Cherry Shot API Quickstart: Your First Shoot in Minutes

The Cherry Shot API transforms ordinary product photos into polished, studio-quality images and video ads. It follows a simple async job model: you create a shoot, poll until it’s ready, then download your results. This guide walks you through the entire flow — from grabbing your API key to retrieving finished images — in just a few minutes.

Get an API key

Open the Cherry Shot dashboard, navigate to Profile → API, and create a new key. Copy it immediately — the full key (beginning with cs_) is shown only once. Store it in a secure location such as an environment variable or secrets manager.See the Authentication guide for full details on key management and rotation.

Check your credits

Before creating a shoot, verify your available credits with a quick GET /v1/credits request.

curl https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api/v1/credits \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer cs_your_key"

import requests

BASE = "https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api"
headers = {"Authorization": "Bearer cs_your_key"}

response = requests.get(f"{BASE}/v1/credits", headers=headers)
print(response.json())

const BASE = "https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api";
const headers = { Authorization: "Bearer cs_your_key" };

const res = await fetch(`${BASE}/v1/credits`, { headers });
console.log(await res.json());

Response

{ "credits": 250 }

Each shot costs 1 credit (standard quality), 2 credits (pro / 2K), or 4 credits (4K). If your balance is low, top up from the dashboard before continuing.

Create a shoot

Submit one or more public product image URLs along with a style and the number of shots you want. The API returns a shoot object immediately with a pending status — processing happens asynchronously.

curl -X POST https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api/v1/shoots \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer cs_your_key" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "product_image_urls": ["https://example.com/my-product.jpg"],
    "style": "editorial",
    "shots": 4
  }'

import requests

BASE = "https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api"
headers = {"Authorization": "Bearer cs_your_key"}

payload = {
    "product_image_urls": ["https://example.com/my-product.jpg"],
    "style": "editorial",
    "shots": 4,
}

shoot = requests.post(f"{BASE}/v1/shoots", headers=headers, json=payload).json()
print(shoot["id"])

const BASE = "https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api";
const headers = { Authorization: "Bearer cs_your_key" };

const payload = {
  product_image_urls: ["https://example.com/my-product.jpg"],
  style: "editorial",
  shots: 4,
};

const shoot = await (
  await fetch(`${BASE}/v1/shoots`, {
    method: "POST",
    headers: { ...headers, "Content-Type": "application/json" },
    body: JSON.stringify(payload),
  })
).json();

console.log(shoot.id);

Response

{
  "id": "b3f1c2a4-...",
  "object": "shoot",
  "status": "pending",
  "shots": 4,
  "credits_used": 4,
  "credits_remaining": 246,
  "created_at": "2026-07-01T10:00:00Z"
}

Save the id field — you’ll need it to poll for results in the next step.

Poll until the shoot is complete

Cherry Shot processes shoots asynchronously. Poll GET /v1/shoots/{id} every few seconds until the status field changes to completed (or failed).

curl https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api/v1/shoots/b3f1c2a4-... \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer cs_your_key"

import requests
import time

BASE = "https://kyliwpyuseadbwawnsyd.supabase.co/functions/v1/api"
headers = {"Authorization": "Bearer cs_your_key"}

shoot_id = shoot["id"]  # from the previous step

while True:
    result = requests.get(f"{BASE}/v1/shoots/{shoot_id}", headers=headers).json()
    if result["status"] in ("completed", "failed"):
        break
    time.sleep(4)

for img in result["images"]:
    print(img["url"])

Response (completed)

{
  "id": "b3f1c2a4-...",
  "object": "shoot",
  "status": "completed",
  "images": [
    {
      "url": "https://.../shot-1.png",
      "thumbnail_url": "https://.../thumb-1.png",
      "status": "fulfilled"
    }
  ],
  "credits_used": 4,
  "created_at": "2026-07-01T10:00:00Z"
}

Each entry in images contains a full-resolution url and a thumbnail_url for previews. Download or pass these URLs directly into your application.

Turn your shoot into a video (optional)

Once you have completed shoot images, you can generate a video ad from them. Pass the image URLs to POST /v1/videos to kick off a video generation job that follows the same async create-and-poll pattern.See the Videos guide for the full request schema, available styles, and duration options.

Prefer chatting to writing code? Add the Cherry Shot MCP server to Claude Desktop and simply say “generate an editorial shoot for this product” — then follow up with “make a 10-second ad from it.” The MCP server handles all API calls on your behalf.

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Cherry Shot API Quickstart: Your First Shoot in Minutes