Have you ever purchased a sofa online and noticed the homes displayed in the background of product images? When launching a new collection, furniture brands often invest heavily in photo shoots, a process that can be both tedious and costly due to the logistics of moving large furniture pieces.
This was the challenge that inspired Presti, a French startup founded in November 2022. Leveraging generative AI, Presti transforms a single product image into a lifelike lifestyle photo. The company recently secured a $3.5 million seed investment from the global tech firm Partech, along with contributions from several angel investors.
“Right from the start, we reached out to 50 potential users for feedback,” said Nabil Toumi, Presti's co-founder and CEO. “Across the board, they expressed that creating product visuals was a lengthy and expensive endeavor without a straightforward solution. Yet, these visuals were crucial for building a unique brand identity and driving online sales.”
Presti’s technology can take a basic product image and enhance it into an engaging setting, resulting in compelling visuals for marketing and sales.
Initially, Presti did not specifically target the furniture sector. However, the team quickly recognized that furniture companies grappled with unique challenges. “To conduct a photo shoot, they often need to rent attractive homes and handle the logistics of transporting heavy products. This can incur costs in the hundreds of thousands, sometimes even millions, of euros annually,” Toumi explained.
At its core, Presti employs Stable Diffusion XL, a robust foundation model that has been refined to excel in product imagery for the furniture industry. Early on, the team experimented with a standard version but encountered issues like incorrect proportions and perspectives. “For example, achieving the right alignment of the wall behind a sofa is essential,” Toumi added.
A key strength of Presti’s approach is its extensive dataset. Currently, the model is trained on over 75,000 ultra-high-quality images of furniture, enhancing its capacity to generate tailored product visuals effectively.
Presti aims to go beyond just creating backgrounds; it also allows users to add accessories. For instance, when generating images for a new sofa, you can incorporate cushions that cast realistic shadows, making them appear naturally integrated rather than digitally placed.
Furthermore, furniture brands often offer various textures and colors for the same model. Though still in development, Presti envisions a tool enabling customers to easily swap materials, simplifying the product launch process for brands.
However, this innovation may not be welcomed by freelance photographers. It raises questions about whether machine-generated backgrounds can fully replace the creativity and originality brought by human stylists, potentially leading to a uniformity in lifestyle images.
Presti primarily collaborates with mid-sized furniture brands, but it also boasts a strategic partnership with Maisons du Monde, one of France's largest furniture retailers. In addition to backing from Partech, the startup has garnered support from investors like Maxime Brousse, Thibaud Elzière, Julien Hirth, Abou Laraki, and Rémi Lemonnier.
By harnessing the power of generative AI, Presti is poised to revolutionize how furniture brands create compelling product visuals.
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