AI-Powered Beauty: Why Brands Are Replacing Photo Shoots with Algorithms
Modern skincare and cosmetics brands are in a tough market, and not only because of the competition. Buyers are sophisticated.
- A Capgemini 2024 report found that 70% of consumers are making fewer impulse buys.
- They’re more than willing to switch brands. A McKinsey 2024 study found that “brand loyalty is fading across demographic groups.”
- They research before they buy. For example, a Mintel 2023 report found that over half of beauty products buyers pay close attention to the ingredients list.
In addition to thought-intensive consideration, the modern skincare and cosmetics consumer has cultivated a reliable intuitive feel as they sift through lists of products and algorithmic recommendations.
They notice details, and their absence.
The details in a top-of-funnel signal matter if it’s going to stop the scroll.
In terms of product benefits, skincare and cosmetics shoppers are processing how the product:
- Will feel on use
- Will look once they use it
- Is used, the mechanism of application
- Will fit and store with other beauty and health items they’ve purchased
Product details are usually first revealed online, and usually through photos.
The thing is, product photos are not made equal.
Photo-Based Competition in Skincare and Cosmetics
Each buyer brings to bear a unique lifestyle that, at any given time, is best accommodated by a particular product. To make that match happen, a seller’s signal needs to “vibe” with the fast reactions of its target consumers.
In terms of photo features, shoppers notice:
- Tone and color
- Packaging appeal
- Contours and shape
- Distracting background elements
- Lighting quality, the absence of glare, and shadow control
There are more factors. On-the-scroll judgments are fast and complex.
In this context, a raw product photo is the bare minimum that a brand can offer. Consider a moisturizing lotion bottle:
This lotion bottle is designed to sit with other toiletry items, have the user press down on the top, get lotion on their hand, and apply it to their skin.
Set against a white background, the product requires the viewer to imagine its function. This cognitive load is an extra step the buyer must make and it counts against the seller’s chances of converting.
Now observe a product in-use photo for the same lotion:
Snappr AI
The lotion bottle now has a place to live and shoppers can see it.
As is popular with skincare consumers these days, the lotion is unscented. Consistent with this preference, the style of the shot is minimalistic and clean.
The lotion is the focus of the photo but it’s still complemented by the toiletry props. The colors are warm and inviting while the lighting is diffused and flattering.
The traditional way to get a product-in-use photo like the one just discussed is through a studio shoot.
But this option has its drawbacks.
The Limitations of Photo Shoots
Cosmetics and skincare brands have a range of products for which they need photos. They need product photos for:
- Product detail pages
- Campaigns, and
- Bundles
Thus brands face an issue of scalability, which is precisely where traditional studios falter.
They falter on two fronts:
- Go-to-market speed
- Per-product beauty shot cost
In terms of speed, brands must:
- Locate and vet photographers
- Coordinate shoots
- Wait for fresh stills
- Conduct quality control
Workflow time is extended.
A 24-hour turnaround for completed beauty shots, for example, is unheard of in this environment.
In terms of pricing, skincare and cosmetics brands do not have access to enterprise-level discounts. Studios have different pricing structures and invoices can be unpredictable.
In sum, per-product beauty shots from studios are too expensive and take too long to get to market.
With the recent rise of specialized generative AI, however, there is an alternative.
The Beauty of Generative AI for Skincare and Cosmetics
Adobe’s 2024 Digital Trends report showed that 23% of marketing executives were using generative AI to personalize images for customers. This number will only increase over time.
The reason is understandable: It works.
- A Think with Google 2024 study found that three in five retail and CPG firms discovered customer experience improvements from generative AI.
- A McKinsey 2025 analysis noted that beauty brands can improve conversion rates by as much as 40% with marketing personalization via generative AI.
Consumers in 2025 are now used to AI. What they want are results. They don’t want to deal with returns, just like brands.
Buyers want to make the best guesswork they can before buying. Photos help them do that more than any other signal. The better the photo, the better the guesswork.
If generative AI helps a buyer of lotion guess better, they’re fine with it.
As a result a generative AI for a skincare and cosmetics brand needs to:
- Stay high quality and on-brand across channels
- Be quick-to-market and be affordable
This can happen.
It happened for Italian fashion brand Portolano. Conversions for featured products on Faire lifted by 25%.
Similar benefits accrued to the dance sneaker brand Fuego. By using AI lifestyle imagery, they received a 60% higher click-through rate on social media ads and 45% conversion rate increase on the website.
That said, brands need to discriminate between AIs. Compare two.
This photo does not represent the cutting edge of visual content creation. Shoppers would notice problems with the background and the lighting. Product masking would break the viewing experience.
Now look at the work of a different AI.
The product is moisturizer. It’s designed to hidrate skin. That is exactly what the photo illustrates for the shopper. The photo draws attention to both the virtual model’s glowing skin and the product.
This photo comes from Snappr AI. So do the photos that Fuego and Portolano use.
Snappr AI for Cosmetics and Skincare Brands
Skincare and cosmetics brands cannot sacrifice quality. Buyers expect nothing less. That’s why Snappr AI is full service.
- Instruct Snappr
- Wait less than a day
- Approve, edit, or ask for a Snappr revision
Then publish.
Beauty-specific features of Snappr’s generative AI
For a complex vertical like cosmetics and skincare, a generative AI should be trained on datasets specific to it.
That is precisely what Snappr engineers have done. Beauty-specific models have been fine-tuned for gloss, tone, reflection, packaging detection, and more factors.
Customers have access to stylized templates and can generate photos for one SKU, multiple, or a beauty and health collection.
Snappr’s AI improves.
- It will conform to a particular client’s brand and creative guidelines.
- It will update as a particular customer scales and approves photos.
- Snappr’s engineers iterate on the AI both generally and for the vertical in question.
Editing and quality assurance
Snappr conducts quality control, including to ensure brand consistency across, for example, shades and packaging types. Independent panels of Amazon shoppers, in partnership with PickFu, show that Snappr’s AI lifestyle imagery converts better than raw product photos.
Snappr AI provides for:
- Shadow control
- Glare removal, and
- Hallucination removal
A revision per image is included in paid plans.
- This covers issues of product integrity, realism, lighting, composition, and resolution.
- If a Snappr photo doesn’t outperform a rival AI’s output, Snappr will continue improving the photo for no additional charge.
Customers can edit photos by themselves if they like. They can:
- Retouch for skin tones, color enhancement, and removal of objects and flaws.
- Refine, remove, or replace background elements.
- Edit across batches of images.
Once an image is approved by a customer, they have it with a perpetual license.
Go-to-market speed
It’s critical for beauty brands to move quickly.
From the moment an order is placed customers can expect polished beauty shots within 24 hours.
- This leads to a time-to-launch reduction of 80% for new SKUs.
- Brands Fuego and Portolano saved 30% of creative workflow time, freeing up employee time for other valuable marketing uses.
Pricing for enterprise
An enterprise package is billed annually, with the effective monthly price being $833.
Using a credit structure, the per-product-in-use photo price is about $1, including edits and customer support. Customers can also use fewer credits for a raw product photo or more credits for a collection showcase.
Credits do not expire and any amount can be used at any time.
Scale Beauty Shots with Snappr AI
73% of the Fortune 500 and 48% of the A16Z Top 100 Marketplace use Snappr to satisfy their visual content needs.
They trust Snappr because Snappr knows how to deliver – quickly, with quality, and affordably.
Discuss your needs with the Snappr team. Try a demo for no charge.
