From DJ Booth to Digital Innovation
How a DJ's desire to light up the screens behind him evolved into a full-blown event platform.
Keith Symmonds
DJ K-Sym · IT Developer · CreatorHi, my name's Keith — DJ K-Sym. I'm an IT development manager by day and a DJ by night. I've always wanted to bring something different to a gig.
I have a residency in a pub and in a nightclub. The pub is a sports bar with screens all around. The nightclub has recently been refurbished with massive LED screens. One of the other resident DJs always turns them off — I thought, why can't we put them to better use?
The Visualizer
Taking some of my day job skills, I created a visualizer — an app I could plug into the screens behind me. For a while, this sufficed. But what about gigs that weren't in my regular venue?
I wanted to display the visualizer everywhere, so I put a screen on what I called my small setup. It actually worked really well — clients were really impressed.
Going Pro
As proud as I was of my DIY small booth, I wanted to be taken more seriously. I'd always had my eye on the Humpter B3 — which supports a 55-inch LCD TV. The setup looked super clean and professional.
I invested heavily in 2025, with my primary influence being DJ Daryl Bennett. But somehow the visualizer looked kind of lost on the bigger setup.
The Slideshow
So I thought — why not have a slideshow? I rolled up my sleeves and started coding. The 'Presentation' App was born. This was absolutely brilliant for award ceremonies and weddings. I could play videos and photos on the big screen.
The Lightbulb Moment
Maybe it was just one of my regular residency gigs where a group of girls would be taking selfies. I was struck with the idea — whilst they're pointing at a small screen in their hands, how cool would it be if we could show it on the big screen behind me? Perhaps with a watermark of the venue and maybe a small comment.
And so Event Selfie Studio was born.
Building the Platform
The web-based application had three parts:
The first couple of iterations worked really well. But it required a laptop — and as an Engine DJ ecosystem user, I'm an SD card/USB stick guy.
Going Mobile
First, I dabbled with a Raspberry Pi 5 in kiosk mode — connected to Wi-Fi, serving up the slideshow via HDMI. It worked really well.
But I wanted a proper mobile app. Multi-platform frameworks couldn't handle external display output. So I learned Swift — and to my utter surprise, I managed to get it to work.
The Event Selfie Studio app was born — a device in your pocket that can drive a selfie wall on any screen.
Where We Are Today
After months of testing, the features that DJs and event promoters need:
AI-Powered Moderation
The feature I'm most excited about — AI moderation of images. All uploads can be automatically scanned for profanity, nudity, gambling, upsetting symbolism, and more.
Young Person's Party
Very high threshold
Pub Residency
Relaxed threshold
Corporate Event
Strict & professional
Different settings for different events. You have complete control.
It's live. Try it free.
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