Surveys reveal that most event photographers spend an inordinate amount of time both editing and culling photos. PostPro created Wand, a plug-in for Adobe’s Lightroom that attempts to solve at least one of those problems. The program, which is now out of beta, separates the good photos from the bad. By eliminating the time it takes to manually cull photos, event photographers can save a great deal of time in the post-processing phase of a gig.
CEO Tom Azaria ran a wedding photography business before starting PostPro. He revealed that his team had captured over one million images from 250 events. He wanted a tool that would help him, and other photographers, deliver a final set of images to clients faster. So he developed one, and it is no longer in beta and available for purchase.
Wand culls RAW photos two ways in Lightroom: by either creating Production/Rejected collections or applying a purple color label to those rejected photos. The color can be changed and photographers can go into the ‘Rejected’ collection and pull images out to be edited if they think there’s something missing from ‘Production.’ Azaria estimates that about 30–40% of images are typically deemed usable.
The software doesn’t focus on creative choices. Instead, flaws such as blinking or closed eyes, areas where exposure is blown out and awkward facial expressions are detected. It also eliminates similar photos and selects which one it deems the best so there isn’t redundancy. The algorithm also detects significant faces at an event for increased accuracy in culling the most significant images.
The plug-in is compatible with macOS and Windows 10. It works with Adobe’s Lightroom Classic version 10 and newer. Wand costs $12 USD per month with a yearly plan, or $17 on a month-to-month basis.