Investment & Photo Quality

When seeking a photographer for your portrait needs, it is always important to look at their prices as well as quality. Some photographers ask for a simple fee, but really charge you when you order prints. Other photographers have a one time fee where you get a CD. All in all, they are charging you for all of the time they put into their work. I've heard of stories where photographers ask from $300-1000 just in prints. Why should you have to pay that much? You realize that you're basically paying them sometimes $200 an hour? Is it really worth it? Is their photography THAT good? If you think so, then go for it! You be the judge! Always look at your choices of photographers in an artistically competitive way. Look at what your better deal will be. Know what you are looking for in photos and decide what would be better for you. Their prices should be reflecting their talent and time. If one of the two is not there, then you shouldn't paying them $200 an hour.

I want to explain why I personally charge what I do with my portrait photography. People outside of the photography and graphic design world may not be aware of how long it takes to fully process a digital photograph.



It can take up to 3 hours to edit a batch of images from a one hour photo session. An hour long session can produce about 200-300 photos. I take lots of photos because one shot of one pose is not enough to ensure that my focus was correct and the lighting was spot-on. 3 hours of editing is actually looking though my photos one by one and retouching the ones that I find are worth keeping. The ones I don't like (because of incorrect focus and etc) I just skip over. 3 hours also contains the tedious work of correcting temperature, contrast, general exposure, clarity, other lighting issues within the picture, retouching blemishes and acne on skin (and believe me, there is such thing as over editing the face by softening too much and lots of photographers do not understand WHAT is too much), and any other possibility that may need enhancing. Because I am detail oriented and I want the photos to look as perfect as they can, I tend to spend lots of time on my images. I refuse to not edit a photograph and publish it because no painter puts their unfinished work in an art gallery on purpose. If you don't feel absolutely proud of something, then you shouldn't be putting it out in the world for all to see. Editing is a MUST in the process of photography so when people ask for unedited photos, I feel uncomfortable agreeing to give them such a thing. After going through all of the images, they must be put into black in white as well, which is a process of it's own that can take up to an hour. I pull every photo into Photoshop and again, tediously, adjust all of the exposures and adjustments that I need in order for the black and white to look correctly in it's new format. Each and every file then must be individually evaluated before I am sure I want it to be placed on the CD. This takes a few minutes.. But if I see an image that has something wrong with it, I reopen it and fix it again. Then, I have to downsize the file size to fit on one CD, but still be able to produce large print sizes for the client. This can take about 30 minutes or so depending on how many images. After all of the photos are ready to go, I burn them to a disk for a client's printing use. This usually takes 15 minutes. I have began designing and printing my own custom CD labels. This is the last step but can take 30 minutes to an hour.

Most CDs I make, currently, hold 35-50 photos regardless of what my website states.



So, when you think about it, a photographer (myself) will spend many hours working on your photos, being seated for hours at a time. When a photographer is very busy, they get less sleep than normal jobs. The investment that you put in, let's say you had an hour long shoot and paid $200 dollars (what I charge), your photographer is not only working that hour he or she used to shoot your photographs. And, it's not as simple as using a preset/action over an image and saving it and being done with the photos. It's a long process that takes many, many hours. And depending on the photographer you choose, they may or may not be an artist, the details should mean everything.It should be vital to that artist for your photos to look the best they can be.

I love my job and I love what I create. I even enjoy the process of retouching photos. I can not define myself any other way other than I am an artist from the inside out. I have spent years discovering, utilizing, enhancing, and mastering all of the skills I have. The most fun for me, though, is to have a happy customer. My goal is to use my art to put joy into others. Photos are worth an investment because a photographer captures you in that moment that you can keep for many generations to see.

I hope I can photograph each and every one of you out there just as you are, because you deserve a photograph that represents you, and you shouldn't have to give me a million dollars for it.