How VeryBusy Came to Be

Welcome to blog post numero uno! I'm Peter Hunner, co-founder of VeryBusy, alongside Emily Fishman. We invite you to bookmark this blog as we've lined up some insightful photo industry leaders to lend their knowledge on all things commercial photography and retouching. But before we dive into that, we wanted to start with a post about why we, as high-end retouchers, decided to build software.

VeryBusy Co-Founders Emily Fishman and Peter Hunner
Photo Credit: Bill Phelps

How did we get here?

For over a decade, our retouching studio, Hunny Retouch, has serviced clients spanning catalogs, ad campaigns, packaging, editorial, and e-commerce.

Early on, we recognized the complexity of managing projects. In fact, it was pretty overwhelming juggling the email chains, PDFs, and spreadsheets that typically accompany retouching.

To overcome this, we tried some of the general project management tools you’re likely already familiar with. Unsurprisingly, they were too general and lacked features to manage nuances of retouching like detailed markups, revisions, and approvals.

We then tried tools that were specifically built for commercial photography. However, upon implementation, we found these tools far too complicated, expensive, and still not incorporating tools specific to retouching review and approvals.

By 2019, our studio had grown to the point where we had no choice but to find a good solution for our retouching workflow. The universe must have been listening, as we were introduced to a young and motivated development team that helped us map out our requirements and jumpstart our vision for VeryBusy.

Our software requirements…

Our experience and conversations with clients and industry peers informed us that there were six essential elements that any platform must possess to entice users:

• Simple and frictionless: Not only is time money, but some of us in this industry are working on new projects every week or couple of weeks. Therefore, this platform had to be exceptionally easy to use, requiring very little effort to understand. The interface and tools should feel familiar to other tools in the user’s ecosystem, enabling new users to onboard quickly.

• Photography-specific: So many products we encountered on the market tried to do it all, and they ended up missing nuanced but integral steps of the retouching review and approval process. Other products are designed for users to collaborate on video, images, design files, etc., all within the same platform. We believe that by bundling all these feature-rich workflows in one platform, these omni solutions not only intimidate new users but also prevent the creation of photography-specific workflows.

• Ability to leave detailed, organized feedback - fast: We know it’s common to have 20+ detailed markups on an image. When working on a project with 50 or 100 images, that can amount to a lot of time. The platform should allow users to enter an image, immediately create markups, type comments, and move on in a way that is fast and intuitive.

• Image quality and load time: Images are central to the process; therefore, we wanted high quality, full resolution images that loaded fast. Additionally, the platform should handle quick culling, tagging, and zoomable full resolution images.

• Affordability: In recent years, many niche collaboration platforms have begun to skew toward an enterprise pricing model, which comes with a much higher price tag for users. We wanted a solution that not only accommodated small and medium organizations but also freelancers.

• Uptime and support: Projects are on tight deadlines and there isn’t room for application downtime, bugs, or unanswered support requests. We had to have a way to communicate quickly and seamlessly with users, as well as provide them with a database of information that could be easily referenced.

“Napkin sketch” mockup of VeryBusy

The results

VeryBusy is your one-stop-shop for managing retouching! Upload images, invite collaborators, transmit retouching instructions, conduct revisions, approve and deliver finals. It’s the same steps we’re already familiar with, but now they are centralized instead of spread across several applications.

Since incorporating VeryBusy into our retouching studio’s workflow, the combined impact of clearer communication and faster turnarounds has resulted in a 40% increase in efficiency.

Whether you’re a creative director at an agency looking to expedite a project, a photographer seeking an easier way to communicate with retouchers, or the head of a retouching studio yearning to scale, 40% is a powerful number. If you're involved in any part of the post-production process, I strongly encourage you to implement VeryBusy on your next project.

Visit app.verybusy.io/signup to create an account and start a 30-day free trial. Put the platform through its paces by starting a project, uploading images, and inviting collaborators. You’ll get the hang of it quickly, we promise. If you need any support, we’re here for you via chat in-app or email.