Do you Edit? Yes. Do you Retouch? Yes.

Hello all, I think I’ll finally get a bit deeper than just posting pretty pictures, this way more of you guys are educated on what to look for when you’re looking for a photographer for your big day. One of the questions besides “are you a photojournalist?” or “how many photographers are included?” is “Do you ‘retouch’ the images that are included in your package?” The answer to that is pretty simple and it is a big B-I-G no. Let me explain.

The term retouch is thrown around very loosely among other photographers, but for me there is a very big and distinct difference between editing all of the images and retouching them. For me, the brief definition for retouching an image would be removing stray hairs, blemishes, pimples or other imperfections on the face(s) as well as other “physical” changes (i.e. face/arm/body slimming) to the image. I am very sure that no photographer is going to “retouch” ALL the images, if he shoots 800 or 1000 shots, you probably will not get your images back for at least 6 months! In my opinion, the brief definition for editing is adjusting the white balance, luminance, contrast, saturation, color correction, and any other adjustments/tweaks that may give the images that extra pop to give it that signature MrHenryWang look.

For us, the workflow for after an shoot is to download the images then back them up 3 times in two different locations (we’re proud of that). Then we would go through all of the images shot to delete any of the undesirable images, for example blinked, flash not firing, testing shots, or the occasional out of focus shots (yes, we’re human too….). After that step is done then comes the “editing” stage. We open each image with our RAW file editor and, as I mentioned above, we will adjust the luminance, contrast, saturation, white balance, and other secret tweaks that we do to give it the look we’re looking for. All of the images that goes through this process is then saved to our server which you will receive as part of your package. This means that all of the images/files that are received by our couples are fully edited, color corrected, and basically ready for showing off!

Now, please do not get confused and start telling everyone that Henry Wang Photography does not retouch any of the images. That’s not true as well. Once our couples choose their favorite images for their album, we will do all of the retouching the bride and groom requests and also add our own touch to the images as well!

So while you’re shopping for your wedding photographer, and he/she tells you that he professionally retouches all of the images that you get, ask him a quick follow up “I know it may sound silly, but what do you mean by retouch?”

-Henry

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