Retouching Jobs over the web

[P_fuzz]

Just wondering whats out there in this market.

I have recently relocated to London, UK and although my main focus is photography I feel there could be a chance of making a few extra $$ on retouching jobs over the web or in house.

Anybody here doing these kind of jobs? what would be the best place to look for jobs in these area? any tips?

[Aladdin]

You would have to do it through some actual photo/retouch house, you have to build name for your self otherwise you will end up competing with damn Indians & Filipinos @ 50 Cent a blemish, 25 cent a wrinkly, this is the web. you will be lucky to get $5 worth of work. I am serious, do your best to go to real photographers and offer your work to them, those Indians can't compete at this level.

Case in point, my daughter was out on a job interview, general office stuff, then realized that they do catalogue work, jewelry stuff and they use photo shop, she told them that she is a photo shop avid and can do it, she was told that they out source the work (BG extraction) to India @ $10/day for 1000 pictures - You will have to relocate to the swamps of New Delhi to afford an income of $10/day.

[P_fuzz]

hi aladdin.
Yes, that is what I would be interested to do anyway...

real photography and retouching... not the average "i wanna look good on facebook" picture.

thanks for the advice!

anyone else with experience in this field around here?

[vladdutch]

`Hi P_fuzz
I specialize in the most complex and critical restorations of old photo and images with highest requirements to quality.
Please check up the link :
http://digitartgallery.com/Extreme_P...estoration.htm
Thanks for your time

[Godmother]

Originally Posted by Aladdin

You would have to do it through some actual photo/retouch house, you have to build name for your self otherwise you will end up competing with damn Indians & Filipinos @ 50 Cent a blemish, 25 cent a wrinkly, this is the web. you will be lucky to get $5 worth of work. I am serious, do your best to go to real photographers and offer your work to them, those Indians can't compete at this level.

Case in point, my daughter was out on a job interview, general office stuff, then realized that they do catalogue work, jewelry stuff and they use photo shop, she told them that she is a photo shop avid and can do it, she was told that they out source the work (BG extraction) to India @ $10/day for 1000 pictures - You will have to relocate to the swamps of New Delhi to afford an income of $10/day.

I completely disagree with you.

If all you can do is extract subject from BG, yes you can be replaced by a plug in, much cheaper than india

But if you have something else to offer there's still A LOT of business in retouching.
I know retouchers from India who charge $100 per image. Because they are not relying on a plug in or action to do the retouching and people from any high exchange country learns REALLY FAST what the market will pay for their services, sure they can afford to be cheaper but they don't stay cheap if they know what they are doing.

If you work on the low en you can be easily replaced, if you do other kind of work is like any other business.

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