AI Product Designer

Self-taught, AI-native. I shipped SceneOne, a live AI screenplay feedback tool — solo. Learning more every day.

10
Portfolio Projects
2
Products in Dev
0→1
Builder Mindset
5
Prototypes Live
Scroll
Selected Work
01 / 4
SceneOne
SceneOne
AI Screenplay Analysis Tool

The $100 coverage fee gatekeeps writers by wealth. SceneOne gives every writer studio-grade AI notes across 5 craft dimensions. Built and shipped solo — live at sceneone.net.

02 / 4
Cutman Fight Hub
Cutman
Combat Sports Dashboard

One app. Every promotion. All the fights. A personal combat sports hub that pulls live fight cards, fighter stats, and broadcast info from UFC, Boxing, PFL, and ONE into one clean interface.

03 / 4
Little Caesars redesign comparison
Little Caesars Redesign
Interactive Case Study

Little Caesars has the best value in fast food — but their app makes it feel like a chore. I redesigned the full ordering flow: Hot-N-Ready real-time availability, a smarter menu, and a checkout that actually trusts the user.

04 / 4
Aftershow App
Aftershow
Letterboxd for Concerts

A lifetime concert diary for die-hard live music fans. Log every show you've ever attended — no ticket, no proof needed. Conceived at a Black Queen show. 14 MVP screens built.

See More Experiments
How I Work
01
Concept First

Every product starts with a real problem. I identify pain points, map the experience, and define what success looks like before a single screen is designed.

02
Design With Intent

UI/UX decisions are deliberate. I think in flows, not just screens — prioritizing clarity, delight, and the moments that make users come back.

03
Ship With AI

I use Claude, ChatGPT, and the full AI stack as a development partner — directing, iterating, and building real products faster than traditional workflows ever allowed.

Will Grayson

The Designer
Behind the Work.

I’m self-taught, AI-native, and I build things. Most recently SceneOne — a live AI screenplay feedback tool that gives every writer studio-grade notes without the $100 coverage fee. Designed, engineered, and shipped solo.

I’ve watched real people get frustrated by bad software my whole career. That frustration is why I design — products built for the user, not the developer.

When I’m not designing: combat sports, live music, cooking for my wife, and wrangling my nintendogs Eevee and Bowser.

Let's Build
Something.

Open to freelance, full-time, and fellowship opportunities.

Case Study, 09 / 10
Scrap'd
Purpose-Built Scrapbooking App · PRD Complete, Building
UX DesignReact Nativereact-native-skiaFreemium
View Prototype →
The Problem

Scrapbookers don't have a home. GoodNotes hits a 3-file wall immediately. Canva is a marketing tool — its layers are broken and its best templates are paywalled. Unfold exports to Instagram only, meaning a 100-page family scrapbook literally cannot be sent to grandma. Pic Collage forces watermarks on finished work and sits at a 3.9★ rating from a frustrated user base. Every competitor optimizes for the wrong output.

The Core Insight

People aren't making scrapbooks to post on Instagram. They're making them to keep, share with family, and print. That realization — that every competitor is solving for social media virality instead of personal memory — is the product foundation everything else is built on.

Who It's Built For

Two personas drive every design decision. The Memory Keeper: women 25–45 making scrapbooks for weddings, milestones, travel, and holidays — currently duct-taping together GoodNotes and Canva and physical craft supplies, none of it feeling right. The Gift Maker: people building scrapbooks as gifts, who care deeply about the finished output looking polished and need to actually send it to someone.

Wireframe → Prototype Evolution

The design went through three distinct stages before the current prototype. The first pass focused purely on the canvas layer model — getting the stacking order right before any visual polish. The second pass established the emotional tone: warm craft textures, Playfair Display typography, the "paper feel" that separates Scrap'd from every generic grid editor. The third pass locked the onboarding flow — the decision to get users into creation in under 60 seconds, skippable everywhere, no account required.

Stage 01 · Wireframe
Layer model + canvas architecture. No visual polish — just proving the stacking system works.
Stage 02 · Visual Identity
Scrap'd
Snap it. Scrap it. Share it.
Craft textures, Playfair Display, warm palette. Establishing the emotional tone.
Stage 03 · Prototype
My Scrapbooks
Paris 2024 ✈
Full login + onboarding flow. Get to first creation in under 60 seconds.
What Makes It Different
Unlimited free books
GoodNotes' #1 complaint. Becomes the headline of every ad.
Share anywhere
Unfold users literally can't send books to their families. We fix that.
Proper layer model
GoodNotes forces delete-and-redo to reorder. We built drag-to-reorder from day one.
No watermarks. Ever.
Pic Collage is losing users over this. It's a core promise, not a paid perk.
The Canvas Architecture

Every page is a 6-layer GPU-rendered canvas via react-native-skia. Layer 1: background paper. Layer 2: photos. Layer 3: stickers and washi tape. Layer 4: typed text and journaling. Layer 5: Apple Pencil or finger drawing with pressure sensitivity. Layer 6 (Tier 2): video and GIF. Nothing is destructive. Unlimited undo. 60fps target on iPhone 12 or newer — non-negotiable.

4.5★
Day-One App Store Target
$250
Total Day-1 Asset Budget
>10 min
Target Session Length
12
PRD Feature Specs Written
Where It Stands

Full PRD complete across all 12 feature specs: library, canvas, photo import, stickers, washi tape, background papers, text, drawing, templates, sharing, onboarding, and offline architecture. Login and onboarding prototypes built. Design system established. Tech stack confirmed. Asset licensing strategy defined. Next phase: resolve 10 open questions in the PRD, then developer handoff spec.

Case Study, 05 / 10 · Personal Project
OurTable
Family Kitchen Platform · v2.1.0 · Active Build
UX DesignReact NativeExpoAI VisionPlatform ThinkingHousehold System
View Prototype →
The Origin

My wife had her gallbladder removed. Overnight our cooking had to change — certain fats and ingredients were suddenly off the table. Every recipe app we tried was built for a single person with no restrictions and unlimited pantry access. None of them understood that real households are complicated: multiple people, medical needs, dietary preferences, and a fridge full of things you bought three days ago and forgot about. So I started building the app I actually needed.

The Design Evolution

OurTable went through four distinct phases. V1 ran on-device — dark mode, real navigation, real data, proof the system worked. V1.5 explored light vs. dark formally in a design system mockup — light mode won because the app needed to feel like a kitchen, not a command center. V2 introduced the navy/cream/gold palette, full cooking mode, household architecture, and the Family Recipe Book. V2.1.0 — the current build — adds Party Mode, aisle-organized grocery lists, pricing tiers, and the full platform vision.

V1
Dark mode. On device. Proof of concept.
V1.5
Light vs dark exploration. Design system built.
V2
Navy/cream/gold. Household system. Recipe Book.
V2.1 ←
Party Mode. Aisle lists. Pricing. 45 screens.
The Household Intelligence Layer

"Who's at your table?" — during onboarding you add household members and set dietary preferences per person: Dairy-Free, Gluten-Free, Vegetarian, Halal, Kosher, and more. Every recipe surfaces conflict warnings per member. The household gets its own stats dashboard: shared recipes, meals cooked, lists created, food waste saved. My wife's gallbladder recovery isn't an edge case — it's the product thesis.

The Family Recipe Book

The platform's emotional core. "The Wilson Family Recipes — collected with love since 2024." Every household gets a shared recipe book organized into chapters: Weeknight Favourites, Emma's Kitchen, Grandma's Classics, Quick & Healthy, Special Occasions. Members can each contribute recipes to shared chapters. 60 shared recipes, each with personal notes, cook count, and star ratings. This is the feature that turns a utility into something people feel attached to.

Party Mode — The Surprise Feature

Set your guest count and every recipe scales automatically. Hosting 12 people? Every ingredient quantity recalculates in real time. One tap generates a scaled grocery list for the entire meal. No other recipe app has this. It emerged from real household need — and it's the feature that consistently surprises people when they see it.

The Fridge Intelligence Layer

Scan your fridge — AI detects and catalogs ingredients across Fridge, Pantry, and Freezer tabs. "What Can I Make?" ranks recipes by match percentage: 95% means cook now, 85% means add one item. Expiring items get prioritized automatically. Food Waste Mode shows exactly how much money you've saved cooking what you have. The grocery list organizes by aisle — Produce, Meat & Fish, Dairy — not a flat list. Add an entire recipe's ingredients with one tap.

Party Mode scaling
Set guest count → every ingredient auto-scales → scaled grocery list generated. Nobody does this.
$4.60/serving
Cost per meal tracked on every recipe. Total cost shown for full household. No other app shows this.
$62 food waste saved
Household-level food waste tracking. A number families feel, not just a feature toggle.
recipebook.ourtable.app
Web access planned for Household tier. The recipe book lives beyond the app.
The Tradeoffs

Light mode vs. dark mode: V1 launched in dark mode because it felt premium and modern. V1.5 formally tested both. Dark mode lost. The insight: recipe apps are used in kitchens under warm lighting, often handed to another person to read. Dark mode felt like a command center, not a kitchen. Light mode with the navy/cream/gold palette felt like a cookbook. Emotional context overrode aesthetic preference.

Household-first vs. individual-first onboarding: Most apps onboard the individual and bolt on household features later. We inverted it — the first question is "who’s at your table?" The tradeoff is a slightly longer onboarding flow. The payoff is that dietary conflict warnings work from the first recipe and the app immediately feels like it was built for your household, not adapted for it. Complexity upfront, simplicity forever after.

One-time payment vs. subscription: The Plus tier is $9.99 one-time, not monthly. The decision came from product values — a recipe book should feel like something you own, not something you rent. Subscription fatigue is real, especially for utility apps used daily. A one-time payment builds more trust at the point of purchase and reduces churn to zero for that tier.

Retention by design: A household that builds a shared recipe book doesn’t churn. The Family Recipe Book is both a feature and a lock-in mechanic — the more a household contributes, the more irreplaceable the platform becomes. This is the difference between a utility someone deletes after a week and a platform that earns a permanent spot in the household.

The Business Model

Three tiers designed from first principles. Free: up to 30 recipes, basic grocery list, fridge scanner 5x/month, 1 member. Plus at $9.99 one-time: unlimited saves, URL and social import, unlimited fridge scanning, cooking mode, cost tracker, Family Recipe Book. Household at $19.99/year: everything in Plus, up to 6 members, shared grocery lists, dietary conflict warnings, household stats, and web access at recipebook.ourtable.app. No ads. No subscriptions on the core tier. Yours forever.

The Platform Vision

The next layer is a weekly and monthly meal planning calendar powered by your own saved recipe database — the more recipes you add, the smarter your suggestions become. A personal data flywheel that makes the platform more valuable the longer you use it. A senior developer reviewed the architecture and joined as a collaborator. The foundation is built to scale there.

45
Screens Designed in v2
4
Design Versions Shipped
3
Pricing Tiers Architected
1
Real Household Problem
Tech Stack

Built in React Native using Expo, running on both iOS and Android. Camera integration powers the fridge scanner. Navy, cream, and gold palette with full light and dark mode. Web access planned at recipebook.ourtable.app for Household plan members.

Case Study, 04 / 10
TriageAI
AI Helpdesk Platform · SMB SaaS · In Development
AI BuildSaaSProduct DesignValidation
View Live Demo →
The Origin

I work helpdesk at a nationwide company — four people covering the entire org. Every day the challenge isn’t the work itself, it’s knowing what to handle first. I saw the same problem everywhere at SMBs: no dedicated IT staff, tickets piling up, no intelligent layer to sort signal from noise. So I started building one.

What I Built

TriageAI is an AI-powered Tier 1 helpdesk subscription platform for small businesses. The system handles first-response, classifies and routes tickets, attempts resolution via a knowledge base, and only escalates what actually needs a human. Built for teams of zero to four — not enterprise IT departments.

3
Phase Roadmap Built
40+
SMBs Cold Outreached
The Validation Work

Before writing production code, I built a full outreach system — prospect tracker, cold email sequences, follow-up cadences — and ran campaigns across law firms, dental offices, insurance agencies, and accounting firms in the LA area. 40+ businesses contacted. That outreach generated real market signal about messaging, pricing sensitivity, and the verticals most likely to convert first.

The average SMB spends $1,500–$4,000/month on a part-time IT contractor. TriageAI’s $400 entry tier replaces that spend entirely. The financial model shows profitability at 5 clients on the Growth tier — a realistic first-year target for a one-person operation. The pitch isn’t “try AI helpdesk.” It’s “cut your IT spend by 70% and never miss a ticket.”

The Build Artifacts

Alongside validation I built: a working interactive demo (v4), a break-even calculator modeling the $400/$650/$999 subscription tiers, a full system wireframe covering Phase 1 and Phase 1.5, and a GitHub research checklist for the technical build. The financial model shows profitability at 5 clients on the Growth tier.

Phase Roadmap

Phase 1 — TriageAI Core: Internal IT helpdesk for SMBs. AI handles Tier 1 resolution, escalates only what needs a human touch. Monthly health reports for owners.

Phase 1.5 — ClientDesk: Client-facing inbound triage. AI acknowledges instantly, classifies and routes to the right staff member, escalation timers prevent anything from falling through.

Phase 2 — Security Layer: Proactive monitoring, threat detection, and compliance reporting for SMBs who can’t afford enterprise security tooling.

Case Study, 10 / 10 · Client Work · Delivered
Iron Arc
Personal Trainer Brand Identity · Full Brand System
Brand IdentityClient WorkContent StrategyAI-AssistedDelivered
View on Gumroad →
The Client

A personal trainer with a genuinely unusual differentiator: he cosplays. Not as a side hobby kept off his brand — as a core part of who he is. Every agency he approached wanted to sand that down and give him a generic fitness brand. I did the opposite.

What Was Delivered

A complete brand identity system built from scratch: brand foundation and voice, visual identity with color palette and logo direction, content strategy with 4 content pillars, weekly posting framework, 90-day content calendar, 30 done-for-you caption templates, client onboarding kit, 4 fillable workout program templates, and a 50-prompt AI pack for Claude and ChatGPT.

6
Deliverable PDFs
50
AI Prompts Written
30
Caption Templates
90
Day Content Plan
The Approach

The brand leans into the cosplay identity completely. The name, voice, visual direction, and content strategy all treat it as the differentiator it is — not something to hide. A trainer who cosplays isn’t a liability. It’s the entire hook. The clients who connect with that identity become the most loyal ones.

The Pivot

The client hasn’t activated the brand online yet. Rather than let the work sit idle, the system was generalized and productized — the full kit is now available as a digital download for personal trainers on Gumroad and Etsy. The same deliverables built for one client now serve an entire market.

Why This Matters

Iron Arc is proof of two things: that the best brand work comes from listening to who the client actually is, and that good systems are worth more than one use. The work shipped. The pivot shipped. Both count.

AI Tool, 07 / 10 · Live Demo
Briefed
AI News Summarizer · 15 Words or Less · Claude-Powered
Claude APIAI ProductNewsLive Tool
Open Briefed →
The Problem

News articles bury the actual point. Headlines lie or sensationalize. TL;DR summaries give you five bullet points when you needed one sentence. Nobody has time to read 800 words to find the thing that actually matters.

What It Does

Paste any article, long email, press release, or wall of text. Briefed calls the Claude API and returns the essential truth of what you just read — in exactly 15 words or less. Not a rewrite of the headline. Not a bulleted summary. The one core claim the whole piece is really about.

Design Decisions

The 15-word constraint is the product. It forces precision in a way that "summarize this" never does. Playfair Display gives it editorial credibility — it should feel like a sharp editor, not a chatbot. The dark UI with yellow-green signal color (`#e8ff47`) creates a signal-vs-noise visual language that reinforces the core idea.

How the AI Was Designed

The 15-word constraint didn’t come from intuition — it came from failure. Early prompts returned summaries that were technically accurate but 40–60 words long. They weren’t wrong, they were just useless for the use case. Tightening the constraint surfaced a new failure mode: the model started truncating instead of distilling, cutting off context rather than identifying the core claim. The final prompt architecture separates those two jobs — first identify the single most important claim, then express it in 15 words or fewer. The constraint is the product. The prompt engineering is what makes it work.

15
Word Hard Cap
1
API Call Per Summary
3
Example Articles Preloaded
<2s
Avg Response Time
AI Tool, 08 / 10 · Live Demo
ReplyRight
AI Text Rewriter · 3 Tone Modes · Claude-Powered
Claude APIAI ProductCommunicationLive Tool
Open ReplyRight →
The Problem

You sent the wrong tone and now the whole conversation is off. Or you didn't send anything at all because you couldn't figure out how to say it. Texts, emails, Slack messages — the register matters as much as the words, and most people don't have a second set of eyes on demand.

What It Does

Paste any message — a frustrated text, a passive-aggressive email, something you typed in a heated moment — and ReplyRight returns three rewrites simultaneously: Calm (de-escalates, neutral), Warm (relational, empathetic), and Assertive (direct, no softening). Same point, three different registers. Pick the one that fits.

Design Decisions

Three results served at once instead of asking you to pick a tone first — comparison is the whole value. Color-coded left borders (blue / amber / red) let you scan the register before you read the words. Light UI so the tool disappears into the workflow rather than demanding attention. The app icon and branding stay minimal because this is a utility, not a statement.

How the AI Was Designed

The hardest prompt engineering problem in ReplyRight wasn’t generating three tones — it was preventing the model from being sycophantic in Warm mode and aggressive in Assertive mode. Early outputs had Warm rewriting the user’s point entirely to avoid conflict, and Assertive dropping all empathy in ways that would escalate rather than resolve. The fix was explicit constraints per tone: Warm preserves the core message and adds relational acknowledgment; Assertive keeps the point but removes apology language only. Same message, calibrated register — not a different message per tone.

3
Tone Modes (Calm · Warm · Assertive)
1
API Call, 3 Results
∞
Use Cases (Texts, Email, Slack)
0
Tone Selections Before You See Results