Culling a wedding: how to get from 3,000 RAWs to a delivery set

The slowest part of a wedding job usually is not the editing. It is the first pass over three thousand near-identical frames, deciding which ones deserve attention.

Score first, decide second

PhotoQA pre-screens a RAW album and flags the keepers, so the first time you open the set it is already ordered by how usable each frame is. You are reviewing a shortlist instead of building one.

Tag as you go

PhotoFlow gives every photo one of five tags. Tagging during the first pass means the retouch list assembles itself, rather than being reconstructed later from memory.

Let the album state carry the status

An album moves through eleven defined states from import to delivery. Anyone who opens it can see where it stands without asking, which is what removes the daily round of status messages.