ginny_e

<p>Thanks for all the great responses!<br>

I will not be adding frames in in PS. I am pretty proud of the fact that I still shoot medium format film and I like the authentic feeling I get from knowing it is truly original, at least for myself if not for the sake of the craft.<br>

I checked out betterscanning.com and that looks promising. I did email him about what I am looking for and he responded:<br>

"People who want to do that usually buy one of my single channel film holders<br /> and then modify it themselves." He linked this page which talks about the modifications toward the bottom, including caveats: <a href="http://www.betterscanning.com/scanning/insert.html">http://www.betterscanning.com/scanning/insert.html</a><br>

My only worry about that is that I will be spending $80 on a precision piece of equipment just to possibly ruin it by attempting to modify it myself. I may try Noah's ideas with an old neg carrier or mat board first.</p>

<p>I frequently shoot rolls of 120 film in 6x6 frames on my Hasselblad and Holga. I use an Epson perfection 4990 flatbed to scan in the negatives but the negative holder that came with the scanner has a pretty tight frame crop. I'd really like to include some of the edges of the film (including things like the frame number, "kodak" stamp etc.) into the scanned images. I've done a bit of searching for a negative holder that would allow a larger part of the film edges to be scanned but I can't seem to find anything on the Epson site or elsewhere. Does anyone have any leads on a holder I could purchase to use with my scanner?</p>

<p>Okay, so here's how I think I will respond:<br>

-First inquire as to what their budget for a photographer actually is<br>

-I will most likely cut down the post processing price a bit but I absolutely won't give them straight out of camera images. And I'll explain the importance of this part of the creative process.<br>

-I will suggest a narrowed shot list so as to spend less initial time shooting. <br>

-I will offer them the opportunity to purchase the usage for a shorter amount of time. Thus incurring less of an initial cost. </p>

<p>David: So most advertising photographers hand over their images straight out of camera?<br>

My concerns over editing are less about cropping and picking which images as they are with making sure they are color correct, saturation and contrast perfect and so forth. It's hard for me to justify selling them what I consider to be an unfinished product. I feel that it's part of the photographic process and is paramount to the quality of the product I provide. I mean, otherwise, why hire a professional photographer who knows how to optimize their images? </p>

<p>I'll try to be brief with the setup: <br>

I'm looking for advice on how to respond to an email I received after I sent an estimate for an advertising job with a potential client. After a lengthy phone discussion with them about what exactly they were looking for as far as shots, time commitment and usage, I sent them what I feel is an <strong>extremely reasonable</strong> estimate. Basically after our initial discussion, I gleaned that they want all the photos (which I will still edit out model blinks, bad exposures, and apply my standard set of "make the photo pop" adjustments to) in high resolution, on disc to use for both print and online regional advertising for an unlimited amount of time. Since I would really like to work with them, I quoted them a great price that included a very reasonable fee for shooting time, post production and what is basically a nominal charge for unlimited usage. Here is the response I got:<br>

"Thank you for sending me the bid. The total is a quite bit more than what we budgeted for this project, so I’m hoping we can lower some of the cost. For example, we can edit the photos here at the office instead of having you do post production. I know you were a little worried about this when I mentioned it last week, but if we don’t get the cost down I can’t afford to work with you. It may also help to know we’ve budgeted to take member photos every other month in 2010, so this will be the beginning of a year long relationship."<br>

Does anyone have any words of wisdom on how to sell them as to the value of the work I am providing to their advertising campaign and verbage that may help remind them, without being condescending, that I need to make a living too and I won't work for peanuts. I have major scruples about providing raw, unedited images to clients so I'm not too keen on letting them do the editing and post processing. It's not normal to allow clients to do that is it? Also, I am willing to throw a bone their way as to a slight discount for repeat business on future jobs, should I mention that? (Although I'm not stupid enough to give them a discount on this job based on the understanding that they will be repeat customers in 2010. It would probably be wiser to stick to my bid on this one and as they continue to hire me to offer future incentives.)<br>

Any thoughts and wisdom on this matter are greatly appreciated!</p>