Retouching, digital capture, and a surname…

DIE STUDIO is the digital retouching and digital capture practice of José Gil Die, formerly known as THE HOTSHOT.

I came to retouching sideways.

My father was a physician with a serious passion for wildlife. He spent a large part of his life photographing it, and I grew up around that. Even so, I started in computer engineering before abandoning it for photography at Westminster University in London, then went to work for a leading fashion photographer.

Looking back, the detour was the point. A computer background. Years of travel. Time on set with top models and celebrities. Digital retouching sat precisely where those three things met.

Since then I’ve specialised in post-production for leading brands in fashion, sports, food and beverage, products, automotive and airlines. The work asks for patience, an uncomfortable level of attention to detail, and long hours. I give it all three.

I also handle digital capture. Equipment, computers, software, the full capture pipeline — running properly on the day, every file organised, nothing left to chance on set.

The engineering never quite left. I write my own Photoshop plugins, and I’ve spent the last few years working with generative tools the same way I work with everything else — learning where they help, where they get in the way, and how to get a usable result out of them.

When away from the screen I love: travelling, swimming, cooking, the outdoors, and my family.

On the name

Die is a small town in the Drôme, in the southeast of France. The Romans built it and called it Dea Augusta Vocontiorum — dea, goddess. Occitan wore it down to Diá, French to Die. These days it’s better known for its sparkling wine, the Clairette de Die.

It’s pronounced dee. It’s my surname, and the family story goes that every Die in Spain came down from that same valley.