Describe It, Don’t Program It: AI Scene Creation in Josh.ai, With the Prompts That Work
The advice for using AI is to prompt well: add context, be specific, spell out what you want. That is fine for a chatbot and exactly wrong for a house. Nobody comes home from a ski day wanting to recite light levels and shade positions. Josh.ai’s AI Scene Creation starts from the other end: you describe the evening you want, and Josh builds the scene from the devices in the room. This is how it works, the prompts that work best, and the Utah scenes we set up with it.
- Describe the outcome, not the settings. “Make the great room calm for a relaxing evening” beats “set lights to 30 percent and close the shades.”
- Give it the occasion, the rooms and the timing. Those three things are what Josh turns into devices, levels and a schedule.
- Conditions are allowed. “If it is sunny, lower the shades halfway, otherwise leave them.” Josh handles the branch.
- It can only move what is connected. The quality of the scene depends on Lutron, Sonos, shades and the alarm being on the system. That is the design work.
- Everything it builds is editable. Josh proposes; you adjust in the app or by talking to it again.
What AI Scene Creation is
It is part of AI X OS, the Josh app experience that rolled out this year. Instead of building a scene device by device, you describe how a space should feel and Josh composes a scene from what it knows is in that space: the lighting zones, the shades, the audio, the TV, the thermostat, the locks and the garage. It names the scene, shows you what it decided, and saves it. From then on it runs by voice, by a tap on the Josh Touchscreen, from a keypad button, or on a schedule.
The key is that it starts from the idea. In Josh’s own example a sales engineer plans a football Sunday this way: put the game on the first floor, set the lights to team colors, lower the shades halfway if it is sunny, play music on the back deck for the barbecue, and set the porch lights for the party to end at eight. One request, six devices, a weather condition and a schedule. We have written a longer guide to the three ways to create a scene in Josh; this is the deep end of the first one.
How to ask
- Start with the occasion. “Create a scene for a dinner party,” “for movie night with the kids,” “for leaving for the airport.” Josh uses the occasion to decide which rooms matter.
- Say where it happens and when it moves. “We will be in the great room until seven, then the dining room.” Josh can stage the lighting across rooms and time.
- Add the one or two things you care about. Music on the deck. Shades half down. Lights to team colors. You do not need to list everything else; Josh fills in the rest sensibly.
- Add a condition if you have one. Sunny versus overcast, before or after a time, whether the TV is on. Josh builds the rule.
- Review what it built, then refine out loud. “Make the kitchen a little brighter” or “drop the music to the dining room only.” Each adjustment is saved into the scene.
The scenes we build this way in Utah homes
Ski morning. “At 6:30 on weekdays, bring the mudroom and kitchen up warm, open the kitchen shades, start the news in the kitchen, and warm the boot room.” Lutron does the light, the shades handle the glare off the snow, Sonos carries the audio. Cabin arrival. “When we get to the Heber house on Friday night, have the entry and great room lit, the heat to 68 by six, the driveway lights on until we are in, and lock up behind us at ten.” That one leans on the alarm and the thermostat as much as the lights. Dinner party. Josh’s own example, which maps to a Park City house exactly: great room first, dining room at seven, shades set for the party. Good night. “Close every shade, turn off every light, lock the doors, make sure the garage is closed, and if the family room TV is still on before eleven leave those lights at ten percent.” That conditional is the one people did not believe until they heard it work.
Why the devices matter more than the prompt
A prompt can only move what is on the system. “Set the lights to team colors” needs tunable fixtures, which in our houses means Lutron Ketra or Lumaris. “Lower the shades halfway” needs motorized shades with position control. “Music on the back deck” needs an outdoor zone on Sonos. “Make sure the garage is closed” needs the door on the system, which Josh added through MyQ this fall. This is why we design the whole house before anyone talks to it: the better the foundation, the more a single sentence can do.
What Josh needs from the request
| You say | Josh turns it into | Needs on the system |
| “Calm evening in the great room” | Warm dim lighting, shades, low music | Lutron zones, shades, Sonos |
| “Game on the first floor, team colors” | TV source, color-tunable lights | Video control, Ketra or Lumaris |
| “If it is sunny, shades halfway” | A weather condition on the shade position | Position-controlled shades |
| “Lock up at ten” | A scheduled lock and arm action | Smart locks, Alarm.com integration |
| “Music on the deck for the barbecue” | An outdoor audio zone at party level | Outdoor speakers on an amp |
Frequently asked
Do I have to use the exact words? No. That is the whole point. Say it the way you would to a person in the room, and Josh works out the devices.
Where do I say it? To a Nano or Micro in the room, into the Edge remote, or typed in the Josh app. Typing is handy for the long ones.
Will it change scenes I already have? Only if you ask it to. A new request makes a new scene; “update the good night scene” edits the existing one.
Does the house listen all the time? No. Josh processes on the Core in your house and listens for its name. Josh’s code of conduct spells out what it keeps and what it does not.
What if it gets something wrong? Tell it. “Not that bright” or “skip the music” fixes the scene in place. We also review every scene with you at handover.
Can my builder or designer set these up for a client? We do it at commissioning, from the client’s own description of how they live. It is a better handover than a list of buttons.
Want a house you can describe instead of program? We are a Josh.ai dealer serving Park City, Deer Valley, Heber and the Wasatch Front, and scene design is part of every Josh commissioning. Tell us how you want to live in the house; we will wire it so Josh can do it.
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Shield Low Voltage designs and installs Josh.ai homes across the Wasatch Front and Back. Prompts and examples from Josh.ai’s October 6, 2026 story. Images and video courtesy of Josh.ai.