Evergreen Family Stories
We designed and built Evergreen Family Stories from the ground up: an oral-history platform on AWS where families record, keep, and share their stories. The storyteller stays in control of every recording.
The platform
Oral history and family archive
Evergreen Family Stories
A production oral-history platform built from the ground up for storyteller ownership and control.
The brief
Build a platform for families and friends within the Chinese diaspora here in the USA to record and memorialize oral history, where the storyteller retains ownership and control of their story. Build the platform on AWS.
What we decided
We built the entire platform from the ground up as a large Next.js application on AWS, not a template or thin wrapper.
What we built
- Browser recording studio and media upload pipelines
- Transcript processing, review, and speaker tools
- Storyteller ownership: releases, visibility, approval
- Family, friends, sharing, and family-tree workflows
- Role-based admin: users, videos, processing ops, analytics, search
- AWS Amplify, Cognito, DynamoDB, S3, Chime, Batch, Lambda, SES
The result
A production oral-history platform built from the ground up: browser interview recording, upload and media processing, diarized transcripts, storyteller ownership and control (releases, visibility, approval), family and friends sharing, family tree, and full admin operations — on AWS.
The shipped product includes studio recording and upload, Chime-based interviews, transcript review, legal releases, visibility and approval, friends and sharing, family tree, notifications, and role-based admin — backed by DynamoDB, S3, Cognito, Amplify, Batch, and related AWS services.
Ownership
The product runs on AWS under the project’s own account and services — identity, data, media, recording, processing, and the Next.js application on Amplify.
How it runs
Next.js on Amplify; Cognito; DynamoDB (ElectroDB); S3 media; Chime meetings; Batch GPU processing; Lambda, EventBridge, SES, admin and cron ops.
Technical specification
Architecture, systems, data, and how it is hosted and run.
- 01
Application
A Next.js product on AWS Amplify — recording, ownership, sharing, and admin in one system.
- 02
Identity and data
Cognito for auth. DynamoDB with ElectroDB for the product data model behind users, stories, relationships, and control of each recording.
- 03
Capture
Amazon Chime for in-browser video chat and interview recording inside the product.
- 04
Processing
WhisperX transcription on AWS Batch with on-demand GPU — heavy media work when the story needs it, then back into the app for review.
Project details
Services
Currently accepting select projects
Let’s make it.
Need a product that has to exist, not a template that almost fits? We design, build, and deploy it on infrastructure you control.
We build and deploy what you need so you can create and ship what you want. Then we make the ads and place them.