A
amitchell
Guest
What is the name of your state? Oklahoma
I am sorry this is so long but there is a lot to explain.
I was married in May, last week I received my wedding picutures (almost 5 months after my wedding) and they were awful. I am not just being a "picky" bride - they are blurry and a few of them have images that are transparent (you can actually see through the heads).
Throughout the past 5 months the photographer kept putting us off - everytime I called to see if my pictures were ready she would give me some excuse and promise another date and then not deliever. I got my pictures on a Thursday, by 7:00 a.m. on Friday I called and left a harsh message informing her that I was not happy with my pictures, told her why and informed her that I would not be able to contact her again until Monday at 8:00 a.m. I called Monday and left a message - no response. I finally spoke with her on Tuesday and she claimed "she didn't know what I was talking about." she said she thought the pictures "were fine." I informed her of the transparent heads and she told me that they were transparent she had just used a "very soft focus."
I had been concerned when I got the proofs because they looked this way and called and asked her about it and she said she could fix them. To help her out I even composed a list of every picture I wanted fixed and what I wanted done to it. Some were minor changes like shiny foreheads yellowish faces from the lights) and some were major (like the blurriness and the transparent, almost double exposed effect). None of these changes got done and I did not make a copy of the list.
I work at a university and took them to the person that does photography for the campus newspaper and he said that she DID NOT use soft focus and that the transparent/double exposed look was most likely caused by too much flash exposure and an incorrect shutter speed. The blurriness he thought was caused by poor photography. He thought the transparent/double expos. could be fixed but that most likely the blurriness could not. While looking over the phots with him we notices on one particular picture (we ordered several in different sizes) she had corrected the double/expos of my husbands hand (not his back, profile or my profile) but did not on the other pictures. You can look at the 5X7 and his hand is blurry, on the 8X10 it is not. This leads me to believe that she knows she should have corrected it but just didn't care. Her contract states "The utmost care is taken with respect to the exposure, development and the delivery of photographs taken and the negatives and or digitial files." Can't I prove that she didn't take the "utmost" care because she didn't correct my pictures when I know she can because she demonstrated that by fixing the hand?
Now- to add to all this is the fact that I interviewed her and looked at her portfolio before hiring her and things seemed fine. I called a few days before the wedding to ask if there were going to be someone with her (to assit with all this) and she said yes. The day of the wedding there were two people but the person actually taking the pictures was this other woman ( I don't even know her name) whom I had never met, let alone reviewed her portfolio. I didn't say anything at the time because, well, it was my wedding and it was just a little hectic! On our contract it refers to the "photographer" not her company and at the bottom by "Photographers Signature" she signed her name - not the name of the real person who took our picutures. Does this make our contract invalid? Also in the contract, it states "It is understood that no other photgrapher, amateur or professional, shall be allowed to photograph at the wedding while the photographer is working......" Now, we had disposable cameras for our guest and I asked her about this and she said that it would be fine as long as they did not interfer - we did not get this in writing. Did she breach her own contract by having someone else photograph us?
I don't want my money back I just want my photos corrected. I am giving her an opportunity to correct them but am worried she won't deliever the quality I am expecting. Her contract states the negatives remain the property of the photographer....actually, there is a typo so it reads "negatives and/or digital files remain the property IF the photographer and they may be used for advertising...." Could I sue to get my money back plus the negatives so that I can pay someone else to develop them correctly?
I am sorry this is so long but there is a lot to explain.
I was married in May, last week I received my wedding picutures (almost 5 months after my wedding) and they were awful. I am not just being a "picky" bride - they are blurry and a few of them have images that are transparent (you can actually see through the heads).
Throughout the past 5 months the photographer kept putting us off - everytime I called to see if my pictures were ready she would give me some excuse and promise another date and then not deliever. I got my pictures on a Thursday, by 7:00 a.m. on Friday I called and left a harsh message informing her that I was not happy with my pictures, told her why and informed her that I would not be able to contact her again until Monday at 8:00 a.m. I called Monday and left a message - no response. I finally spoke with her on Tuesday and she claimed "she didn't know what I was talking about." she said she thought the pictures "were fine." I informed her of the transparent heads and she told me that they were transparent she had just used a "very soft focus."
I had been concerned when I got the proofs because they looked this way and called and asked her about it and she said she could fix them. To help her out I even composed a list of every picture I wanted fixed and what I wanted done to it. Some were minor changes like shiny foreheads yellowish faces from the lights) and some were major (like the blurriness and the transparent, almost double exposed effect). None of these changes got done and I did not make a copy of the list.
I work at a university and took them to the person that does photography for the campus newspaper and he said that she DID NOT use soft focus and that the transparent/double exposed look was most likely caused by too much flash exposure and an incorrect shutter speed. The blurriness he thought was caused by poor photography. He thought the transparent/double expos. could be fixed but that most likely the blurriness could not. While looking over the phots with him we notices on one particular picture (we ordered several in different sizes) she had corrected the double/expos of my husbands hand (not his back, profile or my profile) but did not on the other pictures. You can look at the 5X7 and his hand is blurry, on the 8X10 it is not. This leads me to believe that she knows she should have corrected it but just didn't care. Her contract states "The utmost care is taken with respect to the exposure, development and the delivery of photographs taken and the negatives and or digitial files." Can't I prove that she didn't take the "utmost" care because she didn't correct my pictures when I know she can because she demonstrated that by fixing the hand?
Now- to add to all this is the fact that I interviewed her and looked at her portfolio before hiring her and things seemed fine. I called a few days before the wedding to ask if there were going to be someone with her (to assit with all this) and she said yes. The day of the wedding there were two people but the person actually taking the pictures was this other woman ( I don't even know her name) whom I had never met, let alone reviewed her portfolio. I didn't say anything at the time because, well, it was my wedding and it was just a little hectic! On our contract it refers to the "photographer" not her company and at the bottom by "Photographers Signature" she signed her name - not the name of the real person who took our picutures. Does this make our contract invalid? Also in the contract, it states "It is understood that no other photgrapher, amateur or professional, shall be allowed to photograph at the wedding while the photographer is working......" Now, we had disposable cameras for our guest and I asked her about this and she said that it would be fine as long as they did not interfer - we did not get this in writing. Did she breach her own contract by having someone else photograph us?
I don't want my money back I just want my photos corrected. I am giving her an opportunity to correct them but am worried she won't deliever the quality I am expecting. Her contract states the negatives remain the property of the photographer....actually, there is a typo so it reads "negatives and/or digital files remain the property IF the photographer and they may be used for advertising...." Could I sue to get my money back plus the negatives so that I can pay someone else to develop them correctly?