker #0

  Zara, you're not supposed to agree with him.

• Speaker #2

  Why not? Yes.

• Speaker #1

  Definitely an interesting time to be living and to be in. And there's tons of opportunities out there when it comes to AI and images and video and you name it. And images are one of the things I think are kind of leading the way in a lot of what's happening.

• Speaker #0

  is there

• Speaker #2

  anything that you see that ai is still struggling with like on the creative side um i mean yeah like for sure um like capturing you know like 100 accuracy is like still a challenge uh when it comes to more like you know difficult items like when it comes to more like intricate details or so um so because you know it's all about the system like predicting like a lot of the things and then when it comes to more like complex patterns or you know like textures or so like it's like still like challenging like to to create the 100% accuracy on those and then logo integration is like something that we do specifically like on the you know like t-shirts or like dresses or things like that like there's a company logo and then it's been also like it's it's still a big challenge like to because you know like they have their particular requirements like in terms of the scale in terms of the the the details of it so we are working on that too like we are providing a like a like an editing function to to upload to apply their particular logo um

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. And underwear is like, it's, there's a big demand coming from underwear companies, for example. And it's a challenge like to create the, you know, like the details around them as well. Yeah. But, but it's, it's covering most of the main use cases right now, like creating, for example, diverse models, like different sizes. It's, it's been very helpful for a lot of brands like to yeah to become like to be like more inclusive when they are visuals, for example. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  Hey, Kevin King and Norm Farrar here. If you've been enjoying this episode of Marketing Misfits, thanks for listening this far. Continue listening. We've got some more valuable stuff coming up. Be sure to hit that subscribe button if you're listening to this on your favorite podcast player. Or if you're watching this on YouTube or Spotify, make sure you subscribe to our channel because you don't want to miss a single episode of the Marketing Misfits. Have you subscribed yet, Norm?

• Speaker #2

  Well, this is an old guy alert. Should I subscribe to my own podcast?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, but what if you forget to show up one time? It's just me on here. You're not going to know what I say.

• Speaker #2

  I'll buy you a beard and you can sit in my chair too. And we'll just, you can go back and forth with one another.

• Speaker #1

  Yikes

• Speaker #2

  But that being said, don't forget to subscribe, share it. Oh, and if you really like this content, somewhere up... there there's a banner click on it and you'll go to another episode of the marketing Misfits make sure you don't miss a single episode because you don't want to be like Norm oh very

• Speaker #3

  good well it's looking like it's getting to the top of the hour Kev do you have any other questions no I just people want to try the tool they can try it for free right there's like I saw there's some free credits if someone just wants to go to savannah.ai and you can give it a free world, right?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, exactly. They can go to our website, savannah.ai, and then they can click on try for free. And then they will be directed to the app, like either on desktop or mobile. They can create an account either with their Google or non-Google accounts. And then we provide a couple of free credits. for them like to test it um and then if they like it they can yeah sign up they can get one of the plans to start with it's also like just they can start monthly see how it works for them uh we also they can also reach out to us and then schedule a live demo we usually help them like uh before and after as well like we do um onboarding we help them like we show basically how the the particular solutions work you And yeah, it takes like 10 minutes or so to get, you know, more familiar with the solutions. And it's pretty fun after that, actually, like they can, you know, like, we get this, we get this feedback, which is like, like, which makes me very happy. They say that it's a very fun platform to use. It's pretty easy to use. So it's, yeah, that's, that's the goal. A lot of people come to us, they're like, It's like so exhausting, like to write prompts and I don't even know where to start to, you know, like create something good. So that's what we provide to them, like the starting point, like a base. In terms of design, too, they can they've been a lot of the brands, the teams, they've been using it for design related solutions as well. So, yeah.

• Speaker #2

  Awesome. Well, at the top of the hour, it is exactly the top of the hour. We always ask our misfit if they know a misfit.

• Speaker #0

  Like someone else?

• Speaker #2

  To be put on the spot just like you.

• Speaker #0

  Okay. Yeah, so actually a friend of mine, she was on your podcast, Shant Shant. She, I think, recommended me to you. I would say... A friend of mine, Sylvan Kuo, they have a very cool startup as well. They do more like UGC type of videos for any type of company. And yeah, their startup is super cool too. I can recommend her.

• Speaker #2

  Very good. We'll be reaching out to get that information. All right. Well, thanks so much. This has been awesome. Learned a ton. Learned a ton about your company. And it looks like it's just going to be a real success.

• Speaker #0

  Thank you so much. Yeah, it's been a pleasure speaking with you. Thanks so much for having me.

• Speaker #3

  Thank you for coming on. Appreciate it.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #2

  All right. Now I'm going to remove you. I think if I remember how to do this. There we go. All right, Kev. That was pretty good.

• Speaker #3

  Yeah, there's so much going on in the world of AI and imagery right now, it's hard to keep up with it all. It seems like every day there's a new thing. But I think what she's doing is smart and future-proof and where it's putting the agentic side in where you can do this stuff at scale. And that's something that you and I are working on.

• Speaker #2

  We just talked about it before we got on the podcast today.

• Speaker #3

  Exactly. And so that's perfect. And I think she's on to something there. And this is just, I think, a good example of the proper use of AI. And so for those that are listening that are anti-AI, this is the right way to use AI right here. It's the tools and the processes. It's not so much the slop and the crap that's out there. That's what sets everything apart. So if you haven't, go to Savannah. I'm saying Savannah. I think she's pronounced it Savannah. sabana.ai and check it out. And speaking of that, there's something else they should check out. What is that, Norm? They should check out something on the YouTubes or the TikToks or something?

• Speaker #2

  I think it's called that. Yeah. Or the Googles. No, definitely check this out. Go to marketingmisfits.co, not .com. And you can always go to YouTube, check out our channel. And that is Marketing Misfits Podcast. Or if you just want to... check out these three minute or less clips. Go to Marketing Misfits Clips on YouTube.

• Speaker #3

  Or you can also read the podcast. We have a newsletter called Misfits, Marketing Misfits. It's at misfits.news. So misfits with an S dot news. And you can sign up every Wednesday. A brand new edition comes out, features the highlights from this podcast as well as some of the past podcasts. And we're getting really good feedback on people that... I'd like to read that and just skim over it. And maybe you don't have an hour to listen to every episode, but you can actually check out the latest of what's going on in the marketing world and get some ideas there. So misfits.news.

• Speaker #2

  And we're a little biased.

• Speaker #3

  A little bit biased.

• Speaker #2

  I think it's good.

• Speaker #3

  We're getting some good feedback from people. But, yeah, so if you want more feedback or feedback from us or learn from us, we're here every Tuesday with a brand-new episode. So I guess I'll see you again. Next Tuesday, Norm.

• Speaker #2

  Very good. All right, everybody. We'll see you later.

• Speaker #3

  Take care.

• Speaker #2

  Bye.