Mobile Photo Capture: A QR Code, A Phone, A Set of Photos

Asset photos need to land on the asset, not in somebody’s phone roll, inbox, or forgotten thread. The mobile photo-capture flow links the phone camera directly to the asset record, so a future defect question has evidence attached where the team expects it.

The flow

On the asset detail page on a desktop, the operator clicks "Capture photos." A QR code appears on screen. The operator scans it with their phone’s camera, which opens /(mobile)/mobile/capture in their phone’s browser, pre-authenticated to the same asset. They take photos. Each photo uploads in real time, with a thumbnail showing on the desktop as soon as it lands. When they’re done, they close the page. The desktop view has the photo set already.

Why a QR code

The alternative is logging into the platform on the phone, navigating to the asset, opening the camera. Six taps. The QR code is two — and it doesn’t require the operator to remember the asset ID or have credentials saved on the phone. The QR-token is short-lived (a few minutes) and asset-scoped, so a stolen phone can’t use an old token to upload to other assets.

Compression and thumbnails

Photos compress client-side before upload, so a 12-megapixel original becomes a 600KB upload — fast enough on a 3G warehouse Wi-Fi. The platform generates a thumbnail at upload, used for the asset detail page tile and the photos library. The full-resolution original stays in Vercel Blob, accessible via lightbox when somebody actually wants to inspect a defect close-up.

Multi-entity links

Photos can attach to assets, inbound orders, outbound orders, collections, and disputes — all from the same capture flow. The QR code is scoped to whichever entity the operator opened it from. The photo also gets tagged with the entity link, so a photo taken at receiving can later surface on a dispute that references the same asset.