Here is a little about us!
We are a digital studio with over fifteen years expiernce in photo retouching for both web and print. We love what we do and it shows! While our original group started out in San Francisco we
have grown and have multiple locations across the United States.

Here is a little about our fearless leasders:

Tracy Hassman
Founder and Chief Pixel Pusher

"I am so lucky to have worked with an amazing variety of photographers, art directors, design firms and everyday people who are all looking to produce great work"

Nia Kellogg
Partner and Pixel Pusher

So who have we worked with?
Well, we don't like to reveal all of our secrets, after all the idea is that you can't tell that it's retouched right? However here is small list of folks who we enjoy working with everytime we get the call.
Sanbox Studio, Gap, ProFlowers, Old Navy, RedEnvelope, Restoration Hardware, Piperlime, Rob Broadman Photography, Cherry Moon Farms, Procter and Gamble, Banana Republic, Anderson Image Works, Athleta, Personal Creations, Michael Markam Syling, San Francisco Giants, Johnson & Johnson, G.E. Aircraft, Sheri's Berries, Michelle Jackson Styling, The Sak, The North Face, Johnstson and Murphy, Williams-Sonoma, e-luxury and Macy's

Interested in the History of Retouching?
What is Photo Retouching?
Photo manipulation is the application of image editing techniques to photographs in order to create an illusion, enhancement or correction, through analog or digital means.

In digital editing, photographs are usually taken with a digital camera and input directly into a computer. Transparencies, negatives or printed photographs may also be digitized using a scanner, or images could be re-photographed with a very high res camera eliminating moiré issues. With the advent of computers, graphics tablets and digital cameras, the term image editing encompasses everything that can be done to a photo, whether on a computer, or done in a darkroom. Photo manipulation is often much more explicit than subtle alterations to color balance or contrast and may involve overlaying a head onto a different body or changing a sign’s text, for example. Image editing software can be used to apply effects and warp an image until the desired result is achieved. The resulting image may have little or no resemblance to the photo (or photos in the case of compositing) from which it originated. Today, photo manipulation is widely accepted as an art-form.

Technical vs. Creative, what's the difference?
Technical retouching
Manipulation for photo restoration or enhancement: color balance, contrast, sharpness, removing elements or visible flaws on skin or materials etc.

Creative retouching
Used as an art form or for commercial use to create more sleek and interesting creative images for advertisements. Creative retouching could be manipulation for fashion, beauty or advertising photography such as pack-shots. One of the most prominent disciplines in creative retouching is image-compositing. Here, the digital artist uses multiple photos to create a single composited image. Today, 3D elements are used more and more to add extra elements or even locations and backgrounds. This kind of image composition is widely used when conventional photography would be technically too difficult, too expensive or impossible to shoot on location or in studio.

Darkroom
Long before images were edited on computers despite the popularity of digital photo manipulated in the computer the darkroom was the place to make changes. Darkroom manipulations are regarded as traditional art rather than job related skill. Techniques are very similar to digital retouching, but they are harder, take longer and are usually not as effective as the ones that are created digitally.

Historical ways of getting the job done.
Before the computers, photo manipulation was achieved by retouching with ink, paint, double-exposure, piecing photos or negatives together in the darkroom, or scratching Polaroids. Airbrushing was also a poplar means of getting the job done. The first recorded case of photo manipulation was in the early 1860s, when a photo of Abraham Lincoln was altered using the body from a portrait of John C. Calhoun and the head of Lincoln from a famous seated portrait by Mathew Brady– the image that was used can be found on the original five dollar bill.

The 1980s saw the advent of digital retouching with Quantel computers running Paintbox, and Scitex imaging workstations being used professionally. Silicon Graphics computers running Barco Creator became available in the late 1980s which, alongside other contemporary packages, were effectively replaced in the market by Adobe Photoshop.

Today almost all photo retouching and restoration is completed by utilizing Adobe Photoshop, however it is still as much art as technology and the best retouchers are artists.

thanks to wikipedia for this great description!
www.wikipedia.com

All photo retouching ©RadPixel 2011, All rights resevered. Shots taken by various photographers both professional and amature, all rights resevered.
Unless pre-authorized in writing, all images before and after, any resale, distribution, public display, use or dupliction is a violation of all applicable laws and subject to prosecution.