How Many Revision Rounds Should a Photo Contract Include?

Start with two included rounds, and say why

Two rounds is a sensible default because it matches how feedback actually behaves. The first round catches what the client sees on first viewing: the wrong expression, the crop, the colour they hate. The second catches what the first round's fixes revealed, or what a second stakeholder noticed. A third round usually means something upstream is wrong: unclear brief, a late-arriving decision-maker, or taste being discovered by trial and error at your expense.

That is a judgement, not a statistic. Your own work may justify one round (high-volume headshots), three (campaign work with legal review), or a different structure entirely. What matters is that the number is written down before the shoot, next to a definition of the unit.

Define the round, not just the count

The count only works if a round has edges. Three sentences do most of the work:

1. A round opens when the client receives the images and closes when they send one consolidated set of notes. Not one email each from four people; one set.
2. Notes sent after a round closes belong to the next round. This stops the trickle, where a "last small thing" arrives the evening after you delivered.
3. A round covers changes to the agreed scope. Swapping a retouched frame for a different one, or asking for a new crop ratio on every image, is new work, not a revision.

The second sentence is the one clients argue with, and the one that saves you. It only holds if there is a single place where notes are collected. If feedback arrives by text, email and a voicemail, nobody can say when the round closed. That is the practical case for one review link with per-frame notes, which is also the argument in per-image comments beat whole-gallery feedback.

What an unlimited-revisions clause costs, worked through

Here is arithmetic you can rerun with your own numbers. The inputs below are assumptions for illustration, not industry figures:

• A round touches 12 of the delivered frames.
• Each touched frame takes 10 minutes to revise, re-export and re-upload.
• Your effective rate is $75 an hour.

One round: 12 frames × 10 minutes = 120 minutes = 2 hours. 2 hours × $75 = $150 per round.

Now compare contracts for a client who sends six rounds:

The gap is 4 rounds × $150 = $600 on one job. That is before the invisible part: every extra round also delays the next client's gallery. If chasing replies is part of your overhead too, the same logic is worked through in the hidden cost of chasing clients for selects.

Swap in your own frame count, minutes and rate. If your number per round is $40, two included rounds is generous. If it is $400, you may want one.

How to price round three

Quote it before it happens, in the contract, as a rate rather than a negotiation. Three structures work, and none of them needs a stern tone:

• Flat fee per extra round. Simple, predictable for the client. Set it near your cost of a typical round (the $150 above) plus a margin for the interruption.
• Hourly after the included rounds. Fair on big jobs where rounds vary a lot; less comfortable for clients who want a fixed number.
• Per-frame fee for changes after approval. Useful for a client who approves, then wants a swap. It also keeps the conversation about frames, not about whether you are being difficult.

Whichever you choose, send the price when the extra round is requested, not after you have done the work. "Happy to do that. A third round is $150, and I will start when you confirm" ends the vague end of the conversation and gives the client a real choice.

Keep the round count visible to the client

A clause nobody can see gets forgotten. Put the count where the client works: in the delivery message ("this is round 1 of 2"), and in the review itself if your tool allows it. When you deliver a new version, say what changed against the last set of notes and what, if anything, you did not do and why. A short delivery note that lists addressed and unaddressed notes does two jobs at once: it proves the round was honoured, and it prevents the same note being raised again as if it had never been heard.

Deadlines belong in the same message. A round that never closes is the main way two included rounds become five, so pair the count with a date by which consolidated notes are due. Proofing deadlines clients will actually meet covers the reminder cadence that makes that date stick.

If you use a review tool such as Appruva, per-frame notes and version history give you a record of exactly when each round opened and closed, which is the evidence you need if a dispute does arise. A shared inbox can do it too, with more discipline from you.

Sample wording you can adapt

Clause language varies by country and by client, so treat this as a starting shape for your lawyer to adjust, not a template to paste:

"The fee includes two (2) rounds of revisions. A round begins when the Photographer delivers images for review and ends when the Client returns a single consolidated set of written notes. Notes received after a round ends count toward the next round. Revisions are changes to the agreed scope; replacing images, adding images, or changing the deliverable format is additional work. Further rounds are charged at the rate stated in the fee schedule and are begun on written confirmation of that charge."

Notice what the paragraph does not do. It does not threaten, and it does not promise speed it cannot keep. It states a count, a boundary, a scope and a rate. Clients tend to accept clauses that read like a process rather than a penalty, so keep the tone neutral and put the rate in the fee schedule where they already expect to find money.

Finally, go over the clause in the pre-shoot call. Two minutes spent saying "here is how rounds work" out loud is worth more than a page of terms the client scrolled past, and it gives you a chance to learn early whether a second decision-maker is hiding behind the person who signed.

Edge cases to write down now

Five situations come up often enough to deserve a line each:

1. New decision-maker mid-project. Say that feedback must come from one named approver, or that a new stakeholder's notes count as part of the current round, not a fresh one.
2. Contradictory notes. State that you will act on the named approver's notes when stakeholders disagree, and flag the conflict rather than guess.
3. Changes after final approval. Treat approval as closing the revision allowance. Later changes are quoted as new work.
4. Reshoots. A revision cannot fix a missing shot. Specify that missing coverage is a reshoot, priced separately.
5. Rush rounds. If the client wants a revision turned in a day rather than your normal window, say whether that carries an expedite fee.

None of these needs a long clause. One sentence each, in plain language, is enough, and a client who reads them before signing is far less likely to be surprised by them afterwards.