Azure Intelligent Image Search

AI-Powered Image Search with OCR, Tagging, and Automated Infrastructure

Storage Layer
AI Processing
Search & Indexing
Infrastructure (Terraform)
Infrastructure Deployment (Terraform)

Automated deployment of all Azure resources using Terraform IaC.

Storage Account
Blob storage for image assets with CORS configuration
Cognitive Services
Azure AI Vision for OCR and image analysis (S0 tier)
AI Search Service
Basic tier search service with datasource, skillset, index, and indexer
Resource Group
Organized container for all project resources
terraform init
terraform apply
Image Upload to Blob Storage

Upload images to the image-assets container in Azure Blob Storage.

  • Images stored in private container
  • Supports common formats (JPG, PNG, etc.)
  • Metadata automatically captured
  • Triggers indexer to process new images
az storage blob upload-batch \
  --account-name <storage-account> \
  --destination image-assets \
  --source ./images/
Auto Trigger
AI Vision Processing (Skillset)

Azure AI Vision automatically processes images using cognitive skillsets.

OCR Skill
Extracts text from images with orientation detection
Image Analysis Skill
Generates tags and descriptive captions for images
Output: Extracted text, image tags, and captions mapped to search index fields
Search Index & Querying

Indexer populates the search index with processed image data for intelligent querying.

  • Datasource: Reads from blob storage
  • Index: Stores searchable fields (text, tags, captions, metadata)
  • Indexer: Orchestrates data flow and field mappings
  • Search: Full-text search across OCR text, tags, and descriptions
az search indexer run \
  --name image-indexer \
  --service-name <search-service> \
  --resource-group <rg-name>
Result: Images are now searchable by content, not just filename!
User Workflow
1
Deploy
Run terraform apply to provision all Azure resources automatically. Infrastructure created in minutes.
2
Upload
Upload images to blob storage using Azure CLI or Portal. AI Vision processes them automatically.
3
Search
Query images by text content, tags, or descriptions. Find images based on what's in them, not filenames.
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