Creases out, weave and drape kept. The whole skill is telling the difference between a fold that happened on the way to the set and the texture a customer is paying to see — and most cheap retouching cannot.
| Comes out | Stays |
|---|---|
| Packaging and shipping fold lines | The weave — rib, twill, jersey, knit structure |
| Styling creases from handling on set | Drape, and the way the cloth actually falls |
| Pin, clip and tape marks, and their shadows | Intentional pleats, gathers and construction detail |
| Foam, wire and padding showing through | Seam lines, topstitching and hems |
| Creases that only appear under studio light | The texture that tells a buyer what the material is |
Done with dodge and burn and local tonal correction, not blur and not a smoothing filter — which is why it holds up when a customer zooms in on the product page.
Post-production is cheaper than a reshoot. It is not cheaper than a steamer, and a well-prepared garment photographs better than a rescued one.
Retouching earns its place on what steaming cannot fix: fold lines set into the fabric, pins and clips holding a shape, creases that only show under studio light, and the frames you cannot reshoot because the sample has already gone back to the supplier. If a studio tells you post can replace garment prep, they are selling you hours rather than solving your problem.
Usually quoted inside the service rather than as a line of its own. Rates published in full, and they fall as monthly volume rises.
A smoothing action takes out the wrinkle and the weave in one move. The result reads as a drawing of a garment rather than a photograph of one, and on a category page it is obvious the moment it sits beside a frame done properly.
It is a method problem rather than a skill problem, which is why it repeats on every frame once a supplier has chosen that method. Check it the same way every time: open the hardest fabric in the batch at 100% and look for the weave. If it is gone, the wrinkles were not removed — the fabric was. The four checks to run on any supplier.
By hand, frame by frame, separating two things that look alike. Packaging folds, styling creases, pin marks and tape shadows come out; weave, texture and drape stay. Done with dodge and burn and local tonal correction rather than blur, which is why it survives being zoomed into.
Because a blur removes the crease and the weave together. The garment reads as a drawing rather than a photograph. It is a method problem, not a skill problem, so it repeats on every frame.
Steam first, always. Post is cheaper than a reshoot but not cheaper than a steamer. Retouching earns its place on fold lines set into the fabric, pins holding a shape, and frames you cannot reshoot because the sample has gone back.
Yes, and those are the frames worth sending in a test. On satin a crease is a highlight, on knit it is a shadow between stitches, on a print the repeat has to stay aligned. Each needs a different approach.
No. Hand-retouched frame by frame, never run through generative tools, never used as training data, and we sign your DPA saying so.
Usually quoted inside the apparel, flat lay or ghost mannequin rate rather than separately, and the rate falls as monthly volume rises. The full table is published.
Free, on your own files, no call first. Send the satin and the heavy knit rather than the cotton tee — the easy frames prove nothing. For catalogues at 500 images a month or more.