Lately, I’ve been retouching a lot of photos shot by other photographers. Some are really good and need only minor edits or some compositing. But others, not so much. A lot of my work involves fixing photographer mistakes, trying to salvage images marred by poor posing, bad lighting, or weak composition—issues that retouching can’t always fix.
Retouching Family Portraits
I recently worked on two sets of outdoor family portraits shot by different photographers.
The first set was overexposed by about two stops, resulting in overly bright faces and washed-out hair highlights. All the photos were crooked—I guess the photographer had one leg shorter than the other :-) The images were also cropped too tightly, making it impossible to print or frame them without cutting off body parts of family members.
This photographer is a wedding-portrait photographer with ten years experience according to his website. His editing and masking were poorly executed, leaving behind clearly visible halos and artifacts.
The second set of family photos had some images that were too dark, others too bright, and one photo had its contrast lowered so much that it was a mostly grey image with no shadows or highlights. The photographer’s poor masking techniques left obvious and sharp outlines around the subjects after the photographer did a terrible job of blurring the backgrounds.
These images were far from professional quality. If the photographers had delivered better shots, my retouching wouldn’t have been necessary, and the families would have saved money.
Advice for Photographers and Customers
Photographers – learn to use your camera’s manual settings for portrait sessions. Use a tripod. Learn to edit. Get your photos critiqued at portfolio reviews.
Customers – always hire the best photographer you can afford. Don’t go cheap if the photos are important.
No Retouching Allowed
I encountered a situation where a bride wanted her wedding photos retouched, but the photographer had included a “no alterations” clause in the contract. This said the bride could only get retouching services from the photographer.
A quick web search showed that a few other wedding photographers also have a no-alterations clause. I did not find any other type of photographer who had a similar contract clause, only wedding photographers. However one wedding photographer’s contract stated that the customer is free to use, edit, print, and share their photos in any way they want, except for commercial use. A smart marketing move!
While I understand that photographers have moral rights over their work and that poorly executed retouching can reflect badly on the photographer, a no-alterations clause seems overly restrictive, especially for private use.
It’s quite possible such a clause violates Canada’s Competition Act, Section 77, which addresses “exclusive dealing.” This law prevents a supplier or manufacturer from forcing customers to work only with them.
This particular bride noticed that her photos had exposure, colour, and contrast issues, which is why she wanted them retouched. She also asked for some skin retouching,stray hair removal and a crooked tie to be fixed. I did the retouching and the customer was happy with the results.
Being Secretive
I’ve noticed some wedding photographers remove EXIF data from their images before delivering them to clients. This doesn’t seem to happen with other types of photographers. The photographer’s name and copyright remain in the IPTC data, but all other metadata is deleted.
Few photographers, especially outside of news photography, don’t fully utilize IPTC data, which could benefit both the photographer and the customer.
Misaligned Photographer
A customer sent some wedding photos for retouching, and several were noticeably out of focus. Why did the photographer deliver these images? The photographer’s business name was embedded in the IPTC data, (and all other metadata was removed), and their website identified them as a large Toronto wedding photography company with about two dozen employees. Given their size and professional profile, one would expect them to know better than to deliver out-of-focus images.
The focus issue wasn’t just poor technique—it looked like a misalignment problem. In horizontal photos, about 75% of the image, from left to right, was in focus, while the remaining portion was blurred. The same happened in vertical shots with 75% of the image in focus from top to bottom, leaving the rest out of focus. This suggests that a lens element, lens mount, or camera sensor is misaligned. It’s surprising that the photographer didn’t catch this, as the issue was quite obvious.
