This story has been bugging me for a bit because it’s being told by people who have no clue what they’re talking about. They’re not in this specific part of the industry and they have these hot takes that are wildly uninformed.
First, this update is not for you. This is almost exclusively firmware designed for volume school portrait studios e.g. Lifetouch. $150 to update a camera is nothing compared to the time in post that custom gridlines will save. I would even wager Sony was directly asked by these companies to do this and they were like “okay but we’re going to charge you.”
So, you have to understand how school portrait software works. You go to a school, shoot 500 something kids against a green screen, good to go, right? No. At some point you throw those photos into cropping software (usually provided by your lab) to get all the heads in the right spot and the right size. And the cropping software has these little ovals where you’re supposed to put the head and lines for the shoulders. Cool, right? Well it’s a ton of work if your photos are all different, someone has to go in and adjust that after the fact. And yeah, the existing grids can more or less get you there, but with custom grids you’re certain when you take the shot. They’re also helpful in this specific industry because the people taking these photos aren’t usually good at photography, so you can’t really trust their eye anyway. Certainly not across hundreds of different people. I’ve been shooting for nearly 20 years and I don’t think I could even be that consistent.
Anyways, how did we used to solve this problem? Viewfinder masking!
So this company would hook you up with an updated camera (like on your 5D or more likely a Rebel, in this type of photography) that had a custom grid line that was exactly what you needed it to be. And it cost something like $200.
So sony’s solution is a) cheaper and b) more flexible than what the industry has been doing for the last 30 years. The exact opposite of what most people are complaining about.
This story has been bugging me for a bit because it’s being told by people who have no clue what they’re talking about. They’re not in this specific part of the industry and they have these hot takes that are wildly uninformed.
First, this update is not for you. This is almost exclusively firmware designed for volume school portrait studios e.g. Lifetouch. $150 to update a camera is nothing compared to the time in post that custom gridlines will save. I would even wager Sony was directly asked by these companies to do this and they were like “okay but we’re going to charge you.”
So, you have to understand how school portrait software works. You go to a school, shoot 500 something kids against a green screen, good to go, right? No. At some point you throw those photos into cropping software (usually provided by your lab) to get all the heads in the right spot and the right size. And the cropping software has these little ovals where you’re supposed to put the head and lines for the shoulders. Cool, right? Well it’s a ton of work if your photos are all different, someone has to go in and adjust that after the fact. And yeah, the existing grids can more or less get you there, but with custom grids you’re certain when you take the shot. They’re also helpful in this specific industry because the people taking these photos aren’t usually good at photography, so you can’t really trust their eye anyway. Certainly not across hundreds of different people. I’ve been shooting for nearly 20 years and I don’t think I could even be that consistent.
Anyways, how did we used to solve this problem? Viewfinder masking!
www.viewfindermasks.com
So this company would hook you up with an updated camera (like on your 5D or more likely a Rebel, in this type of photography) that had a custom grid line that was exactly what you needed it to be. And it cost something like $200.
So sony’s solution is a) cheaper and b) more flexible than what the industry has been doing for the last 30 years. The exact opposite of what most people are complaining about.