WHY IS PHOTO RETOUCHING CRUCIAL TO FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY?

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Ever tried to imagine a fashion industry that does not communicate with its target audiences using print and electronic media? Can you imagine a global fashion industry where none of the fashion designers’ creations is photographed? Not quite possible, right? Photo retouching too is nearly as important to fashion photography as photography itself is to the fashion industry. Let’s see why:

Difference between Reality and Image: Fashion designers often create intricate patterns in their apparel. These fine details may not always get captured with a photograph taken even with a high-end camera and appropriate accessories. In that case, professional photo retouching techniques need to be applied to the images to bring out these fine details. Photo touchup helps portray the fashion attire as close to reality as possible.

Makes the Clothes Look More Buyer-Friendly: Photo retouching lets you emphasize certain patterns which might be the strengths of the apparel’s design. This can be achieved by using tools for photo color correction, removing wrinkles on clothes, cleaning up of spots and marks on the model’s skin, etc.

Maintains Consistency of the Fashion House’s Brand: Connoisseurs can often look at a creation and tell who the designer is, because of the unique style and appearance of the clothing, as portrayed in its photograph. Fashion designers may want all their images to create a particular feel among their audiences. The effects they want you to give to their images using photo touchup tools communicate their design philosophy and often act as an unwritten signature of their brand.

Look at the above picture and notice the difference between the source image at the left and the final, retouched image at the right. If you are a fashion photographer who shoots for a magazine or a fashion house, there could be times when you need only minor touch ups on your images – something you can manage with some elementary photo retouching skills. Learn more about the process of doing photo touchups. (Image courtesy Dreuxsawyer.com)