Personal Paparazzi
Life's best moments usually get captured by a selfie stick or a stranger fumbling with someone's phone. Personal Paparazzi is an on-demand photographer app that closes that gap, matching users with a nearby, verified photographer who comes to them and captures the moment the way it deserves. The founder came to Designli with the idea, and we carried it from the first scoping session through launch on the App Store and Google Play, and we continue to maintain the platform and build into the future.
Why Personal Paparazzi?
Personal Paparazzi (personalpaparazzi.com) is an on-demand photography marketplace - in the company's own words, a rideshare, but for capturing memories. A user requests a shoot on the spot, and the platform matches them with a nearby verified Paparazzi - a local photographer who meets them on-site and captures a scene of nine photos and a short video, uploaded automatically to the user's gallery for download.
The founder comes from a development and IT background and acts as the product's day-to-day product manager, staying hands-on from the earliest SolutionLab workshops all the way to the app stores.
A marketplace means two products, not one. Clients need to request a shoot, pay, and get their memories back. Paparazzi have a product of their own, covering onboarding, verification, accepting work, and getting paid. Designli took on both sides - two apps, the backend and admin CMS, the landing page, and the brand itself.
Step into the SolutionLab.
Designli's proprietary product roadmapping service, the SolutionLab, turned the idea into a buildable plan. Working sessions mapped the actors on both sides of the marketplace and walked through their user journeys, then prioritized an MVP worth building first - with wireframes and design reviews along the way.
Walking both user journeys.
The SolutionLab mapped both journeys: the client's path from request to a finished scene in their gallery, and the Paparazzi's path from onboarding to a first payout. MVP prioritization then decided what each side actually needed first, so the launch plan covered both sides of the marketplace.
Designing both sides of the marketplace.
A two-sided marketplace only works if both products are designed together, so the SolutionLab covered the Paparazzi app just as fully as the client app: onboarding and identity verification, the availability toggle, accepting a request, and the end-to-end shoot flow. Both sides came out of the same session as finished designs, with the wireframes, specs, and prioritized build plan the development team worked straight from.
UX/UI Design & Prototype.
Personal Paparazzi arrived without a brand, so design started before the first screen. Designli's product designers shaped the brand and collaborated with the founder on the logo direction - the elephant in a fedora - then carried it across both apps: the client side (map homepage, request, chat, wallet, and gallery) and the Paparazzi side (onboarding through a live shoot). Prototyping the full product before development meant everyone went into the build looking at the same thing.
A dedicated product team.
Designli's dedicated product team built and launched the whole platform: the client app, the Paparazzi app, the backend, an admin CMS, and the landing page. The CMS keeps the business adjustable without a code change - pricing, radiuses, limits, and users are all configurable.
Designli staffs the complete outsourced engineering department for Personal Paparazzi, which includes a Product Owner, a Tech Lead, developers, a QA specialist, a designer, and a Go-to-Market Engineer to run user acquisition and marketing. Work runs in two-week Scrum sprints with the founder in sprint planning and sprint review, plus product strategy sessions, and every sprint is documented with demos.
Both apps shipped to the App Store and Google Play. Personal Paparazzi went out first to friends and family, then debuted to the public with a street team in Las Vegas. Development continues past launch, with scheduled photoshoots, a referral system, and more on the roadmap.
Feature spotlight:
on-the-spot matching.
The client app opens on a map of nearby Paparazzi. A request goes out and matching happens in real time over WebSockets, with in-app chat connecting both sides while the photographer follows turn-by-turn routing to the client. The session itself is proximity-gated - it can't start until the Paparazzi is actually there.
Feature spotlight:
the custom in-app camera.
Every scene is shot through a camera Designli built into the Paparazzi app to professional standards: pinch zoom, tap-to-focus, HDR, a rule-of-thirds grid, hold-to-record video, and Bluetooth shutter support.
Feature spotlight:
Paparazzi verification & payouts.
On this platform, strangers photograph strangers - so trust is built into onboarding itself. Every Paparazzi clears identity verification through Stripe Identity, a background check, and training before accepting a first request. On the earning side, payouts run automatically: weekly, through Stripe Express.
Feedback has been nearly 100% positive.
One of the Vegas launch team members has a Samsung Z foldable phone and the app looks incredible on it!
Let's build together!
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