Digital Photography School posted an article some time ago by Elizabeth Halford titled Should we ever sell raw, unedited images? The article compared the raw unedited images to food ingredients, and editing the photos (aka post-processing) is equivalent to using the food ingredients to cook a meal.
A more recent post on DIY Photography by Caleb Kerr provides similar arguments for not wanting to provide raw unedited photos.

I whole-heartedly agree with the argument that Elizabeth presents in that article, and would never provide raw unedited photos to a client, as the processing of the images is an important part of the photography process for myself as the photographer, and allows me to ensure the resulting photos look the way I want them to look.



Here are some examples of unedited photos (straight out of the camera) vs the edited version.
I've selected a variety of photos from the last few years - and many are from a mission trip to West Timor last year.

West Timor team photo

Elizabeth Quay Bridge

bonfire on Barate Beach, West Timor

evening at Barate Beach, West Timor

Milky Way over Lake Leschenaultia, Mundaring

bride

boat on the Keizersgracht, Amsterdam

bride and bridesmaids

machete girl

Kupang class

running to the beach, Kupang, West Timor

Elpida School students, teachers and the Wings To Work team at the beach, Kupang, West Timor

With some of the photos above, the edited result is quite different than the raw image. There are many ways each of those photos could be edited - the end result is what I was looking for when I was editing that particular photo.



There are companies that provide post-processing services, so you can out-source the post-processing of all your images, rather than doing it yourself.

Out-sourcing post-processing is something that I first encountered it when Jasmine Star mentioned quite some time ago that she uses The Photographer's Edit (more info in Jasmine's FAQs here and here), and I've since encountered several other photographers who also out-source their post-processing. Many photographers are against out-sourcing, while others happily do it, as evidenced by the various comments in discussion on flickr.com.

Note that I'm not referring to in-sourcing - ie, where a photographer employs someone in-house to edit photos. I'm referring to out-sourcing the editing to a third-party company via a commercial arrangement.

This is a little different from selling unedited images, out-sourcing the post-processing is still putting the task of processing and editing of the photos into someone else's hands. Out-sourcing post-processing is still somewhat more controlled than selling unedited images, because you are using a (hopefully) reputable company to do the post-processing, and would have done some research into the quality of their work before entrusting them with your unedited photos.

However, I don't like the idea of out-sourcing the post-processing of my photos, as it means I am delegating the responsibility of the processing to someone else, and losing control of that part of the creative process.



Do you or would you sell raw unedited photos to a client?

Would you be prepared to out-source the processing of your photos?
Have you had any experiences with out-sourcing the editing of your photos?