Legal Advice.....

Curious as to what would be her claim in the small claim court? Just that she didn't like the photos? Can't see how this would be claimable.

I would see it that any judgement would be based upon what quality is promised to the client (ie the photographers portfolio) and then comparing that portfolio to the produced work. Whilst at the same time listing any exacerbating conditions at the time of the actual shoot (eg adverse weather conditions, difficult client, equipment failure etc..).

It's something that might not be clean cut every time, but should be able to evaluate if the photographer has done their best to deliver what was promised or if they've falsely represented their skills.
 
^^ that is an interesting point. I am not sure if a portfolio would be a 'promise of quality' or not. Is it reasonable to assume that the photographer uses his or her best work, rather than typical work, as a marketing tool rather than as an example of what to expect?
 
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unpopular - whilst a photographer would use their best work, they would still be using work representative of the quality they can deliver for those services. So there shouldn't be a massive difference between that and what they deliver to a client unless there were more extreme limitations on that work which meant that the photographer was unable to produce their best under those conditions.
 
^^ that is an interesting point. I am not sure if a portfolio would be a 'promise of quality' or not and if it is reasonable to assume that the photographer uses his or her best work, rather than typical work, as a marketing tool rather than as an example of what to expect.

Exactly! We see it all the time! If someone takes 100,000 photos... and only gets ten good shots, guess which ones end up on their website as representative of their work? ;) lol! (Hint.. not the 999,990 bad ones!)
 
unpopular - whilst a photographer would use their best work, they would still be using work representative of the quality they can deliver for those services. So there shouldn't be a massive difference between that and what they deliver to a client unless there were more extreme limitations on that work which meant that the photographer was unable to produce their best under those conditions.

This is likely accurate, but the difference in quality would also have to be extreme and clearly represented, enough so that any reasonable person would agree that there is a significant difference in quality.
 
unpopular - exactly there would have to be a marked difference to get a judgement that the photographer had failed. On the other hand if the photographer (for example) attended a few lighting workshops and snapped a few photos of a model posed, lighted, makeuped etc.. all by other parties and then presented that as their work for, say, portrait shooting services -- that would be a photo, which whilst theirs, would not represent their own work. As such whilst it would be their work, it would likely show up a false against regular portraits they produced unless they had all the skills to reproduce the workshop situation without outside assistance to their work enterprise.
 
unpopular - exactly there would have to be a marked difference to get a judgement that the photographer had failed. On the other hand if the photographer (for example) attended a few lighting workshops and snapped a few photos of a model posed, lighted, makeuped etc.. all by other parties and then presented that as their work for, say, portrait shooting services -- that would be a photo, which whilst theirs, would not represent their own work. As such whilst it would be their work, it would likely show up a false against regular portraits they produced unless they had all the skills to reproduce the workshop situation without outside assistance to their work enterprise.

Still, that should be a fairly easy defense. If the client wants a shot that looks like it had a stylist and MUA, then the client needs to pay for a stylist and MUA. Better yet, the OP should be building something like that into the price if that is the expectation.
 

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