The War Between Photographers And Instagram Filters

I get it… Instagram filters are classic and fun to use and ready at your fingertips! But what you might not realize is how a professional photographer might feel when a filter is used on their photo and spread on the vast interweb. This topic is a little touchy and controversial, but I hope my honesty can help settle some of the tension and shed light on why there is an invisible war between photographers and Instagram filters.

CARE AND TIME

Professional photographers spend hours upon hours carefully selecting the best of your wedding or lifestyle photos and even more hours upon hours editing them. I haven’t worked it out to the T, but to give you a rough idea, I spend at least 22 hours culling and editing each wedding and around 6 hours culling and editing each lifestyle session.

Lots of things are taken into consideration – brightness, contrast, white balance, tone, hues etc. Photographers go through their photos dozens of times tweaking the smallest thing over and over again until it is as best as it can be. Because photographers put so much time into their edits, it can be disheartening when these photos are shared on Instagram with a big heavy filter that took maybe 30 seconds to put on top. (Wooooaaa she went there!!)

Examples of what not to do…

MISGUIDANCE

Re-editing your photos in any way or putting an Instagram filter on top can be misleading to your photographer’s future clients/ couples. We love when you tag us when using our photos, but if you have re-edited your photo anyone seeing that photo will assume that this was our edit. If that viewer then clicks on the photographer’s tag and sees the photographer’s Instagram grid with their actual edited photos, they could be confused. Photographers need their work to be consistent across the board so our photos are recognized and clients/ couples know what to expect of their photos when they book us. You are actually doing your photographer a HUGE service when you tag and share your photos as they are!

And lastly…

FINE PRINT

Some photographers have it in their contracts that their photos cannot be altered or re-edited. It’s best to read the fine print and make sure you check with your photographer before re-editing their photos and sharing them online.

 

I hope this post was informative and helpful! We know you’re not putting Instagram filters on your photos to insult us or hurt us in any way. ;) There may just be more going on behind the scenes than you think…