The business of photography and retouching
If a photographer wants to successfully complete a job, they first have to successfully start the job with a well-written estimate.
(This post is for new photographers.)
A potential customer asks you for a price to photograph something. What do you do?
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This same store today sells beauty supplies.
(This post is mostly for new photographers doing corporate or commercial photography rather than retail photography.)
Unlike a department store which sells hundreds or even thousands of products, a photographer basically sells one product – themselves – and that comes in a very limited supply. A retail store’s business model is based on volume. A store has an unlimited supply of products to sell to dozens or hundreds of customers each and every day. A store gets a steady stream of money from lots of small purchases.
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This is another view-from-my-office photo.
A photographer asked me to take at look his recent food photos (mostly photos of product packaging). His customer wasn’t happy with the pictures. The photographer wanted a second opinion before replying to his customer.
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Photo retouching of business portraits isn’t just about the person’s face. Retouching can also fix clothing mishaps such as a crooked tie, a loose collar, wrinkled clothing, a missing button, an open zipper, a twisted pocket flap, etc.
Clothing mishaps aren’t a big deal in personal photos but they shouldn’t be ignored in a business headshot. If it looks like the person doesn’t care about their appearance, then how much do they care about their job?
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The retouched photo still isn’t the best business headshot, but all the flaws are fixed and the photo is very presentable.
Business headshot photography has been part of my business for about 30 years. I’ve learned that some companies understand the purpose of business headshots and some don’t.
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This is another view-from-my-office photo.
Yesterday I was exchanging e-mails with a photographer who shot a commercial job two months ago. The photography has been completed, the photos have been delivered, and the customer has paid. Two months ago.
His customer is using the photos in transit ads. The photographer asked if he should now charge more for this usage.
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There have been only three times when I had difficulty getting paid. All were in the mid-1980s when I was just starting out:
1) My first corporate customer was a very small pharmaceutical company. The company wanted the photos shot on transparency film because the images were for a slide presentation. I asked if they also wanted prints. No, they did not want prints, only slides. The job was done and the slides were delivered. The customer refused to pay because I did not deliver prints.
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