Explore the important fundamental concepts of real estate photography. Find useful information that will help you deepen your knowledge about photography.
We reviewed the best photography books in the market, taking into account their year of publication, best features and format in our reviews.
Becoming a real estate photographer is a unique and rewarding career choice. Ready to take the next steps? We tell you everything you need to know.
Photographing for interiors and exteriors is among the most challenging niches you can do. However, you can improve your photography skills at home thanks to the advancements and accessibility of online learning. I’m compiling a list of real estate photography classes and what you can learn from them. Best Real Estate Photography Classes You can … Read more
Homeowners and agents want to sell properties at their target prices, so they hire a professional real estate photographer who can take enticing and high-quality pictures to market listings. That’s why I’m going to discuss real estate photography tips involving equipment, settings, exposure, compositions, shot list, editing, and work ethics. Real Estate Photography Tips Real … Read more
I am so excited to officially announce a brand new video tutorial from Tony Colangelo, a long-time contributor to PFRE and one of the most respected people in my community. Over the years, many people have benefited from Tony’s advice on the PFRE Flickr group and especially, from his in-depth comments made as a juror … Read more
Lane, from Topeka, KS writes: It doesn’t seem to matter how hard I try to get it right, my kitchen shots get killed by bright reflections and glare coming off of stainless steel appliances. This gets really bad with the fridge, which ends up looking like a circus mirror! What can I do? There’s no … Read more
Here’s a 750 sq ft home I shot with a 24mm. If this doesn’t prove that all those zoom-wide lens aren’t needed I give up. I literally never go any wider than 24mm these days (often 50mm). The 24mm TS-E hasn’t been off my camera in 6 months (I do have another camera for longer lenses). I’ve have some of my clients actually call me–to make fun of a new listing on the Hot Sheet, and how wide it’s been shot… People are starting to get it!
This past year, I have seen quite a lot of real estate pictures being shot “straight on,” with nothing but straight (or rather, as straight as they could get them aligned) lines. Is this some sort of new phase? Or why are they repeatedly doing this in the majority of the shots? You can see examples of this at the local real estate listing website.
Overview:
From gear to editing, composition, lighting, settings, techniques and more, real estate photographer Nathan Cool provides a comprehensive guide for shooting high-quality interior real estate
Craig in Virginia asked:
I’ve noticed that seemingly legitimate websites like AD and Dwell are featuring MANY homes using photo citations such as “Photos Courtesy of Coldwell Banker” or “Courtesy from listing on Trulia.” One in particular from today (1/30/18) is this one.
These are full feature articles written by staff writers of prestigious magazines. Why can’t do the work to look up and see who the photographer was? Never mind that they are potentially using them without proper permission. Is there any way for me to force these journalists to give credit where it’s due?
I use a Canon 17-40 mm on a 5D MKIII and for the most part, it performs well. However, even when shooting north facing windows or otherwise shade-side windows in certain circumstances, l experience lens flare. The inconsistency of it is what drives me crazy. Is there a magic camera-to-window angle or lens height that can help eliminate this pain? I know that some overhead lighting can be a problem and I turn them off when I can but some window situations just seem to be a problem no matter what I do, even at small apertures! For a while, I’ve tried a polarizing filter, but I found this actually made the problem worse! I think the fact that there were more reflective surfaces in the mix was a problem.
Does anyone use several grey cards in a room to get accurate color balance? There are plenty of tutorials on how to use a single grey card but they frequently have it placed near a window or tungsten light. Frequently, it’s near the edge of the frame which can influence color. Even twisting it one way or another can alter the white balance. If several were placed in a room at various locations, each could be on a separate layer and blended or painted out to ensure correct color in all areas of a room. Even an Expodisc varies depending on where it is placed in a room.
Jody who has been in real estate for a long time says:
I know you’ve done a lot of articles on the new/correct ways to photograph real estate but I haven’t seen any articles about how the process is really changing.
Just 15 years ago, you weren’t even able to see a house for sale online. Now, that’s how most shoppers find their house! Some shoppers never even see the estate in person. They are across the country, and put in an offer “sight unseen”.
This is a guest post by Marc Weisberg of Irvine, CA. Marc is giving a workshop in NYC, June 5th and 6th.
Having a foolproof digital post production backup system for architectural and real estate photographers is essential. Below, is a detailed look at the workflow and post production system I use at my studio. I’ve been doing it the same way for about 10 years now. It takes a minimal amount of preparation with a big pay off in time savings and off-site backup redundancy.
Tod in Virginia says:
In the past, I’ve worked mainly on my own but I’m going to work (as a contractor) for a small boutique-ish staging and
photography group. It’s all good and the pay is nice, the only possible drawback is I do all the post processing myself I love Lightroom, but for my own work, I don’t shoot brackets.
Ivy in New York asks:
I was wondering if you know where I can learn how to create floor plans for my real estate clients? Is there an app you can recommend.
There is a huge number of floor plan Apps. Most people that do floor plans use some kind of laser measuring device to quickly measures rooms. Back in July of this year, I did a poll on which Floor Plan creation software as the most popular.
Which floor plan product you use will depend on how elaborate a floor plan you want to make and what’s popular in your market. Over the last several years, floor plans have gotten more elaborate. There are three basic types:
Soo recently asked: I am a real estate agent and photographer. I like to do my own photos and I have a Nikon D750 with a 16-35mm lens. I use Photomatix for HDR for the convenience and Photoshop to edit. However, I have never learned how to get rid of the yellow color cast nicely … Read more
Billy posed the following question recently: With there being so much mobile traffic now a days and their native resolutions being in a portrait/vertical orientation vs landscape – have you or any other photographers considered framing more shots in this manner? I’ve yet to run across a real estate specific website that will auto scale … Read more
Photographers offering floor plans and room dimensions for real estate listings are becoming a hot trend. You may sometimes wonder whether there is anyone else who can offer these services, how they charge for it and whether they succeed with specific floor plan creation apps or software. Floor Plans and Room Dimensions for Real Estate … Read more
A while ago Sandy raise an excellent question:
Are there any books out there that would be beneficial to learning composition techniques for RE
photography ? I think I could use a little help with the basics.
My initial answer was no, I know of no books that talk specifically about interior photographic composition, and recommended that she follow the discussions on the PFRE Flickr group and the PFRE monthly still contests. Also, read Scott Hargis’s analysis of the entries in the 2014 photographer of the year.
Update 1/20: Scott reminded me of his 12-minute composition video from about 3 years ago. It is the best summary that you’ll find for interiors composition. Scott points out in the video, it’s just scratching the surface of this big subject.
the holidays, Willie asked: “Why shoot in RAW instead of jpeg?. This reminded me of the days years ago when I used to have heated discussions here on PFRE about whether or not you should shoot RAW. The video to the right by Jared Polin is a funny argument from that era. Nowadays there’s no … Read more
PFRE reader Sean Elliott at Exposure Property Marketing told me about some new floor plan creation software. Sean said: Whilst the market is quieter I thought I would take the opportunity to contact you about a new product I am using at Exposure Property Marketing. I have helped a software company here in the UK Boxcubic … Read more
Bob in Michigan asks: How much to remove from photos? Flying my drone for real estate photos, I’ve followed the philosophy of removing or cleaning up anything that could be done with a broom, a hose or picked-up (dirt on a driveway, yard signs, cars and trash cans). Yesterday I was asked to remove overhead … Read more
Just yesterday I was accused of not having a anything on the blog or in my book about preparing photos for the MLS. This post will fix the blog part and I’ll make sure I have similar material in my book in the update that is coming soon.
There are a bunch of discussion threads on this subject in the Flickr group. For example here is one that gives a lot of opinions. Not all are accurate by the way.
Here’s the issue:
A very real issue in real estate
Barrel distortion can be corrected with Lightroom 3, Photoshop or other photo editing software but the only way to get rid of perspective distortion is to zoom your ultra wide lens to a longer focal length. How do you tell if a image has perspective distortion? If it looks strange, that’s how. Many would say that perspective distortion is a matter of personal taste. I submit that I only notice perspective distortion when the focal length of the lens is significantly different that the focal length of the human eye. What’s the focal length of the human eye? If you google this, you’ll find that there are a number of answers. I believe the correct answer is between 22 and 24mm. Here’s why:
I did a shoot this weekend of a new listing I have and decided to use both my usual lighting technique (primarily on camera flash) and Enfuse and use what ever worked the best. It turned out not to be much contest; I like the Enfuse results best. Here are a sequence of photos that I used Enfuse to get. For all these shots I shot 7 shots (+3EV,+2EV, +1EV, 0EV, -1EV, -2EV, -3EV). I then Enfused them from Lightroom with LR/Enfuse.