Over a decade ago, when I was just out of university, I had one of my first jobs as a designer and retoucher at a photo studio. It was a tiny place where [Boss] was the owner, photographer, QA, Art Director, Alpha, and Omega.
His main clientele were newlyweds, and when he got too bored or overwhelmed with the number of people wanting photoshoots and albums, he hired first a [Secretary], and then me, as a designer.
My job was to go through a few thousand photos per wedding, choose a few hundred good ones, retouch all of the people in those photos, select twenty to fifty of the best photos of the newlyweds, and design a wedding album with their best photos creatively combined into something decent with a general theme.
There were many oddities with my boss being an old, conservative, non-tech-savvy guy, though I will be telling only the last story. Just for a general idea of what kind of man he was, his favourite joke was to buy me and [Secretary] lunch which had lamb brains as the main ingredient. Because it wouldn’t hurt two girls to have more brains, of course.
It was another Monday after another wedding, after roughly nine months of me being unofficially employed there. I got the flash drive with approximately two-thousand photos.
Boss: “[Husband] specifically said that his mum needs to be beautiful in the photos. Go through all the photos and make her look young; she’s the old cow in the leopard print dress.”
I was already annoyed with his attitude, but what could I do? He was the boss. I opened the photos and quickly found the mum in question. She was a regular lady in her sixties who looked normal for her age.
Me: *To [Boss]* “Making her look young would make her a different person. I think the best approach would be to do the normal amount of retouching, with removing some of the wrinkles and skin imperfections, but not going too far or it would look unnatural. Let’s make her a happy old lady, not a blow-up doll.”
[Boss] was immediately annoyed, condescending and talking to me as if I was an idiot.
Boss: “Did you hear what I told you? I specifically said that [Husband] wants his dear mommy to look young. So, you will make her look not a day over forty-five and that is it, are we clear? Do you hear and understand me?”
I shrugged and went back to my PC to absolutely butcher that woman’s face to the point of next to no wrinkles, a thinner face, no skin pigmentation, and other atrocities. It took me twice as long to go through that wedding, since normally even the bride and groom don’t get THAT much editing. When I was done, the boss approved the set and told me to proceed with the wedding album, which was nothing special.
Fast forward two weeks, after the album and the CD of additional photos were delivered to the clients. An angry man stormed into the office, past me, and into the room where [Boss] was. After some muffled shouting, he left, and [Boss] came up to me.
Boss: “[Husband] was very unhappy with what you did to the photos of his mum.”
My thoughts were somewhere between “I told you so” and “No s***”, but I just nodded.
Next Monday was my payday. I was not officially employed (yes, super illegal, but it was extremely common back in that day back in that area for people of my age), so I was receiving my salary in cash. I got my money, and I was $50 short. I shrugged it off, since sometimes [Boss] didn’t have enough cash and paid what he had on hand, to add the remaining amount the next day.
Tuesday came and went, and on Wednesday, I went to ask him when I was going to get the rest of my paycheck. It was not an insignificant amount for me.
Boss: “You are not getting more; you don’t deserve it. You mangled that poor lady in all the photos, I had to refund him for the retouching and give him unedited photos. You have ruined their wedding!”
I silently went back to my PC, unplugged the mouse and headphones that I brought from home, and walked out, my only two words to him being “I quit”. He followed me, trying to shame me.
Boss: “People don’t just leave like this! You have a job to do! There’s an unfinished pack of photos to retouch… You have responsibilities! Decent people don’t do this. And what about two weeks’ notice?!”
Well, I was never employed there, so there was literally no way he could make me do anything else.
A month later, I was in a different city, studying in a different industry, with an entry salary three times higher than my previous one. I never heard a word about that guy and his business again. Good timing, good riddance!
