Photographer question - I just want the RAW files

Yea, that's not gonna happen....photographers have the right to copyright and protect their files, and they do that by NOT giving out raw files. IMO, that is as it should be.

We're paying (a lot) extra to get a disk of all photos taken that night. We're getting our album through the photographer, but we're going to do the brag books for our parents ourselves (the photog offers the brag books as smaller replicas of our book). A friend of ours is a professional photographer, so we're going to ask him to touch up photos that will go in those books. Anyway, I know of photographers that offer a disk of pictures, but it comes with a cost.

Thanks, guys - that's actually about what I figured, and I respect that! So, if not the original RAW, what are your feelings about giving digital images on CD even at lower res?

I got a flash of ALL the photos taken (1300), and rights to print them all, some retouched, some not. I know most photographers will give you that option, to make your own albums and so forth. Just inquire as to their policies on the subject.

Brian - I guess we won't have to anyway if the images we're provided with are the type that are ready to print/post? I'm not as keen on the details as FS is. Thanks for the heads up, though. I really love my photographer and wouldn't want to wrong her!

I see Brian already covered it. NO WAY that the RAW files ever go anywhere except from the camera to my computer, to my offsite cloud backup.

BTW - Caro do you race (sail)? I'm coming down tomorrow for the Annapolis-Solomons Race.

Really? Almost all of the photographers in the Cleveland area will give you a disk(s) with your photos - although they were already photo shopped and color changed (BW/Sepia/etc), so I don't know if you consider that RAW technically. But I do have high quality digitals of all of my sister's photos and am doing the same thing for mine. It is just far too expensive to order the albums (besides I'm a scrapbooker, and could order an album later if I want).

Most of the Photographers in my area, mine included, include a package where you can get your photos on disk without album (and you don't have to special request it). It is almost always an up charge though. For ours our total package is $1,500 including that, but we got last years pricing because he did my sisters and we have passed him a lot of business from that alone.

Most around here it is a $300-500 up charge and you have to sign a contract saying you won't sell them (like to other vendors).

Jessie_ RAW is an actual file type, that is editable. The CD's that you get have edited files in jpeg form (or other) that cannot be retouched.

I totally agree with you, this is about 90% of why my photog is not a professional. I couldn't see paying thousands for pictures when I could edit the images myself & I have friends that are pro's with photoshop that wouldn't mind prettying up some for me, and then me reprint them by self. So, my childhood BFF is capturing my moments and she is ripping a copy of the SD card while we're on honeymoon & she is going to return the original to me & then play with the copies she has that way we both can play with them & then I'll decide what gets printed from there. And that also helps with the budget because I can get the important ones printed as I have the funds available!!!

Brian- I do race. I won't be there for this weekend, but you should have some great weather if you're shooting!

Jessie- RAW is a file format, they're the totally unedited, uncompressed photos straight from the camera. The files you'd get on a CD are high-quality but not quite the same. I'd be fine with having high-res images on a disc but I'll probably ask for all-color.

My photographer took all of my sisters in color and gave us some that were both color and black and white (of the same image).

I'm sorry I didn't understand the terminology and question.

RAW is much akin to a negative from film (for those of you old enough to remember film - haha).

And honestly, I'd wager that many of the free/low cost photographers don't know what RAW is, or even how to read, let alone edit a RAW file. One of the ways to "save money" (money = time) is to shoot and burn. So they capture the images as JPG's (which are compressed and lossy) dump them off the camera and burn right to DVD.

@ Caro - Nope. I'm racing (it's a night race anyway). I'll be shooting a race next week.

Jessie - no need to apologize, I was just trying to explain a little better I'm getting into photography myself and there's a lot of terminology!

Mat - exactly. You listed some of the reasons why I'm looking for someone who shoots RAW. As a geeky amateur, choosing a photographer almost lets me live vicariously through their kit.

My photog is giving us the rights to all our pictures on cd, so we can print them and make our own albums but they aren't the RAW files, he's a photo-journalistic kind of photographer and I know he'll make them beautiful, and I'm paying a bit more than I wanted but $800 was great for 2 photogs plus all my pics and cds

We are paying an extra $500 for the digital files from our photog

@ Caro - drop me a line if you want to race. My boat is near York, PA. So not too far from you. I have a need for crew on August 4th. I don't have much fallback crew to chose from in this area of PA...

TY for explaining everyone. I learned something new today. And my photographer is great!! $1,500 includes 2 photogs, all day, editing, disk(s) & e-shoot!! Besides his work is AMAZING - better than a lot I have seen even the ones who are more "established." He really just broke into the wedding scene two or three years ago.

http://imagenphotos.com/index2.php?v=v1

Any photogs inputs are welcome btw.

Our photog gave us a disc with every photo on it. He is simple, easy and no mess kind of guy.

He does not care if we use them, how we use, send them, or reproduce them.

We requested he shoot in Raw. He laughed and said thats ALL he shoots in But we got HIGH res Jpegs from the wedding. No watermark, no nutthin.

Juhgail - nice! That's exactly what I want too.