why portraits are making a comeback
Remember when you booked a photographer in years past and that photographer handled everything? a photographer would photograph your special or life changing event and would provide a complete service with a tangible product, a portrait. You never would ask the photographer for the negatives because they were the property of the photographer and rightfully so. our copyright law of 1976 protects photographers who create the images that they capture as soon as the image has been clicked, just as an artist is protected in the same way.
along came the digital file or perhaps digital negatives are a more appropriate description. Digital files changed the platform and the way for photographers that have been both beneficial and somewhat detrimental. I would confess that a benefit of digital files is that as a photographer you are able to correct and retouch images in a capacity that was not as prevalent with a film negative. Photographers have the ability to make images more artistic with their own signature style with a digital file then with film. But to it's detriment something happened along the way with the introduction of the digital file and the photographers who began to willfully give those files away to their cherished clients. not only did this become a trend but it became an expectation from prospective clients that began to devalue the photography industry by giving the images themselves no apparent value. The portrait whether in digital or printed form are what a photographer creates with their skill and is the service they are providing to their client. it is their means of making a living.
surprisingly, even though clients were receiving their images from their photographers overwhelmingly clients on average just decided printing them wasn't that important or maybe they were even just too busy to make printing them a priority. as reports have shown that those clients that received digital files have never printed their images. They are just a disc or perhaps a download waiting to be printed at some point in the future. in the five years I have been in business we have changed the delivery system for delivering digital products three times! First it was the cd disc, then it was the sd card & now we currently deliver our digital products, our digital files a popremiere slideshows on a custom usb drive. as technology is continually changing, phones die all the time, your online storage has the potential to crash but irloom portraits, albums & folio boxes for my clients. Not only can I ensure that my work is being represented in the best way possible with quality professionally made products. I also have the comfort of knowing that my clients will have legacy portraits that will be cherished by the future generations of the people who love them. the portraits I create will ultimately become priceless and best of all I love being able to provide this service to my clients so that the images I create are never sitting in a drawer somewhere to never exist in print.
the trends in photography are slowly changing. we are coming full circle, back to where we stared in a sense. the portrait is having a comeback! people are finally beginning to realize the importance of printing again because fifty years from now your grandchildren and your great grandchildren deserve a legacy of your life. a legacy that they won't have to try to retrieve with a device. my hope is that you have taken the time to capture a portrait that will serve as your legacy, that you begin to see the infinite value in a portrait.
*report information noted in this blog was provided from the article "a lost generation" the professional photographers of America | PPA
