Former TikTok Execs Built an App That Uses AI to Teach You How to Pose for a Photo
Companies have been increasingly leveraging AI’s image generation capabilities to teach people better photography skills. Google introduced a feature called Camera Coach on Pixel phones last year to guide users on framing and composition, while Adobe released a similar AI feature in July that critiques photos and suggests changes before capture. Following that same trend, the Superpose AI pose app takes a slightly different angle, focusing specifically on teaching people how to actually pose for photos.
Built by two former TikTok employees, Melody Chu and Jing Liu, Superpose is a new iOS app launching with an AI guide designed to help users nail better poses in real time.
How Superpose Actually Works
At its core, the Superpose AI pose app functions as a camera app. Users take a selfie or photo of a friend, and the app generates four potential poses using AI. Some suggested poses lean fairly extravagant, and at times, the generated results can feel somewhat uncanny rather than fully natural.
Once generated, users can save poses they like or use the app’s match pose feature to try positioning themselves within the frame based on the AI’s specific suggestions, essentially turning the phone into a live posing coach during the shoot itself.
The Personal Problem Behind Superpose
Before founding Superpose, Chu held various product roles at companies including Meta, Nextdoor, Roblox, TikTok, and Slack. Liu, meanwhile, worked as a founding engineer at a 3D face-scanning startup before later working on image and video models at TikTok.
Chu explained that the idea for the Superpose AI pose app actually stemmed from a very personal frustration. “My husband just takes awful photos of me. It was a true pain point in our marriage where I don’t understand how he gets me to look just so terrible all the time,” Chu told TechCrunch. “And I thought to myself, there has to be a way to solve this problem with advancements in computer vision and generative AI. And I decided to set out on my own.”
Early Growth Since Launch
Superpose launched in July and has already been downloaded more than 22,000 times. According to the company, users have collectively generated over 190,000 poses through the app so far. Superpose offers five free pose generations daily, with additional packs available for purchase, five extra generations for $2.99, or twenty for $9.99.
What Sets Superpose Apart From Competitors
While Chu acknowledged that other companies are also entering the AI-guided photography space, she emphasized that Superpose specifically wants to become the best camera app for taking portrait photos by following direct AI guidance, rather than expanding into fully AI-generated backgrounds or fantasy imagery.
“We want to lean into the core of memory capture versus, say, putting you in a fantastical place that you’ve never been. I think there are so many apps that do that well already, but we really wanna focus on actually capturing the lived moment and experience,” Chu explained, drawing a clear distinction between Superpose’s real-photography focus and more fantastical AI image generation tools already on the market.
She also acknowledged the current limitations around uncanny-feeling pose suggestions, noting the company is actively working to improve generation quality. According to Chu, the startup is currently focused on improving its generation styles, adding more personalization, and finding better ways to coach users directly through the viewfinder in real time, rather than only after a photo has already been taken.
Funding Behind the App
Superpose has raised $2.2 million in funding to date, backed by Khosla Ventures, Chinese smartphone and selfie app maker Meitu, and OVTR Ventures, giving the young startup meaningful early capital as it works to refine its core AI posing experience and expand its user base.
As the Superpose AI pose app continues developing, its narrow focus on genuine portrait photography, rather than fantastical AI-generated scenes, positions it as a distinct alternative within an increasingly crowded field of AI-powered photography tools.