Negatives and Digital Files

[langelis]

I know almost all Portrait/Wedding photographers keep film negatives unless some prior arangement has been made or a large fee has exchanged hands.

Now that we are entering the Digital Era, how should we treat Digital Negatives (files). If we make a CD for any of customers, they can print their own pictures anytime they want. Is the fee structuring these days including the digital files and/or prints?

I am not a portrait photographer, but I have some people who want to pay me to take pictures of them. I have no idea what to charge (that's another post and I am researching now), and I am curious on if I should supply the files on cd.

How do you guys/girls handle this?

Thanks,

luke

[mbze430]

In the biz, you keep your own raw. Unless you are contracted, and if stated in your contract, you are required to give up your RAWs.

Normally I provide the client's requirements. Most of the time I get to keep my Digital Negs.

[tim]

I wouldn't sign a contract which makes me release my RAWs without a very good reason. If they want high res JPG or TIFF they're welcome to them, though I may charge extra depending on the original rate, how much i'd lose in print sales, and how much work it'd be to give them to them.

[chtgrubbs]

The business model for portrait photography has changed drastically with digital. It used to be that a photographer charged a modest sitting fee ($50-100) and made his profit in print price markups. Obviously, today with home scanners and digital files there isn't nearly as much profit to be made from prints. So you could make a package price which includes the sitting fee and a certain number of high rez files for a price which provides you with money you need and let client make his own prints. One of the potential pitfalls here is that you have no control over print quality, and if the client gets lousy prints your name is associated with lousy photographs. Or you can convince the client that you can provide top quality prints at a reasonable price and have some control over final quality. But in either case I would try to get the money on the front end rather than depend on print sales.

[UncleDoug]

As standard practice we give out a CD/DVD with JPEGS, big enough to print a 4x6. And do charge accoringly for this.
We hold all RAW files and print anything above 4x6 in house on our inkjet.

Sure someone can res-up the 4x6's but most of our clients want reprints of high quality....

[langelis]

Thanks all for the replies.

[lakiluno]

The photo-place I got my portrait taken a few years ago took with digital, and then after a bit of PP they took you in and put up a slideshow of all the photos on the screen.

You whittled it down from the hundred+ they took to a few, and if you asked for it in BandW they would change it for you. I believe they PP them all and changed a random (or ones they thought looked best) selection into B and W. Once you chose one (or more) they would give you a date the print would be ready and you left.

This did mean you had to go there 3 times (once to have the photos taken, once to pick them and once to collect it), but it does mean that the client can only scan in and re-print the one they chose. I guess like negatives, they didn't give us the jpegs/raws.

That approach will only be valid for studio portraits though, as things like weddings, the couple expect 100's of photos rather than 1.

Leo

[SezzySue]

For our wedding we were offered the cd of high resolution JPEG files, but not the RAW files. The cd of high res would cost us well over $600 and did not make it worth my while. Because of the large number of prints I ordered (250+ 4X6) he lowered the price which let me buy even more. I was willing to pay him for the prints because he was so willing to work with me. Either way you should keep the file even if they buy them from you. I hope you find a good choice that works for you. Good thread because I was wondering the same things. Have a good day.

[Mike Panic]

wow... LOTS of misconceptions here

first, if you are shooting an entire wedding in raw, you really need to learn how to shoot... the only real reason for doing so is because of uncontrolable lighting conditions. learn to do a custom wb when in the church, since you prob can't use a flash, that problem is solved, you will prob be using a flash for everything else, so that solves most of that... and shoot in jpg. why spend hours and hours editing raw files if you just shoot jpg right the first time, especially if your not printing bigger then 20x30... read shootsmarter.com - its really there for your benefit so you don't waste so much time

moving on... if you are giving the customer a cd of anything other then web sized jpgs that are watermarked, and no bigger then 800x600, you should have nothing to worry about. sure they can print them at home, but no lab will print them.

another option if you have to give them a cd is to use photoshop cs2's web gallery and create the gallery with one of their flash templates. this will ensure that none of the images can be printed.

if you understand the logic behind not giving out your negatives, then you should understand the logic behind not giving out a CD w/ high rez jpg files on it. you are giving money away. aside from someone who really wants to pay big money for it, the people who are asking you to shoot their wedding for $500 and just give them a cd when your done are looking for a bargain basement shooter.

[tim]

Mike, if you get your RAWs correctly exposed and the WB set correctly in the camera, it takes very little time to batch them out to JPG - maybe 30 minutes for an entire wedding. If you get it wrong RAW is a good safety net.

[UncleDoug]

If you get it wrong RAW is a good safety net.

Safe is good:D :D :D

[subtle_spectre]

wow... LOTS of misconceptions here

first, if you are shooting an entire wedding in raw, you really need to learn how to shoot...

I suppose I take issue with this statement. There are any number of good, valid reason to shoot raw, even at a wedding. Obviously there is a wider margin for correction, but there is also a much more robust margin for artistic edits.

As for the original post, for portraits I do not provide electronic files. For event sessions other than weddings I provide med sized jpgs on a dvd. For weddings, after 60 days, I provide full-res jpgs of original images. They're going to print them somehow, so they might as well have something to work with. The schools of thought are seem resistant to this view, but I see it this way. It sets me apart; my original images with only basic PP to make good jpgs are decent images to start with; they don't get any of the fancy, artistic PP I do that they may want; and, if a client is going to print a 5x7 or 8x10 or larger from a small on-line proof, that looks worse on me than does using a decent full-res jpg.

[jeff_b]

RAW files are your negatives! If you shoot in JPEG (or even TIFF) you have nothing better than what you give your client. Think in terms of film and paper. Would you shoot a whole wedding on Polaroid? I hope not. But if you shoot all JPEG files and then give JPEG files to your client, they have as much probable claim to the work as you. Remember, possession is 9/10th's of the law. When push comes to shove, as long as you possess something that is at least one step closer to the original than the other party, you win.