Introducing Contour

After an entire career of designing, building, and supporting client-specific systems, I’ve arrived at a point where it makes sense to formalize what that support actually looks like — and make it scalable.

In practice, I’ve always stayed involved long after delivery. Some of those relationships now stretch back nearly twenty years.

Recently, a concrete need surfaced around real property management. At the same time, the technical landscape has finally caught up. Cloud infrastructure is no longer exotic. Databases, APIs, authentication, and hosting are now readily available — often within an organization’s existing ecosystem. Even traditionally cautious organizations are on board.

Add to that the acceleration of AI-assisted development, and it has never been easier to build, evolve, and support serious systems without massive teams or overhead.

One thing hasn’t changed: my clients expect — and deserve — ownership. These systems often need to live inside their infrastructure, integrate with their authentication models, and respect the fact that they own the data and the assets.

For me, and for Bright Rain, this is also future planning. Building systems that are supported, documented, and intentionally designed to live beyond any single engagement is not just a business decision — it’s a responsibility.

That long-term support commitment is ultimately what turns a solution into a product.

Enter Contour.

Contour is a real property management system built for land management agents — typically utilities — that need tight GIS integration, document management, and lifecycle tracking over time.

One of the core ideas behind Contour is something I call Progressive Geometry. In real property work, geometry evolves. Initial inputs are often incomplete or intentionally minimal. The ability to enhance geometry over time while always retaining a clear sense of “where” is critical.

In Contour, a land manager can record a right using a simple point, the critical attributes, and supporting documents. Detailed geometry can be constructed later by GIS professionals — without breaking the lifecycle of the record.

Contour is the first product Bright Rain is building. It’s being developed deliberately, informed by real work, and supported with the same long-term mindset that has defined my client relationships for years.

We’ll share more as it takes shape.