Central Florida

The photographs that had to reach the projector

A WordPress plugin for a live venue: guests shoot from their own phones, staff approve, and approved photos join a full-screen slideshow on the big screen.

The Luma Loop presentation screen: a guest photograph of a dog in a knitted hat set inside a gold-and-navy “10 Years Anniversary” event frame, beside the guest’s submitted message and first name. — The projector view — an approved submission in the event’s own template.

The guest capture page: a branded event frame with a marked-out space reading “Add your photo” and buttons to take a photo or choose one, beside optional fields for a message and the guest’s name. — The projector view — an approved submission in the event’s own template.

The situation

A live venue wanted guest photographs on the big screen during an event — branded to the night, moderated before anyone saw them, and on the venue's own timeline rather than a third-party app's.

Scoped, documented and delivered end to end for a paying client. The plugin is open source at github.com/ghyde3/lumaloop.

What was actually wrong

Nothing between a guest's camera and a projector: The obvious routes all fail at an event: an app store install nobody will do mid-party, a social hashtag the venue cannot moderate, or a member of staff walking a laptop round the room.
Unmoderated is not an option on a big screen: Anything that appears in front of a room has to be approved before it appears, not removed afterwards. That makes moderation a build requirement rather than a feature.

What we built

Branded templates with a photo hole: The venue's artwork, logo and colours, with a defined space the guest photograph drops into, so every shot on screen matches the event. Composited server-side through PHP's GD.
Capture from the guest's own phone: A page shared by QR code. No install, no account. Take the photo, place it in the frame, add a short message, submit.
A moderation queue that defaults to pending: Nothing reaches the screen without approval. Staff approve, reject or reorder from the same tools they use to run the room.
A presentation screen with an off switch: Full-screen slideshow with smooth transitions on the machine driving the projector, and the ability to pause the show or put up an end screen when the night wraps.
Three shortcodes and nothing else to learn: Capture, presentation and moderation each drop onto a page the venue already controls. Requires WordPress 6.4+ and PHP 8.1+.

Client name withheld by request. This engagement has no measured figures we can publish, so none are shown. We are happy to provide references on a call.