The business of photography and retouching
Almost all business headshots and other professional portraits need to be retouched. This is often done to fix mistakes the photographer made or to repair something that was overlooked such as a crooked tie. Appearing neatly groomed will make you seem more competent.
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This is another view-from-my-office photo.
All products, except luxury items, have a maximum price set by market conditions. A loaf of bread costs up to about $8. A bakery can’t increase the price to $20 or $30 no matter how good that bread is. The price of bread has a ceiling. To make more money, a bakery can expand into products that have a higher price ceiling such as cakes and pastry (which might be considered luxury items).
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There are plenty of clients who don’t actually want the cheapest choice. They want the best one, and a powerful estimate is the clue they use to choose.
– Seth Godin, author and marketing strategist
An estimate doesn’t have to be just a page of numbers. You can use an estimate as an additional marketing tool to help persuade a potential customer. Customers need more than numbers to understand you and your business. If you can sell yourself as being more knowledgeable, more reliable, and less risk, then price becomes secondary.
Differentiate yourself from other photographers not by having a lower price or even a similar price, but by being exactly what they’re looking for. And this is done with words, not numbers, on an estimate. Sell yourself and not the numbers.
Seth Godin’s full blog post about estimates.
Photo retouching isn’t just for portraits. Retouching is almost always necessary for any picture that’s going to be used in a newsletter, an annual report, or any similar business publication, in print or online. Properly edited pictures always make your project look more professional.
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Artificial intelligence image generators are so much fun. The above images were created using a simple text prompt of “business portrait of company CEO.” Every time the prompt was run, the Stable Diffusion image generator kept creating very similar looking images of white males.
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Today I saw a big, shiny van belonging to a company that makes and installs glass showers. The sides of the van had large photos of glass-enclosed showers. But apparently no one bothered to look at the pictures before they were printed on vinyl and attached to the sides of the vehicle.
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I’ve retouched a lot of business portraits, a few actor headshots and even some family portraits. Common retouching requests include removing stray hairs, brightening eyes and teeth, minimizing facial wrinkles, eliminating double chins, fixing skin issues, and repairing clothing malfunctions.
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