Real Estate Photography- The Money Shot...Window Exposure, Lighting...

We've all done it.
   Walked around a house looking for that perfect shot with a view of the sailboat floating in a canal outside of the sliding glass doors, then take the photo. Instead of getting the sailboat all you have is a wall with a whited out, overexposed sliding door in the photo. Not at all what you had in mind. What went wrong? Why didn't the automatic setting on the camera compensate for this? Let's take a look at this common issue with Real Estate photography.

 Buyers Always Remember Clear Crisp Photos!  

   As I mentioned in the former blog post, most Florida homes are kept dark and shaded to help keep the heat out. When you open the curtain of the window you want to photograph a bright spot is created in the scene. The amount of light that's coming through the window creates an intense difference in contrast between the walls around the interior of the room and the window. With the automatic setting on your camera being used, your camera will attempt to focus, to white balance & to contrast balance... plus many other things. After all of this is done, the software that most cameras use will assume that the extremely bright area is a lamp, the sun, or some other unimportant interference. The cameras software will allow it to white out while preserving the rest of the scene in the photo. The result is a clear room photo with whited out windows. If you move closer to the window to get more light exposure the result will be a clear view through the window and a totally dark room.

 Always Shoot From The Buyers Viewpoint 

 How do we fix this?
   You can try different angles or move closer to the window, but thats not the scene you really want. We want a majestic full room view with the sailboat in the canal showing through the back sliding glass doors with all of it showing up in the photo crisp and clear. We have to create enough light in the room to be equal to the amount of light coming through the window. We are going to need a flash discharge and a momentary delay in the shutter to prevent overexposure due to the brightness of both the flash discharge and the sunlight coming through the window. This is how we are going to do just that.

Secret Tip Dude

Super Secret Tip:
This will work for both DSLR's and One-Shot Point & Click Cameras. Change the camera's settings from Automatic to Macro. Go to your camera's menu and find the flash settings. Some cameras have this setting built into the camera body. Set the flash to discharge with every photo taken. With a macro setting most cameras will discharge the flash without making this change in the environment that we are dealing with today. If the flash does not discharge, set it to discharge manually with every shot. Return to the spot you tried to photograph earlier and take the same shot with these settings. You can see a clear difference in the photos. We now have a clear view of the room and can see clearly through the sliding glass doors. There is a beautiful sailboat in the canal behind the house that you can clearly see through the sliding glass doors... The Money Shot!

 This photo clearly shows the canals turning radius 

The flash created the light we need and the macro setting caused a slight delay in the shutter to prevent flash glare in items closer to the camera. Basically we are tricking the cameras software into thinking that we are taking a close up photo of a distant boat. The camera focused to infinity it then discharged the flash and about 1 thousandth of a second later the shutter opened and took the shot. By this time the flash discharged light is bouncing off the wall where the window is located creating the perfect balance of light we need... Awesome!

Most Agents say "WOW" when i show them this little trick........well, maybe thats after the closing check has been deposited  :)

Just a note. Time of day is very important. You should always photograph a house when the sun is as high in the sky as possible. Overhead light is easy to deal with. Sunlight shining through a window is not.

I hope this helps you in your photography ventures.
Frank Colontonio
©2013 All Rights Reserved

 Panorama Virtual Tours Say "Style - Quality - Prestige... This Agent Is A Pro!"