Studio Policy

Welcome to Uniquely Yours Photography!!

Each one of our clients is very valuable to us. And because we also value each photography experience with our clients, we strictly enforce the following studio policies. We believe following these policies also helps us create as wonderful and easy a session as is possible. Out of fairness to both our clients and ourselves, we consistently enforce the following studio policies for all sessions.

Studio Hours & Appointments

Studio Office Hours:

Our studio hours are from Monday through Friday from 9 am to 4 pm. Because we take appointments before, during and after our office hours, as well as on weekends, we may not be available when you try to contact us. If you’re not able to reach me personally, please leave a message and I will reply by the next business day.

Our sessions are by appointment only, as I want to give each client my full attention.

Weekend sessions are available upon request.

Uniquely Yours Photography reserves the right to refuse service to anyone at any time, due to our frequent heavy workload. Nonetheless, we will make all efforts to accommodate customers and their own schedules.

Creative Fee

The creative fee includes the photographer’s time and talent, phone, studio expenses, skype or in-house consultations to help plan your session, the photoshoot, retouching, and ordering sessions. It does not include any finished portraits, products, and the rights thereto. We do not require a minimum purchase; we only want you to buy what you like. Due to that reason, your session fee is non-refundable. Besides our regular portrait sessions, we may offer other seasonal or special sessions that may not require a session fee due to the greater simplicity of the specific session. Please see our pricing information for specifics on this, as they change with the chosen session.

Retainer, Cancellation, and Rescheduling

We require a $350 non-refundable creative fee to book your session date and time, if you must cancel, we allow a one-time rescheduling of your shoot to take place within 90 days of your original session date. Therefore we require two weeks’ notice.

If you need to reschedule your session due to sickness, injury, or a scheduling conflict, please contact us at 504.236.5972 or via email prior to your session and the $350 creative fee will move with the session. We understand that sometimes “life happens” and we get sick or other unexpected events pop up at the most inconvenient of times. No need to worry, just give us a call and we will gladly reschedule your session at our earliest available date.

However, if you cancel your appointment within 48 hours of your appointment time we reserve the right to assess the situation and you may lose your retainer. In the event of a no call/no show, your will indefinitely lose your $350 creative fee. Please understand, during our busiest season, we may not be able to reschedule for a long period of time. You will have to wait until our next opening in our schedule.

Respectfully, we also reserve the right to reschedule a session due to our own illness, emergency, death in the family, inclement weather, and other unforeseen events beyond our control. We will be sure to inform you of any such occurrences as soon as possible and will be sure to reschedule your session at the earliest date available.

Session

Since we want to give each client our full attention as well as their full amount of time, we ask that you please be on time. Although we love our clients to be early we recommend that you do not arrive more than 15 minutes prior to your appointment unless previously discussed with me.

If you are running late, please call, text or email us immediately. Keep in mind that your shoot time will be reduced if you arrive late, and, depending on the HMU Artists availability, we may need to reschedule you if you are more than 30 minutes late. An additional retainer payment of $150 may be required to reschedule. Keep in mind that weekend and evening sessions are in high demand and although we will go to great lengths to meet your scheduling needs, these sessions book well in advance.

Please bring only the subjects to be photographed to the session as well as a parent/guardian over 21 years old. This is especially important with kids, as we will need their full attention on the shoot rather than looking at other members of the family. Of course, parents are always welcome!

The client shall be responsible for controlling all subjects being photographed and entering the studio. It is the responsibility of the client to ensure the cooperation of all subjects. Please be aware that there is much valuable equipment and props in the studio, and that children (and other guests) are prohibited from damaging or destroying same. We understand accidents happen, but we may hold you financially responsible in certain situations, at our sole discretion.

Other than willful misconduct, Uniquely Yours Photography shall be held harmless for any and all injury to the client and the client’s property during the course of any of the sessions and their surrounding events, pre and post the scheduled session.

Uniquely Yours Photography retains creative control of the session. This control includes, but is not limited to, posing, the adjustment of hair, makeup, jewelry, clothing, and clothing straps.

Please understand that consumption of alcohol or drugs prior to and/or during the session may negatively impact the results of the images.

View & Order Session

During the in-studio viewing & ordering session, we will present the best images from your shoot.

You can then choose which images you’d like to purchase and place your order. We have a variety of beautiful products and ways for you to enjoy and share your images. We will guide you through the process and help with any questions and make suggestions for displaying your portraits.

Uniquely Yours Photography does not do proofs or online viewings including, but not limited to, all forms of portraits. However, we do offer skype viewing & ordering session, if you live further away and are unable to come to the studio.

A single view and order session in-studio will be scheduled for viewing and ordering your photographs. The purpose of the view-and-order session is to make your purchasing decision. Thus it’s important to bring all the people involved in the decision.

Though we digitally archive much of our best work product, Uniquely Yours Photography is not required to hold or keep your images for any amount of time. You must place an order or we reserve the right to delete your photos and keep your retainer.

While we capture many images during your session, you will see only those images selected by the photographer, for previewing. We carefully render each image to ensure maximum artistry and technical perfection. Images with eyes closed; heads turned, duplicates, etc. will not be shown and are removed from the archives permanently after the artist rendering is complete.

Additional (i.e., subsequent) View & Order Sessions can be made for $50 each. Please keep in mind we cannot guarantee a time close to your original appointment.

Orders

All orders should be placed within 60 days of the session and must have been paid in full. No part of any order will leave the studio until the entire order is paid in full.

We make every effort to ensure complete satisfaction, because of the uniqueness of custom portraiture and products, all sales are final.

Depending on your products, please allow 2-6 weeks for your order to be complete.

The client should place orders with sufficient time to allow for normal delays and notify Uniquely Yours Photography at the time of the order if there are any extenuating circumstances requiring a quicker turnaround. An expedited fee may be applied to expedited product requests, as charged by third-party manufacturing laboratories. Uniquely Yours Photography shall not be held responsible for delivery delays due to the fault of manufacturing and/or delivery services (e.g. FedEx, UPS).

We will call or email you when your order is ready for pick-up. Orders not picked up within 60 days of notification are subject to a $20 storage fee/month.

Defects in workmanship will be promptly corrected.

Prices are subject to change at any time without notice.

After receiving your final order, you will have 7 days to let us know if you are unhappy for any reason with your order or products. After those 7 days, we assume your products are perfect and you are loving them, and we will not replace any products for any reason. Uniquely Yours Photography will not offer refunds or rebates for any reason. We will, however, be happy to reprint your order if something is wrong with it on our end and you notify us within the 7 days.

Payments

We accept cash, personal check, or credit card (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, or Discover). Louisiana Sales Tax (9.2%) will be added to all appropriate sales.

A $30 administrative fee will be added to orders where a check doesn’t clear. If you have had a returned check we have the right to require cash only for payment or not release any product until we can confirm the check has cleared.

If for any reason you cannot pay 100% of your order you will be required to sign a payment plan agreement.

Absolutely no images will be released or put on social media until the entire order is paid in full.

Payment plan

We are very happy to offer a payment plan to those who want it. The client must sign the agreement and put a credit card on file. Your balance will be split up into 8 payments. The first of the payments will be made when signing the payment plan. Then the remaining 7 payments will be made bi-weekly on the same day of the week, lasting over a period of 14 weeks. Absolutely no product will be taken out of the studio until the entire order is paid in full. At the end of the 14 weeks, the products must be paid in full, if for some reason they are not, Uniquely Yours Photography will be forced to take legal action.

Archiving Images

Images that are purchased from us are archived for your future purchase or for reprints for a minimum of 24 months from the date of your view and order session. Images that are NOT purchased are kept only for 12 months from the date or your view and order session. After this 12 month period, your non-ordered images will be deleted and no longer available.

While we try our hardest to back up your images and keep them in a safe place the problem with digital media and technological equipment is, that anything can happen. If Uniquely Yours Photography is unable to deliver photographic materials due to technological malfunctions, including but not limited to the equipment operation and image processing, or photographic materials/digital images are otherwise lost or damaged without our fault, liability shall be limited to a rescheduled session and production of finished work product at no additional cost.

The Copyright Act protects photographers by giving them, the artist, exclusive rights to reproduce your photographs.

Uniquely Yours Photography retains copyright ownership to all media created during the session, including but not limited to all images in their original and processed formats. It is illegal to copy, scan, print, or reproduce photographs or digital images without a paid print release. Any duplication or alteration of original images is strictly prohibited {Copyright Law Title 17, Appendix V. Additional Provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act 2005, Section 102} without the written permission of the Photographer. Alterations include, but are not limited to, application of filters, cropping, or modifications of any kind.

Violations include, but are not limited to, making illegal copies, scanning, printing from home or downloading from our website or social media. It is illegal to copy or reproduce these photographs in any manner without our permission and violators of this Federal Law will be subject to its civil and criminal penalties. Please understand, the photographer wishes to maintain complete control over the print quality, finishes and presentation of the images and any reproduction outside of the studio may lower the quality of the image and scar our reputation for providing superior portraits. By doing so, you are devaluing my work as an artist. Fines will start at $50.000 for copyright infringement.

Social Media

Clients may share web/blog post links and social media albums through use of the share functions and dissemination of direct links, but shall not copy, download, screenshot or capture unpaid photographs in any other fashion.

If clients post or share their purchased images on social media, they shall identify Uniquely Yours Photography in the caption of all photographs uploaded to social media websites and profiles, as this properly documents the photographer’s work product.

Personal camera and phone

We do NOT allow the use of any outside cameras, phones, and video cameras, for taking either photos or videos during the session as well as during the view and order session.

Uniquely Yours Photography is committed to your privacy. Information collected from clients in person, over the phone, in emails or through our website is strictly confidential. We will not sell or exchange names or any other personally identifiable information about our clients with third parties, and work to ensure your personal information is secure at all times. We fully understand that some clients want to remain anonymous due to their job or personal life.

Model Release

All clients of Uniquely Yours Photography are required to sign an industry-standard model release before the session will start. We cannot photograph anyone who does not sign the model release form. For children under 18 years of age, a legal guardian must sign.

Independent Contractor

We offer hair and makeup to our clients, either build in your session fee or for an extra charge. We have a HMU artist who comes to the studio prior to your session to do this. Uniquely Yours Photography is not liable for any application or services by this HMU artist. This includes, but is not limited to, allergies as a result of the use of the products by the independent contractor. It is the client’s responsibility to convey all allergies to the HMU artist.

The client is also responsible for telling us or the HMU artist if they are unhappy with their hair or makeup PRIOR to taking photos. We will not be responsible if the client doesn’t like their hair or makeup for any reason. No refunds or re-takes will be made. If the client is unhappy with their hair or makeup and expresses that to the HMU artist and/or us, we will do everything in our power to change it so they do like it, within a reasonable time. If that is unable to happen we will have to reschedule the photo and HMU session, at the additional cost of the client. No refunds will be given if the client is unhappy with their hair and/or makeup.

Contact me

Click on the contact tab to send me an email or call 504.236.5972 if you have any further questions or would like to book a session with me.