This page is about the photograph. If you read one section, read what happens to the photo.
Last updated 10 September 2026.
The short version. We use one photo — taken at the booth, or one you choose yourself — send it to two AI companies to draw the artwork, and then our copy is gone. We never store it. They keep one for a while: Google for up to 55 days, and we cannot switch that off. We keep the artwork for at least 30 days so we can print the card and so your private link works, and it is deleted automatically after 90 days. Nothing is shown to anyone else unless you tick a box. Prefer no photo at all? Ask us for a hero designed from scratch — the same card.
Forge A Hero is a family-run booth that turns a photo into superhero trading-card artwork, printed on the spot. It is run by RAD Dad Tech LLC, and that company is the operator of this website, the booth kiosk, and the private hero pages linked from each card.
Contact: [email protected] — this reaches a person, and it is the address to use for anything on this page.
We ask fal.ai not to keep it. fal’s own default is to store the data sent with a request for 30 days. We switch that off on every single request, using the setting they publish for exactly that purpose, and we tell them to discard the generated image after an hour.
Google keeps a copy for up to 55 days, and we cannot switch that off. Google’s published policy is to retain the request and the generated image for 55 days so it can check its service is not being misused. That happens inside Google, after the setting we control, so the switch we flip at fal.ai does not reach it. Google states it does not use paid requests like ours to train its models. We would rather say this plainly than let you assume the photo vanishes the moment the card prints: on our side it does, at Google it takes up to 55 days.
What we cannot promise. We do not control fal.ai or Google and cannot verify what happens inside them — only that we ask, every time, in the way they document. fal's data protection terms do cover us, and oblige them to hold their suppliers to the same standard. They are also not written about children or about faces, so they are real but general protection, not a promise about your child. With Google we have no agreement at all: they are fal's supplier, not ours, which is why the 55 days above is a policy we can point at rather than a commitment made to us.
If that matters to you, ask us for a hero designed from scratch — no photo at all, and the same card.
| What | Why | How long |
|---|---|---|
| The photo | To draw the artwork | Not kept — see above |
| The hero's artwork and card | To print the card, and to serve your private link | At least 30 days; deleted automatically after 90 — longer only if you ask |
| The hero name your child chose | It is printed on the card | With the artwork |
| The event name | Printed on the card; groups an event's cards | With the artwork |
| That a grown-up agreed, and when | To show we asked before using the photo | With the artwork — no photo, just the time and which notice was on screen |
| A grown-up's email, if you give one | Only to send you the link to your artwork | Until you ask us to delete it |
| Booking enquiries from this website | To reply about an event | Until you ask us to delete it |
We never ask for a child's real name, age, address, phone number or school, and there is nowhere in the booth to enter them.
Keeping something longer. Ask us to hold a hero past 90 days — for a reprint, or because it is a family favorite — and we will, and that entry skips the automatic deletion. Only ever at your request, or for our own family and test heroes. You can undo it at any time.
If your hero was made at Louisiana Card Con (29–30 August 2026), you were told 30 days at the table. We have extended those to 90 so the code on your card keeps working — if you would rather it went sooner, tell us and we will delete it that day. Heroes made before that show stay on the 30 days they were promised.
With the optional box on the consent screen ticked, we may show finished artwork in three places: the display screen at our table, our booth gallery, and Forge A Hero’s own social media (currently Facebook). Artwork only — never the photograph, which we do not keep and have never published.
The check is enforced on our server, not just in the app, so leaving it unticked genuinely prevents display. Unticked stops it being shown to anyone. It does not change how long we keep it — we still need the artwork to print your card and serve your link.
We never name a child alongside the artwork. What appears is the hero name your child invented and, sometimes, the event — not a real name, an age, or a school.
Artwork from before 4 September 2026 was agreed under wording that named the table screen and our booth gallery. We treat keeping a hero in that gallery as covering the same artwork being shown online — it is the same picture, shown to people, with no photograph and no child’s name attached. If you would rather yours was not, say so and it comes down, the same as any other request below.
Changed your mind? Email us and it comes down — see your rights below. That applies to a post that is already up.
Each card carries a code leading to a page with your artwork. That address contains a random 128-bit token: it is unlisted, not indexed by search engines, and effectively unguessable. It works for at least 30 days, expires after 90, and the artwork is deleted with it.
You can, at any time and without giving a reason:
Email [email protected]. Tell us the event and the hero's name — that is enough for us to find it. Declining or withdrawing consent never costs you the card you paid for.
The artwork is generated by an AI image model, not drawn by hand, and we do not pretend otherwise. Which companies see the photo, and for how long, is in what happens to the photo.
Everything travels over encrypted connections. The artwork lives on a small private server we run, reachable only through an authenticated address. Access is limited to us.
If we change what we collect or how long we keep it, this page and the date at the top change too. If it affects data we already hold, we ask again rather than assume.