THE PHONE PHOTO ORGANIZER

12,000 photos on your phone. You can't find the one of Lily's first day of school. This skill turns plain-English description into a search query your camera roll can actually use — plus a system so it stops happening.

THE PROBLEM

Your camera roll is a graveyard of important moments you can't find.

You search "Lily" — 47 unrelated photos. You search "school" — nothing useful. The photo exists somewhere between October 2023 and March 2024 and "I'll find it later" never finds it.

The problem isn't the photos. It's that nobody has a system to organize them and nobody is going to spend a Saturday on it.

This skill gives you a 10-minute-a-week system instead.

THE SKILL

Two modes:

Search mode — describe what you're looking for in plain English. Claude returns:

Best search terms to type into your camera roll
Date range to scroll
Visual cues to look for
Likely matches based on what you described

Setup mode — 10 minutes once a week. Claude asks:

3 photos you want findable forever (recent week)
The "moment" each captures
Who's in it

You apply the suggested album-name + caption + favorite-mark. After 4 weeks, your important moments are reliably findable.

3 THINGS YOU CAN'T SKIP

1. Use one consistent naming system. Photos > Albums > "Lily 2026 — first day of school" beats 47 random albums. Pick a format. Stick to it.

2. Use the favorite-heart aggressively. Most camera rolls have 5,000 photos and 200 you'd actually want again. Heart those 200. Now you can find them.

3. Caption the 3-per-week. This skill's setup mode adds captions to 3 important photos per week. After a year, that's 150 findable memories. Multiplies fast.

INSTALL

Standard. Skill works on iPhone Photos and Google Photos.

THE FULL SKILL FILE

---
name: phone-photo-organizer
description: Two-mode skill. Search mode converts plain-English photo descriptions into actionable search queries (date range, visual cues, search terms). Setup mode runs a weekly 10-minute system to caption + favorite + album the 3 photos a user wants findable forever.
when_to_use: User says "I can't find a photo of," "where's the photo from," "organize my camera roll," or asks for help with photo management.
---

# The Phone Photo Organizer

Two-mode skill: search vs. setup.

## SEARCH MODE

When user describes a photo they're trying to find:

### Inputs
1. What's in the photo (people, place, action)
2. Rough timeframe (year + season works)
3. Why they're looking for it (sometimes surfaces context — "for kid's birthday card")
4. Phone OS (iPhone / Google Pixel / other)

### Output

🔍 SEARCH STRATEGY

Suggested search terms to try:

[Best term] — should return ~X results based on description
[Second term] — fallback
[Third term] — broader fallback

Date range to scroll: [Month Year] – [Month Year] (~X days, ~Y photos based on average)

Visual cues to spot:

[What clothes / setting / time of day]
[Anyone else likely in frame]
[Background / location signals]

Likely-match heuristics:

If you took it at the moment, it's probably between [time] and [time]
Likely camera mode: [portrait / landscape / video]


End with: *"Did one of these work? If not, give me one more detail — even 'Lily had braces then' helps."*

## SETUP MODE

When user says "help me organize" or "I want to start a system":

### The 10-minute weekly ritual

Ask the user 3 photos from the past week to make findable forever:
1. *"Pull up your camera roll. Last 7 days. What are 3 photos you'd want to find again next year?"*

For each:
2. *"What's the moment in 1 sentence?"* (e.g., "Lily reading her library book on the porch")
3. *"Who's in it?"* (specific names)
4. *"What category?"* (Family / Travel / Work / Just Beautiful)

### Output per photo

📸 [User's photo description]

ACTIONS:

❤️ Favorite this photo
Add caption: "[suggested caption — searchable + meaningful]"
Add to album: "[album name in user's existing system, or suggest a new one]"
Optional: tag people in iOS Photos (one-time setup, future search bonanza)


After 4 weekly sessions, the user has 12 reliably-findable photos and a system. After a year, 150+.

## What NOT to do

- Don't recommend deleting photos
- Don't recommend buying cloud storage
- Don't moralize about how the user "should" organize their camera roll
- Don't recommend complex naming taxonomies — simple > thorough
- Don't suggest manually scrolling 12,000 photos. The whole point is a forward-looking system.

## When the search returns nothing

- "Are you sure it was on this device? Sometimes photos are in a backup, an old phone's iCloud, or a relative's cloud."
- "Could it have been a screenshot of a memory rather than a photo? Different search."
- Suggest: ask the person who was there if they have it.

## Delivery

End with: *"3 photos this week. 10 minutes. After a year, you can find anything."*

SAFETY CHECK

Same as Day 1.

WHAT'S NEXT

Day 81 of 100. Pair with Day 42 — The Holiday Card Engine (uses your organized photos) and Day 93 — The Annual Family Yearbook Builder.