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AI Designer: a design chat that edits the 3D scene for you

Tell the AI Designer the look you want, like a glossy tortoiseshell under studio light, and it makes the changes in a live 3D scene. You watch each change land, hit Apply, and keep going. Underneath is Material Studio, a full 3D material and lighting editor. I haven't seen either on another eyewear platform.

Live AI design chat · AI that acts, not just answers · 3D materials · Render automation

product
AI Designer & Material Studio
platform
VARAi
role
CTO & forward-deployed AI engineer

Results

Design mode changes materials, lighting and exposure in the scene; Apply or Reject each change in the chat
Chat → live 3D
Q&A mode advises; Design mode does the work
2 modes
PBR fields per material slot, every one editable by hand or by the AI
14 properties
Studio preview, storefront 3D viewer, try-on and thumbnail renderer share one apply path
1 pipeline, 4 surfaces
Turntable video presets; ~20 ms per 1080p frame on one GPU workstation
7 camera moves

Problems solved

8 problems

  1. 01Templates lived in SQL

    broke
    Authoring a material template meant hand-editing JSON in the database with no preview.
    changed
    A full-screen studio: pick a model, click a mesh, edit its material and lighting, see it update live, save as a reusable template.
    proof
    Templates move private → review → public catalogue, with submitter and approver recorded.

  2. 02A chat that edits a live scene, safely

    broke
    An assistant that edits a 3D scene can silently overwrite a designer's work.
    changed
    Design mode makes structured changes; each appears in the chat as a card with a before/after and Apply / Reject.
    proof
    The scene updates the moment you hit Apply; Save stays a separate step.

  3. 03Model output can be malformed

    broke
    A truncated or invented tool call could push bad values into the renderer or the database.
    changed
    Tool input is buffered and parsed whole; malformed calls show as rejected cards, patches merge without erasing unmentioned values, and the save path strips unsafe keys and non-finite numbers.
    proof
    10 unit tests on the AI service and 15 on the overrides sanitiser.

  4. 04AI cost and access bounded

    broke
    An open chat endpoint could run up cost or reach users before it was proven.
    changed
    Rate limits, a cached system prompt, and an audit event for every proposed change.
    proof
    Q&A mode has no tools at all; only Design mode can propose edits.

  5. 05Metal frames rendered black

    broke
    Metallic and transmissive materials need an environment map; without one they render flat or black.
    changed
    The AI is told to set an HDR first, a default HDR loads with the model, and every PBR material gets the environment map.
    proof
    The same fix runs in the studio, the storefront viewer and the thumbnail renderer.

  6. 06One product, four conflicting sources

    broke
    Template, product override and two HDR settings could each claim the final look of a product.
    changed
    Bulk template and HDR assignment funnel through one channel and clear stale per-product HDR rows.
    proof
    51 tests, including cross-tenant delete safety and adversarial inputs.

  7. 07Products with no comparable image

    broke
    Frames without a photo showed nothing in the catalogue, galleries and try-on carousel.
    changed
    A headless batch renderer makes same-angle 3D thumbnails per client from each product's template and overrides, and the UI falls back to them.
    proof
    AI-suggested lens colours are rejected per product unless they are valid 6-digit hex.

  8. 08Turntable videos clipped temples

    broke
    Framing a model from one pose cut off the temples when it rotated side-on.
    changed
    The framing solver fits the geometry across every frame of the move.
    proof
    5 real models measured 0.900–0.902 fill against a 0.9 target; no frame touched the border.

Give the model the same controls a designer has: it does the work in the live scene, shows each change, and a person decides with one click.

stack · TypeScript · React · Three.js / WebGL · Node.js / Express · PostgreSQL · Claude API (tool use, SSE streaming) · Puppeteer · ffmpeg · Jest

More from VARAi

  1. P-01Lens JourneyDeterministic rules engine · Prescription upload · Catalogue sync · Multi-platform commerce1,500+ testsLens-journey suites, Sep 2026 (recorded runs of 1,431 and 1,772)
  2. P-02Virtual try-onBrowser AR · 3D rendering · Storefront integration · Production reliability38.3 s → 57 msOne documented gallery-query benchmark
  3. P-03AI search and recommendationsAI search · Recommendations · Redis caching · Magento integration~2 s → ~50 msRepeat queries served from the Redis cache, skipping AI routing and the store's API
  4. P-04Store analysis and catalogue syncCatalogue sync · Data mapping · Shopify · Magento · Human approval43 products · 1,605 variantsLive run on a heritage British eyewear store; 6 accessories excluded and named

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