Poseidon software
Event photos on your guests' phones the same night. Your camera sends photos to a computer you own. Guests scan one QR code, take a selfie, and see the photos they are in. Tips or pay-after orders go straight to you.
What it does
One install per photographer, on hardware the photographer owns.
Camera to guests' phones
The camera sends photos over secure FTP while you shoot. They land in a gallery guests open by scanning one QR code. After the event, a card sync adds anything the live transfer missed.
A selfie finds your photos
A guest takes one selfie and sees the photos they are in. Sure matches show first; "Might be you" photos are shown separately for the guest to check. The selfie is used for that one search and never saved.
Runs on hardware you own
A NAS, a Linux box or a Mac laptop. Photos and face data stay on your machine. There is no cloud face service, and no shared platform holding your guests' photos.
Money goes straight to you
Set each event to tips only, or let guests order now and pay after with Venmo or a Stripe card link. Payments go to your own accounts. Poseidon is not in the money path.
How a night works
- Before. Create and start the event on the dashboard. Choose tips only or pay-after. Print the QR kit: the printed code opens whichever event is live, so the same cards work every time. Deploy and dry-run a day ahead.
- During. Shoot. The camera sends JPEGs to your server, through a laptop on a phone hotspot or through a relay to an always-on server at home. Guests scan, take a selfie and see their photos as they arrive.
- After. Put the camera card in and run the card sync, then check that every photo is hosted. End the event and mark the tips and orders you were paid.
Where this actually stands
The honest status, as of October 2026:
- Piloted at four events Beau Williams photographed, Oct 1–4, 2026 (a rec-room night, a nightclub, a college football game and its after party), on his own NAS. More than 2,000 photos were hosted across the four, counted from the server afterwards.
- The card sync delivered most photos. The camera's live sending is best-effort over a phone connection. At one event no photos arrived live; at the smallest, all of them did. The first three events each ended with a card sync, so it is now a standard end-of-night step, not a recovery.
- Real-selfie accuracy is still being measured. Face search has been tested with stand-in selfies (faces cropped from the event photos, and clear photos of people who were not there), not yet with guests' own phone selfies. Some wrong photos still appear, mostly under "Might be you". In dark rooms many faces are too dark to match at all; flash helps more than software.
- One camera tested: Sony α7 IV. Canon, Nikon and Fujifilm support comes from the makers' docs and is untested. Any camera works through the card sync.
- Nobody else has installed it yet. Today it runs on one photographer's hardware with a manual setup. The next gate is a second photographer installing it from the manual alone, ideally on Canon or Nikon.
- Not for sale. No price, no download, no checkout. The "Coming soon" button stays inert until that changes.
How it will work
Decided in October 2026. Price and license terms are published when Poseidon is listed; until then this page shows no price and no download.
- Your own copy. Each photographer runs their own copy on hardware they own, with guided setup. A hosted service may come later.
- Your brand. Guests' galleries carry your brand, with a small "Powered by Poseidon · Trident Social" credit.
- One event per selfie. A new install starts with each selfie searching only the event the guest is at.
- A relay for the camera. Trident Social will run a relay server so your camera can reach your server at home without opening ports.
- Your name on the privacy page. Guests will see who runs the face data and how to reach them.
- Colorado first. Face-data laws differ by state, so access starts with Colorado photographers while other states are reviewed.
What you need
For one photographer's install. "Tested" means tested at the pilot events; everything else is untested.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Camera | Built-in secure FTP (FTPES) for live sending. Tested: Sony α7 IV. Canon, Nikon and Fujifilm models: from the makers' docs, untested. Any camera works through the card sync after the event. |
| Photo format | JPEG. RAW and HEIF files are not accepted yet. |
| A computer to host it | An always-on NAS or Linux box with Docker, or a Mac laptop. The pilot ran on a NAS with Docker; a Linux box or a laptop as the host is untested. About 5 GB free, plus room for full-size photos. |
| At the venue | A phone hotspot for the camera (iPhone tested; Android not yet). Plus either a laptop at the venue, or a relay so the camera can reach your server at home. |
| Domain | Your own domain name and a Cloudflare account. A Cloudflare Tunnel puts the gallery online without opening ports on your network. |
| Payments (optional) | A Venmo account for tips (a business profile to sell photos), and Stripe Payment Links if you want card payments. |
| Setup | Someone comfortable with a terminal. A guided setup command is planned, not built yet. |
Privacy: you run the face data
Poseidon makes a face template for each face in the photos it hosts, so a selfie can find them. On your install, you are the operator of that data, not Trident Social. You decide who can search, how long face data is kept, and you answer to your guests and to the law where you shoot.
- Templates stay on your machine. No cloud face service is used, and payment providers never receive photos.
- Selfies are not kept. A guest's selfie is used for one search and discarded; it is never saved to disk.
- Guests opt in. They tick a consent box before the selfie camera opens.
- Face data is deleted on a timer you set (the default is 6 weeks after an event ends), or on request.
- Search scope is a setting. "One event": a selfie searches only the event the guest is at. "Every open event": one selfie searches all your open events, which also means anyone holding a photo of someone could see which of your open events that person was at. New installs start with one event.
- Backups hold face data too until they are replaced, so keep your backups on the same timer.
- Laws differ by state. Several US states regulate face data, for example Illinois (BIPA), Texas, Washington and Colorado. Check the rules where you shoot, tell guests at the venue, and check venue rules too: some campuses and venues ban selling on site.
This is a plain summary of how the software works, not legal advice.
Built by Trident Social for its own event work first. The studio also builds websites, brand launches and social for small businesses.
See what the studio builds →