There are some things that seem to bring a person closer to their essential being, closer to whatever it is that defines ‘you’. There are things that we experience that are so personal that there is simply no one on earth that could understand but you.
Now that I look at it, that statement sounds a little more grandiose that I intended. I mean to say that there is something in each of us that connects to our souls in a way that cannot be described. It doesn’t matter whether it’s watching your favorite NASCAR driver succeed (whatever it is that is considered success), or being able to lay down a nasty blues riff, it is that connection is what makes a person an ‘individual’.
Now, there have been billions of people that have existed since the beginning of time for whom self awareness and gaining perspective were not priorities. They were born, struggled, worked, then died. After all, if you have a farm, the plague, etc., the last thing you are thinking about is whether or not the human capacity to help to is weaker than the capacity to hurt. (It is). These people, while probably very nice, never explored their basic human-ness. It has been my experience that most people are clueless, and perfectly happy not exploring. That’s fine for them, whatever.
But there are people that have a more existential view towards life. I mean existential as it was originally defined, as an examination of our sentience. Our awareness of ‘other’, if you will.
For me, I am closest to ‘other’ when I am far from civilization, checking the tall grass for snakes as I approach an abandoned homestead, the old walls leaning, hoping to find an image that will convey the enormous sense of isolation that consumes the scene. The only sounds are my breathing and the wind as it pushes itself through the trees. This is the essence of exploring, all five senses acute, the ‘fight or flight’ reflex only a heartbeat away. It is at this moment, when I pause at the apogee of my exhale, before the next inhale, when time is still, the instant before my brain tells my finger to engage the shutter, when I am myself.
Photographing homes and buildings presents a unique set of challenges for a shooter. There are any number of variables that affect each project, this is an outline on how to make the best photos possible under any circumstance.
Equipment
First, let’s talk about equipment. This is a basic equipment list, the ‘gotta haves’, if you will.
Digital SLR, at least 10mp. I use a D300 and a D200 for my daily work.
12mm lens (18mm after sensor accomodations). I use a Sigma 12mm, this lens provides zero barrel distortion.
Tripod with geared head. Making fine adjustments is critical for producing top quality images.
Hotshoe bubble level. Keeping things nice and level will improve your images greatly.
Flash Units. I use six SB-800′s, but you can get away with just one.
Expo Disc. White balance is a huge pain in situations where there are several mixed types of lighting. An Expo Disc will solve this.
Specifics
Let’s get into some specifics. The list below is more about the nebulous aspect of architectural photography, technical details will follow.
Taking fantastic photos of homes and buildings is less challenging if you remember these few things:
Let the building/home tell it’s story. Your job is to provide an accurate representation of the unit to your customer. If the home is dark, don’t try to blast it with light. If the home is bright, don’t shutter up the windows. A client will prefer images with dark corners or blown out windows to heavily flashed or shaded areas.
The house IS what it IS. You will inevitably run into a real estate agent or seller that sees the home as something it is not. You simply cannot make a $120k condo look like a $5 million dollar estate. Once again, your job is to provide an accurate representation to the customer. You may find yourself acting as a diplomat trying to explain this to an anxious seller.
Always remember that you are in someone’s home, not a studio or an office. Being formal and cordial is essential. You will be accessing all areas of a home, and you want the occupants to feel comfortable. Always be well groomed, and wear clean white socks every day (you will be removing your shoes in many homes). I have over 100 pairs of socks that look brand new. Clean socks that have discolored soles may as well be dirty.
Nature will always win. If you take pictures on a cloudy day, the images will show it. This is true of interiors and exteriors. There is a myth that cloudy days are better for shooting interiors, I have found this to be demonstrably false. If your client can wait for clear weather, then wait.
Over shoot. Take pictures from any angle you can find, as you gain experience, great shots will present themselves.
Technical Tips
Here are some technical tips to ensure that you are getting the best shots possible:
Use wide apertures and long shutter times, this will provide warmth and will keep the shots from looking like crime scene photos. Add a touch of flash (1/64th) to combat color shift and to add highlights to the scene. I generally keep my ISO at 400 or 640. Anything faster is too grainy, anything slower shifts the colors too much.
Take advantage of the wide angle. A 12mm lens will allow you to get great shots of even the smallest powder room, and will show large spaces very accurately.
Stand back. Hold the camera to your eye and back up until you have the widest shot you can get, then you can set the tripod down and compose your shot. Don’t be afraid to include doorjambs into the shots, it will give the viewer a natural sense of depth.
Keep the camera below eye level of an average person. I have mine set to around 4.5ft, the lower angle will take the images out of the ‘snapshot’ category.
Keep your sensor clean.
Take light measurements from the darkest part of the scene and adjust your exposure from there. It is always better to underexpose than to overexpose.
When shooting exteriors, think of the building as the center point of a large circle. Walk the entire circle, shooting every time you see an appealing angle.
Workflow Tips
Here are some tips regarding computer processing and data management:
Edit the images as little as possible, get the best shot you can while on site. People are getting very savvy and will be able to pick out a heavily manipulated image in a heart beat. Limit your edits to color correction and resizing, if possible.
Develop a data management strategy. Shooting is only half of the job, you will need to keep your images organized and safe. I get calls several times a week from agents asking for images from last week, last year, or the year before. Being able to find them quickly will make you look more professional. I have 1 TB of space that holds my images in Aperture libraries, finding an image is as simple as doing a search for the home’s address.
Develop an efficient workflow. The last thing you want is to be spending more time at the computer than you did actually shooting. Use an application like Aperture 2 or Adobe LightRoom to manage your files, you will not be sorry.
That’s pretty much all there is to it. Just like all types of professional photography, you will need experience to define your style, and it’s your style that will bring in the $$$. So my advice is to shoot shoot shoot. One last note, be passionate about your images. People ask me all of the time if I get bored shooting houses everyday. They don’t understand the satisfaction I receive from the work, and that’s the way it should be.
There is no shortage of great stories/photos that feature lavish, multi-million dollar homes. Just pick up a copy of Colorado Homes and Lifestyle and you will find a dozen top notch properties. But Denver has more to offer than stately manors, estates, and swanky lofts. Each neighborhood has its own character whether it’s the brick bungalows of Mayfair Park or the winding green belts of HIghlands Ranch. It isn’t hard to find beauty in all places, it’s just sometimes you have to look past the noise (and everything else) of Colfax, or the mind numbing aesthetics of the newer suburbs. I have a lot to say about suburbs and urban sprawl, but I will save that for another time. I will just say now that my view of the ‘burbs has softened after being in a couple of thousand tract houses from far east Aurora, to Lonetree, to Highlands Ranch. It is clear to me that it is not the houses that make a good neighborhood, it’s the people that live in them. You don’t see a lot of children playing in the streets of the really fancy areas, it would be pointless. Most of the kids in these areas have acres to roam in the back yard, not to mention every convenience inside the home. There is simply no need to play in the street. By contrast, there are some Saturdays where it is practically impossible to navigate the ‘burbs because of the neighborhood activity. My point is that there are trade-offs in life, you heard it hear first.
One of the first areas I explored when I moved to Denver was E 6th Ave, a wide avenue that runs east-west from Speer Blvd to Quebec Blvd. The area between Colorado Blvd and Quebec Blvd is wide and park-like, the grassy median separates the traffic, and has a jogging trail that courses through huge trees. The length of 6th from Speer Blvd to Colorado Blvd is one way traveling east out of downtown, and provides easy access to Cherry Creek Mall and the shops of Cherry Creek North. E 6th Ave is a very convenient way to get across town almost any time of day. The buildings along 6th Ave vary from very busy commercial to quiet residential.
This home is located on E 6th ave, between Colorado and Quebec. Constructed in the early 1900′s, remodeled in 1932, and again in 2007, this home has had many occupants. The current owner is a local builder and he was pleased to point out some of the unique features of the home. The crown moulding is original, formed with plaster on-site. Their workmanship has held up for over 100 years. The arches in the home provide a sense softness to the rooms not often found in homes of this age. The most recent remodel made major changes to the interior of the home. Many walls were ripped out, providing an open feeling that most people prefer, as opposed to the closed in, maze quality of the original layout. A large, bright bathroom was added to the master suite.
The outside of this home is extraordinary. There is a nice patio on the east side, and the front door is elevated from street level, with stone stairs framed by massive brick pillars. The white window frames work perfectly with the light colored brick. You can bet it is just as beautiful under a blanket of fresh snow.
This home will never be in Architectural Digest, and most people don’t give it a second look as they speed by. But it is a special place, one of several hundred thousand that are all around us.
Creating beautiful images in only part of what it takes to be a successful photographer. Managing large amounts of data while still being able to access it quickly and easily is one of the biggest challenges facing photographers.
Today’s high resolution cameras generate an enormous amount of data very quickly, a 12mp camera will produce a 15mb RAW file. If you consider that a busy shooter will take hundreds of photos per week, the gigabytes add up very quickly. Developing a smart workflow and data storage/management strategy will allow you to concentrate on shooting, not where you are going to put your images (or worse, looking for a single image among thousands). I will be outlining my workflow and data management as a guide, your workflow will vary.
DF Studio (for client proofs, final image delivery, archiving)
PC users can use essentially the same setup using Adobe LightRoom instead of Aperture 2. Both programs work on the “library” method of managing files. Okay, I am a bit of a Mac snob, but I will say that my Mac workflow is about a million times better than my best PC workflow. So, my advice is to switch to Mac as soon as it’s feasible.
The Four Commandments of Digital Photography
Always shoot RAW. No sense in not utilizing every pixel at your disposal. You will be able to generate and export any size file from your libraries.
Do Not Delete. Save all of your shots, the good, the bad, and the ugly. This serves two purposes, first, you can examine the bad images so you can improve your shots the next time you find yourself in a similar shooting situation. Second, just because YOU think it’s a bad shot, someone else might love it. Trust me on this one.
Do Not Edit Master Files. Your original RAW files should be treated very carefully. Think of engraving plates used to print money. Any changes made to the plate will show up on every copy.
Stay Organized. Once you begin your workflow, you need to follow it to the end.
It is possible to manage your images without using an application like Aperture 2 or LightRoom, but it is not recommended and will not be covered here.
The Digital Workflow
New Photos:
Import into Computer – Create a folder on your desktop called “Daily Dump Folder” or just “Dump Folder”. Download your images into this folder.
Import into Aperture 2 – Open Aperture 2 and drag the files from your dump folder into the library. Aperture 2 will automatically create a new project called “untitled project”. You can change this to indicate the date, subject matter, location, etc.. If you want to add more photos to this project later, you will drag the new shots into that folder and it will not create a new project. All of your projects are kept in a library. You can have as many libraries as you want. For example, I have alibrary specifically for pictures of my daughter, a library for each invoice period, etc.. Once the images have finished importing into Aperture 2, you can delete the files from your dump folder. Exact copies of the RAW files have been added to your Aperture library, where they will remain safe and warm.
Stack Images - Select the images you would like to keep as a group, then (apple key) + K. This will keep your images in a stack. Stack or unstack at anytime to make viewing easier.
Create Album - Select a new stack of images, the (apple key) + E to choose all of the images within the stack, then (apple key) + L to create a new album within your project.
Review and Select Final Images - Check the images you would like to use (using the green check mark will automatically assign 5 stars).
Export from Aperture – Select your final images, then ctrl + (apple key) + E to activate the Export dialog. From here you can rename your images as well as choose the size to export (JPEG – Original Size, for example). Export the images to a folder on your desktop. These images are now ready. Your original files have not been altered, the JPEG in the export folder is a version of your originals.
A note on libraries:
I only keep my active Aperture library on the hard drive on my computer. Every two weeks, I will create a new library, sending the previous library to an external drive. Each month has two libraries that hold all of the images for the period. If I need to locate an image from say, April 2006, all i have to do is open that library and its right there.
The key is consistency. If you use the same workflow every time, you will never have problems managing your data.
I approach an abandoned homestead, the old walls leaning, hoping to find an image that will convey the enormous sense of isolation that consumes the scene. The only sounds are my breathing and the wind as it pushes itself through the trees. This is the essence of exploring, all five senses acute, the ‘fight or flight’ reflex only a heartbeat away. It is at this moment, when I pause at the apogee of my exhale, before the next inhale, when time is still, the instant before my brain tells my finger to engage the shutter, when I am myself.
