Use Case Overview
Often in photography, especially for journalism or public sharing, it’s necessary to protect the privacy of individuals who are not the main subject of the photo. This workflow automates that process. After an initial face detection scan, the user can specify which person to keep in focus using plain language (e.g., “the middle one”), and the agent will redact all other faces.Workflow Steps
Try it out yourself with the following prompts (in Claude Desktop or Web):Prompt 1: “Detect the faces in this image: https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/Yvs83nR9GrDk9bq4Weq5eZ.jpg”Prompt 2: “Ok, now blur all the detected faces, except for the middle one.”
1
Load and detect faces
First, use the Response: The tool returns a list of bounding boxes and confidence scores for 5 detected faces. The agent then summarizes their locations.
put_image_url
tool to load the image. Then, immediately use the detect_faces
tool to get the coordinates of all faces.2
Identify the face to exclude from blurring
Based on the user’s second prompt, the agent analyzes the locations of the detected faces. It correctly identifies that “the middle one” corresponds to “Face 3”, which is located in the center of the image.
3
Blur all other faces
Use the Response: A new image is created with the selective blurring applied.
blur_bboxes
tool. Crucially, the agent passes the bounding boxes for every face except Face 3, ensuring only the intended subject remains clear.4
Generate final preview
Use the Response:
preview_object_ref
tool to generate a shareable URL for the final, selectively redacted image.Example Result
Build Your Own Intelligent Redaction Workflows
This conversational, multi-step editing process opens the door for highly specific content moderation and privacy use cases. You can adapt this “detect-then-selectively-modify” approach for many scenarios.- 👩🏫 Education: In a classroom photo, blur the faces of all students to protect their privacy, leaving only the teacher visible.
- 🎤 Public Events: Keep a public speaker or performer in focus while anonymizing the crowd in the background.
- 📰 Journalism: Protect the identities of sources or bystanders in a photo without having to manually edit the image.
- 👨👩👧👦 Personal Photos: Share a group photo while respecting the privacy of friends who prefer not to be shown online.