How To Shoot and Edit Professional Interior Photography

in today's video we're going to be talking all about shooting and editing interior photography we'll be discussing how to get great shots of rooms what gear you need and how to adjust all of those images to get a professional look now there are tons of different ways to shoot interior photography you could use flash you could use constant lights you can use natural light which is my favorite and it kind of depends on who you're shooting for and who the client is when i shoot a room i like to use all natural window light i'll shoot multiple exposures usually three i'll blend those in post or i'll just kind of choose one image and edit that i'll let the windows blow out and kind of be either white or kind of have that hazy look because that's my personal preference and the reason why i like to do this is oftentimes when you're shooting a home for listings or for a real estate agent what's outside the windows isn't normally that appealing there's another house next door out the window or a street or there's a bunch of cars in the road i like to kind of blow those windows out focus on what's on the inside sometimes you're going to want to see what's outside if the home that you're shooting has a view that the realtor wants featured if it's important to see how the outside of the house interacts with the inside of the house then you're probably going to want to shoot with consonants or with flash or you're going to want to do hdr photography where you shoot multiple exposures and blend those in posts so you can see both inside and outside now over the past couple of weeks we've been releasing our new home renovation series link up here if you want to check it out so i thought i'd show you how i shoot our space for our blog and for instagram we're going to be letting the windows blow out here we're not going to be talking about flash photography today when i shoot a room i want that room to look as close to what the eye sees as possible so we're using natural light we're not going to over edit the photos we want them to have a natural feel and overcast day is typically the best for shooting interior photography when it's sunny out a lot of times that sun streams in through the windows and leaves really harsh highlights on furniture and the floor and that can be really difficult to shoot so often times when i'm shooting real estate for a living we would pick overcast days to shoot the interiors and sunny days with blue skies to shoot the exteriors before we get into actually how to do this we need to talk about gear first and the kit for shooting interior photography is very small and you can really get away with one camera two lenses and a tripod for this i like to use a full frame camera like the sony a7r iv with a 16 to 35 lens now it doesn't matter if that lens is 2.8 or f4 because if you're shooting interiors you're going to be shooting at f8 f11 so it's not going to matter how fast that lens is you're going to be sticking that camera on a tripod this is a rectilinear lens so you're not going to have that distorted fisheye look it's a nice wide lens without too much distortion and any distortion that the lens might have is easily correctable in post if you are shooting aps-c or on a crop body camera then the equivalent to this is a 10 to 18 millimeter lens or a 10 to 22 millimeter lens and that's going to give you the same field of view so a camera and a wide angle lens that's going to be your main shooter for those wide shots but i also like to take a 50 millimeter lens there as well for those nice detail shots my go-to lens for shooting detail shots is the 50 millimeter 1.4 this is a great normal looking lens which is perfect for those nice shallow depth of field detail shots and the depth of field of this lens is going to allow you to focus on details in the room while creaming out any distracting backgrounds equivalent lens for aps-c cameras would be 35 millimeters for the 50 millimeter lens i'm opting for a 1.4 or a 2.8 version so we can get that shallow depth of field and that sets it apart from that wide angle total depth of field look that we get with the 16 millimeter so we've got our camera we've got our wide lens and we've got our normal looking 50 millimeter lens you're also going to need a tripod for this when we're shooting those wide room shots we're shooting at f8 or f11 and we want our iso to be as low as possible to get the cleanest shot possible when you're locked into a specific f-stop and iso then your shutter speed is going to be what's changing and oftentimes it means it's going to be lower than what's acceptable for a handheld shot now we're also going to be shooting multiple exposures as well so that's another plus for the tripod so you're going to want to put your camera on the tripod adjust your shutter speed accordingly let the long exposures happen and let the multiple exposures happen now you're probably going to be shooting those detail shots with the 50 millimeter lens or that 35 millimeter lens handheld but the wide shots at 16 millimeters those are gonna be on a tripod my favorite tripod is the peak design tripod but if you're looking for a nice tripod that's a little bit more of an affordable price than the promaster x c m modular tripod title is a decent option that's compact and easy to travel with before you can even start shooting we're going to want to make sure that our camera is set to raw because when it comes to interior photography and shooting multiple exposures pulling down highlights in post or popping up shadows editing shots we want to have the most dynamic range as possible so we're going to want to shoot raw to give us the most options before you start shooting you're going to want to have a look around the room to make sure that things are tidy fix up any sloppy pillows wipe off the dust declutter that coffee table and for the love of god please close the toilet seat nobody needs to see down there when shooting a room like this i like to get a variety of shots we're going to want to get those nice wide shots from the most appealing corner of the room but i also like to get these straight on shots which i call a flat angle which is just a straight on shot at something usually this works really well for a kitchen or for shelving or for a countertop area and then we're going to want to add a lot of detail shots as well and typically if you're working with an interior designer there are probably going to be these little moments in the room that are staged up which are going to be a magnet for your camera you're going to want to shoot them that's where your 50 millimeter lens is going to come into play and as i mentioned earlier all of those wide shots we're going to be shooting at f 8 or f 11 and we're going to have those on a tripod all of the detail shots we're going to be shooting handheld and we're going to be shooting those around 1.4 or 2.8 which will allow us to hopefully pull an appropriate shutter speed for a handheld shot but don't be afraid to toss that camera on a tripod if the room is feeling a little bit dark so when you're setting up your tripod shots there are a couple of things you need to keep in mind if you're vertical and horizontal lines are kind of off or skewed that's called keystoning and that's kind of a telltale look of an amateur shot so you're going to want to make sure that you get those vertical and horizontal lines as straight as possible in the camera and then when you bring them into lightroom you can adjust them a little bit using the auto align feature or if it's a little bit more complex than what lightroom can handle you can bring that right into photoshop and use the perspective or distort tool to fix it and i like to pull over guides to all my vertical and horizontal lines here so i can be sure that those lines are indeed straight your tripod height is going to kind of depend on the room that you're shooting and how tall that ceiling is i like to start at chest height and then move down or up depending on the room you don't want to get too low where you're shooting at the legs of the furniture but you also don't want to be so high where you have tons of ceiling in the shot and you're going to have to judge that in the back your camera when you get into the space depending on how the room is laid out the height of the furniture and how high that ceiling is with those wide room shots we're going to try to get as much in focus as possible so we're going to be shooting those at f 8 or f 11. we want those shots to be nice and clear from the front to the back so f8 f11 should do the trick and then we shoot those detail shots we're going to be shooting between f 1.4 and f 2.8 and we're going to want to have that creamy depth of field to set those shots apart from those wide shots with total depth of field shooting your wide shots at f8 in your detail shots with a shallow depth of field is also going to give you a nice dynamic set of images as i mentioned earlier when i shoot a room i use natural light and i like to shoot bracketed three exposures so a shot that's exposed properly for the mid tones one for the highlights and then one for the shadows then later in post i can either choose to blend those images together to get an hdr image or i can choose one exposure and tweak that from there now with cameras like the a7r iv the dynamic range is so good that if i overexpose by a stop or two i can actually bring that down in post and get a perfectly exposed image assuming that we don't have that bright sun outside and this usually gives me the best results but i still tend to shoot those extra images just as a safety net in case i have a part of a room that's too dark or too bright that i need to blend in or if i need to see outside and see the inside then i have the ability to blend those exposures so when you're shooting multiple exposures you can actually set this right up in your camera depending on if your camera is compatible with this you just set your exposure take three consecutive shots and it will change the exposure for you and when you're doing this you're probably going to want to make sure that you're on manual focus so that during those three shots your focus point stays exactly the same when capturing a room you want to try to get a number of compositions so that you have a nice dynamic set of images if you're shooting for a realtor just the wide shots are probably going to be good enough just to show the room but if you're shooting for an interior designer you're probably going to want to shoot a number of different types of shots we're going to want those wide shots so usually for those i'm going to pick the most attractive corner in the room and shoot into a corner then i'm going to shoot those flat ankle shots that i was talking about earlier there's like tile work kitchen countertop artwork fireplace those lend themselves really well to flat shots we have that wide lens that ranges from 16 to 35 on as well so don't be afraid to zoom in a little bit and get those mid shots sometimes it's nice to have something that's not super wide and not super tight like that 50 millimeter is going to give us we do our wide shots our angle shots our flat shots we're gonna move into our detail shots and i'm thinking about flat lace here kind of product style images maybe stuff that has a lot of white space on top and once we get all of those images in the bank we're sure we got our room shots we got our detail shots we can start to get a little bit artsy by shooting some dirty frame images or maybe doing something really different by getting low or getting really high and shooting a really angled image or maybe even shooting through a mirror talked about keystoning keeping those verticals and horizontal straight but if you're shooting a more artsy shot where your shot is specifically you know tilted up or tilted down and you have those really exaggerated angles then that can actually work now a realtor might not like this but a designer or an architect might like this so don't be afraid to shoot up or down and break those rules on your last couple of shots once you have the other ones in the bag when it comes to editing my interior shots i try to keep them as neutral as possible a lot of times for instagram we're kind of editing pretty heavily into a style so i want to try to make sure that those room shots are actually looking fairly natural so for blending exposures we want to be really careful that we're not getting any weird halos or we have that unnatural hdr look less is more when it comes to blending exposures and if you're using the clarity tool don't go too heavy-handed with it oftentimes the clarity tool can add these really weird halos and make the shot look unnatural sometimes you might come across a room that has a large window on one side and not a lot of windows on the other and if you only have one exposure you can use tools in lightroom to selectively adjust the exposure of certain parts of the image so sometimes i can add a local adjustment brush to a shadow and just pop up the exposure you're going to want to make sure that when you shoot all of these images you are shooting raw so you have the most flexibility in post as possible so that is basically all of my tips and tricks for shooting interior photography i hope you guys found this video helpful if you haven't been watching the home run series check it out link up here thank you so much for watching and we'll catch you on the next one check oh i should make sure that i don't have cheesies and boogers on my nose a few pimps but that's it that's all you can do roll off baby

Channel: Becki and Chris

Views: 195,213

Keywords: beckie and chris, becky and chris, How To Shoot and Edit Professional Interior Photography, youtube mini series free, home decor, how to shoot interior photography, how to shoot interior design photography, How To shoot a room professionally, how to shoot a living room scene, how to shoot room interior, Real estate photography, how to shoot real estate photography, real estate photography for beginners, real estate photography editing

Id: ccqozLcXQWk

Length: 11min 25sec (685 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 24 2022