boudoir clients will be more critical of their body than the older client. So,
a price schedule of enhancements is very important.
the Mature Woman. Retouching and Light Face-Lifts on
After a light retouching of the mature woman’s portraits, we show her our
slide show. We then tell her what we can really do. It is very important to
go over all of the images and point out specific digital enhancements that
she would want. I always ask, “Okay, how many years do you want us to
take off?” She’ll laugh and say, “Give me the works.” At that time, we’ll
print proof sheets and mark the images with exactly what retouching she
wants. A full digital face-lift costs $75.00 extra. I sell these face-lifts by ex-
plaining how much time it takes to properly retouch and image. I also ex-
plain that this is a one-time fee. If she wants reprints of an image we’ve
already retouched, there are no additional retouching fees. If she still ob-
jects, show her a completely retouched image of herself and compare that
to the original file.
Tactful Enhancements and Reductions.
My average client for boudoir is around thirty-five to forty-five years of
age. Most of these women will want to “hide” parts of their body. The
parts that she wants to hide may very well be her significant other’s fa-
vorite parts, so address this when you meet with her. Ask her what her
needs are, what her fears are, and what her spouse/boyfriend likes best
about her figure. At this point in her life, she wants something that will be
remembered forever.
Left—Here is a portrait that has not
been digitally enhanced. I obviously
would not want to present this image to
my client without doing some retouch-
ing.Right—Here is the final image as
presented to the client. My digital artists
used a combination of Photoshop edit-
ing tools (healing brush, liquify, patch
tool, color brush, burn and dodge tools,
and more) as well as the Nik Software
Inc.’s Color Efex Pro 2.0 software to cre-
ate this finished image.