Sepia-Gate: How is this the World We Live In?

My thoughts on Sepia-Gate…

First, let’s talk about what Sepia-Gate wedding photography controversy is. Keep in mind, I don’t really dive deep into photography articles or pay much attention to the latest drama, so this might be just a snippet or a complete misinterpretation of the situation. I’ve caught a few TikTok’s on the topic and skimmed at least one article… So, consider this like a movie review from someone who’s only watched the trailer but has heard whisperings of the characters and the plot. That’s what you’re getting here.

So, Sepia-Gate, as it’s being called, is all about a dissatisfied client who didn’t like the editing style of the photographer they hired for their wedding. I’m not linking names, companies, or accounts here (primarily because I don’t know them)… If you want the juicy details, just search “Sepia-Gate wedding photography controversy” and you’ll find it.

Here’s the deal: this client, for the purposes of this article, we’ll call her -Karen, hired a photographer known for a warm orange editing style—something that’s apparent and plastered all over her portfolio and website. I call this the “Mars edit” because it makes everything look orange and warm, with black trees and faint hints of other colors. This style can be decent when done right and can look pretty good in a lot of ways for a lot of photos.

Personally, I loathe it. Even more so when using it for wedding photos.

Let me explain why I feel this way you haters…

The edit itself might look fine, but the colors are far from true to life. The colors carefully chosen by the bride and groom are now just a warm, orange mess. Greens are completely gone, blue suits are barely blue, and the skin tones look incredibly, overwhelmingly warm. Even the most pale person at a wedding looks like they just spent the last month on a nude beach in Hawaii. 

Like I said, sometimes this editing style looks great, but in my humble opinion, this is a disservice to wedding photos which are supposed to be timeless in their style (meaning, stand the test of time and trends). This is a trend I fear couples will regret when looking back at their wedding photos years down the line. They’ll have to explain to their kids and grandkids that everything was really orange back in the day and real colors hadn’t been invented yet in 2024.

Some people love this style, and that’s fine. I love creative edits too… just not for wedding photos. I know, I’m old AF and need to get hip, or fetch, or savvy… Or whatever the kids are saying these days.

Think about this: You can always take a true-to-life edit and apply a preset to make it orange/warm, moody, or vintage, but you can’t take an orange-edited photo and bring back the natural colors in editing (unless you have the RAW files… More on that later). This is why I believe in timeless edits that are true to what the event actually looked like and then experimenting with your favorites for Instagram and moody filters to make you look cooler.

But I digress…

So, the client hires this orange-loving photographer, fully aware of her editing style. The photographer shoots the wedding and delivers the photos in her signature orange moody style, just as it is clearly shown on her website. The client loves the photos… at first. Then, after talking to some friends who have a bit more sense than Karen, she decides she doesn’t like the photos and prefers a more natural, true-to-life edit (aka green trees and blue suits).

The client reaches out to the photographer and asks for new edits… This is where things get messy. The client demands new edits, the photographer refuses… back and forth, back and forth. The client threatens to complain online and then does just that. She asks for the RAW files to edit herself, and the photographer later agrees but charges thousands of dollars for the RAW files. More fighting, more TikTok’s, more anger… and thus, Sepia-Gate was born.

Ultimately, I think the photographer handed over some or all of the RAW files but charged her a bunch and didn’t apologize for her editing style, which is again, clearly displayed on her website. Karen wants everything redone for free or all of the RAW files for free, and now they both have social media posts explaining their sides and bickering back and forth. The whole photography world is now arguing over who’s right and who’s wrong, and discussing the internal ethics of giving out RAW files to clients, which IMO, is just old-school nonsense… but more on that pile of BS later in this rant.

The reason I’m writing this is twofold: one, to ride the algorithmic wave of Sepia-Gate wedding photography controversy since it’s relevant to my industry and as an experienced leader in the industry I do have an opinion on the things happening around me. Two, to offer my one cent on this situation. Yes, it’s usually “offer my two cents,” but I haven’t fully researched the topic, so this is just my one cent because that’s how the math works.

So, who’s wrong in this situation?

In my weathered opinion, the client is mostly wrong, and the photographer is partly wrong.

The client is wrong because she hired the orange photographer to produce orange photos, then changed her mind and demanded a different style when she received orange photos. That’s a no. Either get used to liking orange or move on. You don’t get to publicly shame the photographer for doing the job she was hired to do and in the style she clearly offers consistently. That’s unjustly damaging her business when she did exactly what she was hired to do. It’s unkind and probably breaches the contract in several ways if there’s an arbitration clause. You don’t get to publicly bash a company because you changed what you wanted AFTER it was done and delivered.

Now, with that said, the photographer is also partly wrong. She could have very easily ended it in the beginning by giving Karen the RAW files (or selling them at a reasonable price) and letting her fade away into the abyss. Simply explain that she (the photographer) performed the task she was hired to do and apologize for the client not being satisfied with the final results which are 100% representative of the work she was hired to do. Further explain that she does not normally sell or release her RAW files but as a compromise for the satisfaction and request of the client she will offer her a download of the RAW files at a fair price for the time investment of delivering those RAW files. 

Re-edits of wedding photos should be for minor adjustments like cleaning up the background or maybe a head swap if someone blinked. Re-edits are not supposed to be for completely changing the editing style on the full set of photos unless the client pays a substantial price. You cannot “request” what is essentially doubling the workload without paying a price that justifies that level of additional work. Sorry Karen. 

The tricky part of this is because I don’t fully understand the extent of Karen’s social media attacks or the reach of her posts and why this became such a big issue in the first place. Some situations require ignoring it and letting it settle and disappear, while others need a firmer and more direct approach. As a business owner who built a successful business from the ground up, I would fight tooth and nail to protect and defend it. I operate with integrity and a strong work ethic, so I’ll do whatever is necessary to protect my reputation online and off. It’s hard fucking work to build a successful business and put in the daily grind starting with little to no money with crazy long hours… So when a Karen comes along and shits on your hard work in an unjustified tantrum it’s really easy to over-react and make the situation even worse. Most times we entrepreneurs don’t publicly contradict or engage in this type of dumb shit, we simply don’t have time to waste on pointless conversations that are going nowhere positive.  Now with that said, backing an entrepreneur into a corner and forcing them to respond to your shenanigans is generally a bad idea. We’re not normal at all and this is our chance to prove it… If it’s burning down we’ll strap on our most flammable suit and run into the flames with a gasoline camelback. We’ve built once and can build again so if forced in the fire we dance. 

Okay okay, back to the Sepia-Gate wedding photography controversy story…

The client asked the photographer for all the RAW files so she could edit them herself and promised to remove all social media posts if she got them. The photographer agreed but set a high price for the RAW files—around $4000 or so.

This price added fuel to the fire, and the social media posts went into overdrive, describing the photos as hostages and having a ransom demand. Don’t quote me on this as it’s probably way off and none of this was said or happened.

So again, IN MY OPINION, I would have given the client the RAW files (probably for free) just to end the stupid situation. I don’t have time to fight with people or respond to complaints when the solution is as simple as dragging a folder from your computer into Dropbox folder and sharing it with an email address.

This is where the industry is broken and torn… Why are you hoarding RAW files and charging absurd amounts for them? I don’t get it, and it’s ridiculous not to give clients access to the RAW files for a reasonable price based on your time and effort for delivery of those RAW files.

Alright, enough about Sepia-Gate… They’re mad at each other and fighting on TikTok. Orange edits are bad unless you like them, then they’re good… do whatever you want. Just stop treating businesses like they don’t matter and didn’t work really fucking hard to get to where they are and publicly damaging them because you simply didn’t get your way, Karen. There’s only one Burger King, and this isn’t it. Take your photos and move on!

Now, let’s start a debate about delivering RAW files to clients.

To be clear from the beginning if it is not already obvious… This IS something we offer at Epoch Moment. If a client wants the RAW files from their wedding, we charge a very reasonable rate of $249 for our time in uploading files to Dropbox and sending the client the files. We believe clients have a right to them if they can use them and know how to open and edit them.

This is how we do business, and we are not concerned with what the photography world thinks of us delivering RAW files or about us as a whole.

So, why do some photographers never send client RAW files? 

From what I found online… It’s because they’re assholes. Kidding… Most feel it’s an injustice to their services by delivering only half of what they were hired to do.

Others believe giving clients the RAW files allows the clients to fully edit the photos in whatever style they want, misrepresenting the original photographer. They think this damages their reputation. Which, yes, if the cliented edited photos and tagged or linked the photographer and the edits were bad, then yes, that would affect the integrity of the photographer’s work – maybe. 

One person I saw somewhere online said it’s like ordering a pizza and receiving raw ingredients and uncut vegetables instead of a fully cooked pizza. True, a RAW file is half done, and editing adds the other half. In fact, a lot of the magic of photography happens during the edit, and editing can make an ordinary photo look great while poor editing can have the opposite effect.

Here’s the deal… One, you should still edit the photos in your style and then give the RAW files if they want them. That’s what they paid for in the first place. So, now they get a fully cooked pizza PLUS all the ingredients to make their own pizza if they want, for a reasonable price. What’s wrong with that? You get paid to do a job and deliver on that job, why withhold the RAW files if a client aunts them?

If you do offer RAw files, why should it be a reasonable price and not thousands of dollars? Because they’re humans, and as humans, we should be nice to each other and not take advantage of a situation where we are the only one in possession of these items. For those who charge exorbitant amounts for delivering RAW files when all you do is drag and drop a folder into Dropbox, you’re a fucking jerk.

Transferring files from your computer to Dropbox or Drive doesn’t take much effort on your part or even on the computer’s part. You can upload overnight or while editing more orange photos (if that’s your style). It’s nothing for you to upload and deliver these files that will most likely never see the light of day again or will get deleted eventually. Charging far more than your time is worth is absurd and rude, and I hope you eat spiders while you sleep. This price gouging and overpricing is a core problem in the wedding industry and one of the main reasons this industry is broken… There is no place for excessive greed in the wedding industry. 

Another argument is that clients don’t know how to open these files or have the software to work with them. Partly true, as RAW files are very large and require specific programs to open and edit. A normal wedding can be 250GB to 400+GB depending on gear and the number of photos… so clients will need to invest in storage. Plus they are unique files and do require certain software to view them, open them, or edit them. 

But here’s the thing… It’s none of your business what clients will do with them or how. They’ll figure it out using Google or ChatGPT and find a way to edit the files or pay $10/month for Lightroom and Photoshop. They might even let a friend edit them or hire someone on Fiverr or Upwork (another old-school thinking photographer no-no). Photographers act like they use magic and potions to edit photos and they’re the only magicians. They could upload everything to an AI, convert to DNG or JPEG, and edit or have the AI edit everything. It’s not hard, nor is it rocket science… nor is editing a sacred mysterious ritual that only you can do. Get over yourself and let your client have the RAW files from THEIR wedding and do what they want with them if they want them.

We’re close in this world of AI to being able to upload RAW files to anAI, which will cull, edit, make albums, order prints, and post on social media with minimal human interaction. Being close to that reality is another reason why clients should have access to all the RAW files (Photo and video files). Imagine in a few years being able to upload all of your wedding photos and wedding footage into an AI and having it spit out amazing moments and clips of the wedding day with perfect editing in any style within minutes. Anyways… AI is an entirely different subject. 

Maybe teach them how to work with RAW files and help them instead of treating them like idiots who can’t comprehend the mysterious wild world of editing or could not possibly have the computer storage you have (said with sarcasm).

Think about it… what will you do with the RAW files from past weddings? Delete them? Never use them again? Store them forever? Why not give the clients who ask the RAW files? It does not make sense to simply say, “professional photographers don’t give out their RAW files,” and then turn and walk away only to delete those same files. 

You’re missing out on an income stream and a chance to be the coolest photographer around. Just sayin’… It’s not going to hurt your business. Let go of the hoarding magical past and join us in the free world where we care about clients and the once-in-a-lifetime memories we capture for them on their wedding day.

Comment below if you don’t agree and let’s talk about it. 

I think the main reason photographers don’t give out their RAW files is because they don’t want clients to see how many shots missed focus, or have messed up settings, or were poorly composed… they’re embarrassed because they think other photographers get it right every time. Not true… Generally speaking, we all mess up a lot and not every shot is perfect. It’s normal, especially at a wedding, to have many duplicate or missed shots, many missed shots, and settings are off sometimes… Weddings are chaotic, and it’s amazing in itself that we get the shots we do half the time.

Look, don’t be shy or embarrassed. It’s okay to be human and acknowledge your mistakes. Photography isn’t a magical realm where everything works out perfectly all the time, and that’s okay. We are all fallible in nature and no one is expecting perfection. 

Anyways… I’m done ranting about Sepia-Gate and delivering RAW files. I’ve been in this mode because the theme of the August issue of Engaged AF Magazine is all about how the wedding industry is broken, so these thoughts are bouncing around in my head with nowhere to go.

Forget everything you’ve just read and carry on with life, head toward your happy place without a care in the world, not worrying about RAW files and orange people surrounded by black trees. Have a good day! See you in the comments!