I was browsing the web today and came across a blog post with the title… I HATE Photoshop! Actually, I could have said: How my photographer is ripping me off!

I thought his hate on Photoshop was an interesting headline, so I read the post.

Turns out it was written by a bride who had hired a photographer for her wedding, for 4-5 hours (her words, she wasn’t sure how long).

After the wedding, they gave him all the negatives. In her opinion, photographers who keep the negatives and then try to sell the photos are scams. By the way, giving the negatives in the analog world is the same as giving them a memory stick or a CD file of the photos in the digital world.

So, they gave him all the negatives.

He had kept them, the negatives, for quite some time, he didn’t say how long, because he didn’t have retouching software. He finally got himself a copy of Photoshop. He was now “retouching” over 500 black and white images. (The photographer shot half in black and white and half in color.)

The reason he “hates” Photoshop is because of the boredom of retouching 500 photos! Hmmm… I have to wonder how good this photographer is if she has to retouch ALL of them! (Luckily, he got the software as a Christmas present, so I guess he couldn’t hate it for the $600.00+ price!) He never mentioned the steep learning curve, or the time to do the tinkering, or the cost of printer ink. , photographic paper, etc.

BUT… she was not “ripped off” by any photographer! One who actually PAYED the $600 for the software, took the TIME to learn how to use it, took the TIME to touch up all the photos, edited them, then PAYED the costs to print them, and then took the TIME to compile them into an album. . (We won’t even get into a discussion of the cost of equipment, training, and the hundreds of other miscellaneous details that went into creating the photos in the first place.)

Yes… photographers who actually want to charge a fair price for their work, and not give it away, are a real scam! For those of you who have NO sense of irony, I’m kidding!

How many brides never get a wedding album because they want to save a couple bucks and “print it themselves”? and never do? How many brides get an album, but it’s bad because they don’t have $600 software? Or do you not have the knowledge, or will you not take the time to do all the work?

As professionals we know, or at least SHOULD know, the amount of work and effort that goes into creating a beautiful wedding album, or the hardcover books that are popular these days. We know that the bride will rarely push herself to do the job right and end up with no album or a subpar album at best.

So when you take the easy way out and give the girlfriend the negatives or the memory card from the camera, or a CD, whatever, you are really ripping them off. They will NEVER be able to see your album the way it is meant to be seen or enjoy it the way it is meant to be enjoyed. You have deceived them. And they will never know!

By the way, you have also fooled yourself. None of your friends or family are going to see your work as it’s meant to be seen. Do you want YOUR reputation and future bookings to depend on an amateur who “HATES Photoshop”?

I don’t. Stand your ground and get paid for your work, everyone will be better off for it.

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