Early stage · Austin, TX · Not yet available
The whole room
becomes the scene.
Photon Pilot is surround sound for light. An AI that understands what is happening on screen directs lights placed all around your living room, so a blast on the left blooms on the left and rolls past you, rain falls from above, and dread creeps in from behind. It is meant to work even in movies and games with no lighting built in.
Home theater console
Detected tags · scripted
Placement · scripted
A short scripted sequence the AI could move through. Illustrative only: nothing here is analysing video.
Nudge how much each light follows the scene. 100% means as directed.
Pick a scene or press play to see how the room could respond.
The console above is an illustrative demo. No live AI model is running in this page.
01 / Capabilities
Be in the scene, not in front of it
Goals for an early-stage product, not a list of shipped features.
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Watches the screen
Follows whatever is playing, whether a film, a streaming show, or a game.
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Understands the scene
Aims to recognize mood, tension, weather, explosions, a dark corridor or a sunset, beyond which colors are on screen.
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Places action in space
Decides where things happen: a blast on the left that rolls around you, rain from above, a car sweeping past.
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Lights all around you
Light from the ceiling, walls, corners, behind the sofa and the floor, so the room surrounds you the way sound does.
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Works with any movie or game
Meant for the library you already have. No re-mastered discs or developer integrations; the AI reads the picture itself.
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You stay in control
Per-light trims and overrides, so the room never does something you did not want.
02 / Workflow
Set up. Play anything. The room responds.
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01
Set up your room
Bring Photon Pilot into your room and tell it how you like to watch. Details of setup are still being worked out.
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02
Play anything
Start a movie or a game the way you normally do. Nothing needs to be encoded or patched.
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03
The room responds
The AI reads the scene and where the action is, then directs the Photon Pilot lights around you: colder overhead in a storm, closing in from behind in a corridor, warm along the walls at sunset.
03 / Approach
Understanding the scene, not just its edges
A simple approach repeats the colors at the edge of the screen on lights near the screen. That can look good, but all the light stays in front of you, and it does not know why a moment feels the way it does.
- Screen-edge colors
- Repeats the colors near the edge of the picture, in front of you.
- Scene-aware
- Aims to know what is happening and where: a storm overhead, a threat behind you, an explosion off to the left. Then it lights the whole room for that.
04 / System
A complete system
Photon Pilot is designed as one system: the AI that understands the scene and places it in space, and the lights built to be directed by it, all around the room. Because both are made to work together, the room can respond as one.
Status: early stage and in development. Nothing is available yet, and the room in the demo above is illustrative.
05 / Location
Made in Austin
Photon Pilot is an early-stage project from Austin, Texas, built by people who like a dark room, a big screen and a good soundtrack, and who think the lights should be part of the show.
AUSTIN, TEXAS
USA
06 / Early access
Get on the early access list
Tell us what you watch and play. We will write when there is something real to try.
hello@photon-pilot.com