Real estate photography primer: How to capture great exterior and interior shots of buildings

 

 

If you want to improve your real estate photography or just want to learn how to try your hand at shooting interiors or architecture, Digital Photography School has a great article for you. Photographer and writer Lauren Schroeder has written a guide for both exterior and interior real estate photography, including the equipment you'll need.

A camera that can auto bracket, a tripod, wide angle lens and a circular polarizer are excellent tools of the trade. When taking exterior shots, be careful to not have your circular polarizer create unnatural dark areas in the sky, which is quite common when shooting with a wide angle lens. The polarizer is excellent for reducing reflections and making colors pop, however. While HDR isn't everyone's cup of tea, don't be afraid to give it a shot when doing real estate photography.

Moving inside, you should position your camera to capture as much of the room as possible and photograph the room from its best angle, which often includes pleasing furniture or architectural elements. If harsh light is coming in through the windows, be sure to close the blinds or draw the shades, but letting in some natural light often leads to the best shots. As was the case outside, HDR can be very useful when shooting interiors, particular when photographing rooms with nice views. It'll be nearly impossible to capture both the room and the view out the window in a single exposure. To learn about how to shoot in rooms with mixed lighting and for many more details, see Lauren's article.

For another take, we turn to Troy Nikolic's video, as seen on Reddit, which goes over different techniques for making great real estate photos. In the video seen below, Nikolic covers the necessary gear and different considerations that are unique to real estate photography. He shows some editing as well.

When shooting with a wide angle lens -- as you often will in the case of real estate photography -- you will have to contend with distortion. Check out this tutorial from tutvid.com about lens correction options available to you in Photoshop and how to best utilize them.

(Seen via Digital Photography School)