Photography

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A place to politely discuss the tools, technique and culture of photography.

This is not a good place to simply share cool photos/videos or promote your own work and projects, but rather a place to discuss photography as an art and post things that would be of interest to other photographers.

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Okay to ask a professional photographer for RAW versions from a shoot? (alien.top)

submitted 11 months ago by n_hawthorne@alien.top to c/photography@viewfinder.pro

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We hired a pro photographer to take family photos last summer during a beach vacation. My wife wants to use some of the photos for a Christmas card and she bemoaned the fact that in all the photos, the beach and sky have been pretty much whitewashed out of existence. I told her I could fix them in Photoshop if the photographer could provide RAW versions. We’re talking about 15 photos here. Is this a reasonable request? I assume the photographer still has the RAW versions, but not sure. The photographer in fact has not responded to my request. Maybe photographer feels insulted or something.

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[–] alex_ycan@alien.top 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Controversial take:

If they are a capable photographer I believe they should hand it out.

Hear me out: I work in graphic design and illustration for the better part of a decade, I am capable of editing raws myself and I often need to as part of my work.

A photographer not handing out raws is a kill-criteria and makes collaboration difficult. Frankly, I hate it.

I also believe in handing out open files and source material in pretty much any field of visual art.

Remember folks, clients hire your visual talent because of your signature and style (of shooting) + in large parts your personality. If you are afraid a client will walk away with source files and ridicule your work publicly or run off with it to a cheap competitor, than you are not as good as you think you are in the first place.

Agencies I worked for also always gave out files on request.

[–] Comprehensive_Tea924@alien.top 1 points 11 months ago

Okay but as a graphic designer, that’s a different thing entirely. A family photo shoot doesn’t need raws