Show HN: From CRUD Dev to AI Founder in 30 Days – Photor.ai
Hacker News - AI
Aug 13, 2025 02:19
ghiblio
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Summary
A backend developer, concerned about AI making traditional coding skills obsolete, built Photor.ai—an AI-powered image generation and editing tool—in just 30 days using minimal resources and no prior frontend or design experience. The project highlights how accessible AI tools and platforms are empowering individual developers to quickly create innovative products, signaling a shift in the tech landscape where adaptability and leveraging AI are increasingly crucial.
30 days ago, I was just a backend dev writing CRUD APIs. Then AI came along — and suddenly, it felt like my skills might be obsolete. The past two years have been a whirlwind. AI models now create images, videos, and even code faster than humans. I felt both amazed… and scared. If AI could do my job, what would be left for me? Instead of waiting for the wave to wash over me, I decided to build something of my own. Video tools were too costly, so I started with images — the foundation of video — and began working on photor.ai, an AI-powered image generation and editing tool. No design skills. No frontend experience. No budget. 1.V0 for the product page 2.Cursor for both frontend & backend code 3.GitHub for source control 4.Cloudflare Pages for hosting frontend 5.A tiny cloud server for the backend It wasn’t smooth: 1.Broke deployments at 2 a.m. more than once 2.Rebuilt features from scratch when early versions failed 3.Hit API rate limits just hours before launch There was a night I nea