Creative ways to use AI to improve your photography

Trip and shooting preparation with AI

Build a photography scouting brief

When I plan to visit a place I don’t know well, I often start by asking AI to gather information about photographic locations, viewpoints, access, seasons, local events and permits. Then I organize what I find in my database and notes, and use it to build an itinerary. I don’t rely on AI alone. It’s one source of inspiration and a useful starting point; as I search through other channels, I usually discover more locations along the way.

With AI, it is always important to check the sources. My own offline map app helps me keep locations, notes and screenshots together. A scouting brief can complement that work rather than sending me back to a stack of disconnected browser tabs.

If you want to know more about my scouting and research technique, I’ll publish another article about it soon. Stay tuned.

Prepare a travel or documentary photography shot list

This is one of the ideas I find most useful before travelling to a country or community I don’t know well. A little preparation can make a big difference and help you arrive ready to look. I sometimes think that 20% preparation can bring 20% of the results, while thoughtful preparation can get you closer to 60 or 70% of what you hoped to achieve. Those numbers are only my way of describing how much preparation can matter; the reality in the field is never guaranteed.

For example, you can ask AI to brainstorm what a culture is about: the tools people use, their work, clothing, gestures, rituals and the relationships between these things. A research brief about the Kogi might mention the poporo, the mochila, agricultural tools, clothing and daily activities.

The next step could be to combine those details into visual ideas and think about moments and light. Of course, this approach may not suit documentary photographers who only photograph moments as they happen. In my own style, I often photograph people after asking their permission. It is a different approach, and it allows more room for creativity, especially when I prepare in this way.

It won’t be possible to carry out every idea. The point is to arrive better prepared and improve your chances of making the photographs you hope for. The list is there to help you notice possibilities, not to make people perform a scene. Check cultural details with appropriate local sources and let the real situation guide you.

Create a storyboard from a photograph

When I’m researching a place or preparing a photo session, I can give AI a reference image and ask for a storyboard with different actions, angles, distances and lighting ideas. A jungle portrait, for example, might suggest a wide establishing frame, a detail, a portrait with space around the subject and a sequence of gestures.

The idea isn’t to rely only on the skills you already have. It’s to step into the unknown and try a composition, lighting setup or angle you haven’t used before.

If you arrive at a place with nothing prepared, some scenes may be difficult to plan on the spot. If you want to be there at the right time, in the best light, with the elements you need in the scene, it takes preparation and sometimes a conversation with the people involved.

Some AI ideas will simply be impossible or won’t suit the person or situation. I would rather have a few prompts or fallback ideas in mind and respond to the real scene than reproduce a storyboard frame by frame.

Example prompt:

Create a storyboard with [number] frames for a short video about [topic].
Each frame should include simple illustrations with clear character actions.
Keep the style [flat, cinematic, comic, hand-drawn] and maintain consistency.
Add small text labels for what is happening in each scene.

Generate alternative compositions from one photograph

You don’t always need a full storyboard. For a simple portrait session, you can use the same idea to explore variations on one portrait. Instead of coming home with only one staged portrait, you could try different positions and lighting setups. It can also make the session more enjoyable for the person in front of your camera.

Upload a photograph you like, or one you’ve already made, and ask for alternative compositions: foreground framing, more negative space, a lower viewpoint, a tighter environmental portrait or a longer-lens perspective.

The useful part isn’t a beautiful generated image. It’s the thinking process and the conversation about how I might have made the photograph differently. I can ask where the camera would need to be, whether the position is physically possible, and what would change if I waited or moved. That can help me see options next time I’m in a similar place.

Use AI to identify where a photograph was taken

I have tested image-based geolocation myself. It has been useful with well-known buildings and landscapes, but much less reliable in remote places that aren’t well documented online. I don’t treat the answer as proof. I compare it with my trip notes, visible landmarks, GPS data and other clues before adding a location to a caption.

For me, this is a good example of AI as a research assistant: it can suggest a direction, but I’m responsible for checking the answer.

Use AI to spot photography opportunities

Sometimes the photograph you have in mind depends on conditions you can’t plan weeks in advance. Maybe you want to photograph reflections in the street just after rain, or catch a promising sunset from a particular viewpoint. The idea might stay in your head for months, and then you forget about it when the conditions finally arrive.

You could set up a scheduled task in Codex or another AI assistant to check a weather forecast for a place at a regular time and let you know when it sees conditions worth looking at. For example, you could ask it to watch for rain ending before evening in your city, so you can go out and look for puddles and reflections. Or ask it to flag evenings when the forecast suggests interesting clouds around sunset at a location you want to photograph.

The forecast won’t tell you for certain that the light will be beautiful, and the assistant needs access to current weather information and a way to notify you. I would treat the reminder as a reason to check the conditions myself, then decide whether to go out.

You can take this further by keeping a list of subjects, locations and ideas you want to develop. Add the conditions you are waiting for, review the list regularly, and ask your assistant to remind you when an opportunity might be coming. I like the idea of having a simple system like this: it keeps projects moving, gives you a reason to pick up the camera, and can help you build a more varied portfolio over time.

Learning and improving your photography skills with AI

Ask AI to critique your photograph

A few years ago, I tried asking people in photography forums for feedback. Sometimes it helped; sometimes the comments felt uncomfortable or didn’t account for what was possible at the time. Someone looking at the finished image might say I should have changed the angle or light, without knowing that the moment lasted a second or that moving closer wasn’t appropriate.

With AI, I can explain those constraints before asking for a critique. I can ask it to look at the image as a competition curator or tell me whether it communicates the style I’m trying to learn. I can ask about composition, exposure, focus or storytelling, then follow up on the parts that seem useful.

That doesn’t make AI an objective judge. It wasn’t there, and it doesn’t know what I felt or what choices were available. I wouldn’t take a score such as “8/10” seriously on its own. I’m more interested in whether the critique gives me a question I can use on my next shoot.

You can go a step further and tell AI about your photography: what you feel comfortable with, what you’re good at, what you’d like to improve, and what inspires you. The more context it has about your style and the things you find difficult, the more relevant its replies can be.

Learn the technique behind a photograph that inspires you

If you’re not comfortable with camera settings and see a photograph on Instagram or elsewhere that makes you wonder how it was made, you can ask AI to reason about the technique. Did the photographer likely use a wide or long lens? How might shutter speed relate to the movement? Could the background blur come from aperture, distance or focal length?

The exact settings usually aren’t visible in the photograph, so ask for possibilities rather than a definitive answer. After a while, you may not need AI to do this kind of breakdown. It’s a useful exercise when you catch yourself losing time on social media.

AI might also introduce you to techniques, photographers or sources of information that inspire you to investigate further.

Learn composition by breaking an image into parts

If you want to improve your composition, collect a series of images you like and ask AI to analyze and break them down. It can help you train your eye. Once you have a list of elements you like, you may get closer to understanding your preferred style and choosing locations where you can explore similar ideas.

For example, ask AI to annotate an image for leading lines, visual weight, framing, color contrast, subject placement and layers.

Create photography exercises around your own weaknesses

If you keep struggling with complex scenes or want to master a new genre, ask AI to create a week of small exercises around that subject. After each one, you can show it your results and ask it to adjust the next challenge.

The important part is to start with something you actually want to improve. A general list of photography tips is easy to ignore; a short assignment connected to your own photographs gives you a real reason to go out and try again.

A new way to use AI to edit your photos

Sharpen a photograph when you’ve missed focus

Every photographer misses focus sometimes. AI sharpening can make a photograph more usable, especially when the alternative is to throw it away. I’ve found tools that promise to recover detail, but I would check the result carefully around the eye or other important edges. Sharpening can make an image look crisp without restoring what the camera never recorded.

I would keep the original and compare the result at the size I intend to use. For a personal archive, I may accept some reconstruction. For a documentary photograph, I would be much more cautious about detail the software has invented.

Upscale an old photograph

Whether to upscale a photograph depends on your ethics. Let’s say you took a photograph years ago without a long lens. You might revisit the old files and crop more boldly. If the image is small or your camera didn’t capture many pixels, you can ask AI to upscale it and perhaps reveal a treasure sleeping on your hard drive. It can be worth looking again at old photographs you made as an amateur, with limited equipment or resolution; you may find something worth bringing back to life.

I’ve experimented with this in Photoshop, and I’ve been impressed by how the tools have developed. A few months ago, I could only edit images properly at around 1K; now I can work at 4K, and I imagine 8K or more may follow.

Upscaling can add plausible detail, but plausible isn’t the same as true. I would preserve the original and label the enlarged version so I remember what changed.

These images may not be for competitions. They can be for your personal albums and a way to get more from your memories. After all, memories are in our heads, and our heads don’t have pixels.

Denoise only the part of the photograph that needs it

I like the idea of selecting just the noisy area instead of processing the whole photograph. In my first test, the result seemed to reveal more detail than I expected. I haven’t measured it against a controlled comparison, so I would describe it as a promising first impression rather than a proven result.

My own view is that local denoising isn’t automatically cheating. The camera has limits; the photographer has a vision. If a small noisy patch distracts from the image I intended to make, I’m comfortable exploring a repair. The boundary depends on why the photograph exists. If it documents an event, place or person, I wouldn’t quietly add details and present them as untouched evidence.

Experiment with color-grading recipes

I can give AI a reference image and ask it to describe the palette, contrast, saturation, white balance and tonal range. Then I can ask for a practical editing recipe to try in Lightroom or another editor.

I would use that explanation to understand the look rather than blindly copy a preset. If the recipe gives me a starting point, I can decide what belongs in my photograph and what doesn’t.

Use AI for file management

Let AI help organize your Lightroom library

We’re on the verge of being able to ask an assistant to find photographs from one trip, suggest keywords or prepare location metadata from folder names and notes. That could save a lot of repetitive work, especially with a large archive.

I’ve done a few experiments using the Codex app and ExifTool, a long-standing and very useful tool by Phil Harvey. I tested it on a few sets of photos, and it worked really well. I imagine that soon we’ll be able to manage our whole catalogue through voice commands.

I wouldn’t give an agent permission to rewrite thousands of files without checking what it plans to change. I would start with a small copied folder, review every proposed keyword and location, and keep a backup of the metadata. A wrong country or community name can travel a long way once it enters an archive.

Let AI help with captions, but keep your voice

I often start by writing a few rough ideas about a photograph I’ve taken, then ask AI to help improve the caption. I’ve automated that workflow: I can click a button and ask AI to refine the caption. This way, I spend less time at my computer and more time in the field. It’s useful when I’d rather show images than spend a long time writing about them.

At the same time, I’ve started worrying less about making every caption polished. We’re seeing AI everywhere, and its smooth phrasing can make different photographers sound alike. Sometimes I’d rather write a casual caption myself, leave a small imperfection in it and let it sound like me.

Ask an AI assistant to help fix a photography application

If a feature in Lightroom, Photoshop or another application stops working, a coding assistant may be able to inspect a plugin or explain a technical problem. That’s a different use of AI: it helps with the tool around photography rather than with the photograph itself.

This can be useful, but I wouldn’t assume every instruction is safe just because the assistant sounds confident. Before installing a plugin or changing application files, I would check what it is changing and make a backup. The most helpful outcome is getting back to making photographs, not creating another technical problem.

Use AI for sharing your photos

Ask AI to help you cull your portfolio

Sometimes it’s hard to choose your best photographs. Imagine you’re preparing a slideshow for friends, a book, or an online album. You have many candidates and aren’t sure which ones to select. You can group a few of them in your photography software, take a screenshot and ask AI to help you compare them. Include photographs from different angles and distances so it has some variety to work with.

I sometimes use this for social media, and I think it’s a good technique. AI isn’t emotionally involved in the shoot, and our own feelings can make a choice difficult. It may explain why one photograph works better than another. Even when I disagree, that can help me decide: I can say, “No, I don’t agree; I’ll take the other one.” Either way, it guides me through the choice.

Right now, these tools aren’t ready to cull a long series of 500 photographs for me. They can help detect closed eyes or focus problems, but for a selection that really matters—images for a portfolio, for example—I find it useful to compare a small group and ask for a second opinion.

Enhance your captions

I often start with a few rough ideas about a photograph I’ve taken, then ask AI to improve the caption. I’ve automated the workflow, so I can click a button and get help with the wording. This means I spend less time at my computer and more time in the field. It’s useful when I’m better at showing images than writing about them.

Ultimately, though, I’ve started worrying less about captions. We’re seeing AI everywhere, and I don’t want every caption to sound polished in the same way. I sometimes go back to a more traditional approach: write something casual, leave a typo or two, and embrace the imperfection.

Schedule social posts with AI

You could give an AI assistant a folder of photographs and ask it to prepare or schedule posts over time. I haven’t experimented with that. I prefer to choose which images I share and when; I’ve built my own workflow for it.

It might suit someone who wants to automate a routine, but I would still review every image, caption and destination before anything went live. Convenience isn’t worth handing over the final say about how my photographs are presented.

Build a pose book that feels like your own

Many people aren’t comfortable with coding, and I wasn’t either a few years ago. But vibe coding is becoming handy, and more people can create their own applications. You need to choose where to host or run your app; from there, AI can help you build and improve it.

For example, I haven’t built this yet, but it’s on my to-do list: gather photographs I like and that speak to my style, ask AI to simplify them into sketches or visual prompts, then organize them into a small PDF, a folder on my phone or, even better, an app.

Some posing apps are already very good. But with this method, you can take things further and build a guide around your own style rather than relying on an app that may feel limited.

Create a minimalist hand-drawn black-and-white editorial illustration depicting [INSERT YOUR SCENE OR SUBJECT].

Draw using fluid, slightly imperfect black ink contour lines on a pure white background. Use a loose, confident, spontaneous pen-sketching technique with thin-to-medium organic strokes.

Simplify people, animals and objects into elegant, recognizable outlines with minimal interior details. Faces should be friendly and expressive, with simple eyes, noses and smiles. Preserve natural proportions while allowing subtle artistic stylization.

Use only essential lines to communicate form, movement, emotion and interaction. Leave large areas of empty white space.

Strict visual constraints: black outlines only. No color, gray tones, shading, crosshatching, gradients, filled silhouettes, realistic textures or 3D effects.

The finished illustration should resemble a contemporary minimalist editorial ink drawing: effortless, playful, human and visually clear.

Create a photo app tailored to the way you travel

I travel full time and often research places I don’t know well. I wanted a map where I could organize locations by photography type or style, add screenshots and notes, and link one place to another. I didn’t want all that knowledge trapped in a service that might not fit my needs or work offline.

So I built my own photography-planning app. It has its own maps and works offline, which means I can use the research in the field without depending on a connection. For me, there’s a real satisfaction in using something I made because it fits the way I think and travel.

AI makes it easier to imagine building a small tool for a specific need, even if you’re not a developer. You can describe what you want, ask an AI coding assistant to help build it, and improve it as you use it. The result could be much simpler than my app: a local reference library, a map of locations or a way to connect photographs with notes.

Build an offline photography reference library

A pose book could grow into a wider reference library on your phone: compositions, species, traditional tools, architectural details, lighting ideas or photographs you want to study. If you travel somewhere with poor connectivity, it’s useful to have your notes and references available when you need them.

You could make a collection of desert, mountain or street photographs, study their use of light and shadow, or collect portrait ideas. The possibilities are wide open.

AI could help sort and search the material, but I would keep the sources attached. I want to know where an idea or cultural detail came from, especially when I plan to use it in a documentary project.