When Your Wife Stabs You With a Fork You Learn to Pay Attention.

May 29th, 2008 Humor, Photography, Rules of Good Photos atholkay 1 Comment »

In any other situation it’s called a partial seizure. During a showing it’s called The Thanksgiving Turkey Test. That’s the one where the buyers are pretty interested in the home and everything is going pretty well, then suddenly the female half of the buying couple makes a beeline back into the kitchen and just stands there. 

The “standing there” could take a little while. There may be odd movements and vocalizations. It’s really important not to disturb her. What she’s doing is trying to imagine if she’s comfortable pulling the Thanksgiving Turkey out of the oven in this particular kitchen. Open your mouth and you break the spell. Just let her come out of it on her own. 

Oh sure the kitchen is just fine… at least it is to you foul mouthed oafs that make a ham and potato chip sandwich and just spin the loaf of bread afterwards and tuck the end under. Yeah… me too, guilty as charged. True story - back in the in the early days of wedded bliss I once came home from Wal-Mart with a box of matching plates, cups and bowls. When asked how many were in the box, I did the math and said “four days worth”… 

… apparently that was the wrong answer. 

It turns out that when there are just two of you, and you have a four day supply of plates, you have eight settings. Then I had to wash brand new plates! I had to take them right from the box and wash them. She’s not due for PMS until Tuesday either, so she’s like Basic Instinct calm as she said we had to wash them too. I’m freaking out man. 

Sorry, wandered off for a bit there. Anyway, um… wife, kitchen, the standing there, imagining if it’s possible to pull off T-Day. I’m right back with you now. Focused. 

So, here’s the snap of the wet towel – you have to pass the Thanksgiving Turkey Test in the photo of the kitchen. Buyers will study the kitchen photo like no other. 

The good news is that the kitchen photo is the easy one to get right. The biggest key is simply making sure the kitchen is clean as possible, and decluttered as possible. I go really, really, and I mean really decluttered. Move the toaster, the spice rack, the candle, the cat’s food bowl, the dish towels out of the shot. If it’s an ornamental towel hanging on the handle of the oven that the First Lady gave your grandmother, they can either bring an offer, or you take it out of the shot. Take everything that isn’t nailed down out of the shot, with the exception of just two magical items that can sit on the counter. 

1. A coffee maker – because coffee symbolizes relaxation, enjoyment and can cap the end of a successful dinner event. 

2. A roll of paper towels – symbolizes ease of use and cleanliness. 

Now there are a bunch of other important things that do matter in kitchen shots, especially making sure the verticals are vertical, but I’ll hit that up another time. The lion’s share of the emotional impact in the kitchen is just going to be the open space and the cleanliness. 

P.S. Fridge magnets are of the devil. 

P.S.S. Yes I know that this entire post is completely sexist in assuming that the woman/wife will be in control of all the cooking etc for Thanksgiving. In my defense, all I can say is that I’ve seen multiple instances of very even tempered, domestically egalitarian, women turn into possessed maniacs attempting to channel “Betty Crocker on a good day” around Thanksgiving.  Suddenly the way cloth napkins are folded becomes as important as correctly following the checklist for the deployment of Space Shuttle. In situations like this the best advice is to repeat the phrase “everything was fabulous” until the situation has resolved. My point remains salient though – home buying is rarely rational. 

P.S.S.S   You’re probably wondering about about the “stabbing with the fork” bit in the title. Here’s the story… I got up in the middle of the night for a drink of water… the turkey was left in a chicken stock/brine thing in a cooler in the kitchen…anyway, long story short, we had to clean the kitchen floor, I sustained “superficial fork wounds”, and everything was fabulous.

Photo Death By Tree and Powerlines

May 3rd, 2008 Photography, Rules of Good Photos atholkay 2 Comments »

It’s not a bad photo, but zomg tree and power lines dominate. It’s a reasonably busy street, so you gotta choose a side of the road to stand on to shoot the photo too.

Solution…

Park the car at the end of the driveway, stand on the rear quarter panel*, use a wide angle lens…

It’s a much better angle, but if you’re a regular reader you’ll be spotting some sky tweaking and a lack of shadows. Yup… the sun ain’t shining, so I’ll be back to shoot again anyway.

* The Regent Photo Guy does not recommend nor advise standing on the rear quarter panel of your own car. This likely voids your cars warranty and you could fall your clumsy ass right off the car.

Like A Background For A Paxil Ad?

March 15th, 2008 Photography, Rules of Good Photos No Comments »

One of my biggest pet peeves about real estate photos, are exterior shots taken in bad weather. I’ve seen foreboding clouds, rain, snow, hail and in one case what appeared to be an actual tornado carefully hidden behind the house. I kid you not.

This is great stuff if you’re a clothing company selling sub-zero weather proof gear to deep sea fishermen, if that’s the goal I say pour it on baby! Wait for the worst day possible. I’m talking a wall of wind and water pelting everything, get Clint Eastwood dressed up in your special raincoat and shoot him gritting his teeth as you “accidentally” try and drown him. Awesome stuff, we’ll sell a million of them.

However bad weather is like death to real estate shooting. Crappy day photos just send a message of “well at least it’s better than being in a tent”. They’re like a background photo for something like a Paxil advert, or say an avoiding foreclosure debt counseling service.

I’m going to touch on this theme again and again over the coming months… real estate photography is about creating a positive emotion in the buyer. The photos do not need to be technically perfect, but we do want a basic response of “oooh nice house” in the buyer. Real estate purchases for anyone except the most hardened investor are highly emotional, and positive emotion helps sell homes.

The simplest shortcut to getting that “oooh nice house” response for exterior shots is sunshine. Pure natural feel good sunshine simply can’t be faked. In other words, you have to wait until you get a nice day to shoot the exterior photos. Now you may have to go with what you can get in the first couple days of your listing, but nothing is stopping you from going back to the house and re-shooting the front on a nice day. It’s well worth doing this. Yucky weather equals yucky photo, equals yucky house, equals no commission check for you.

The frontal shot is as important as all the other photos put together. That’s because on Realtor.com or where ever the listing is online, that’s what the photo buyers will click on to get to see more about the house. So the front shot better be as good as you can get it.

Not every home squares off to face the sun all that wonderfully. Do ask when the sun hits the front of the house the best. Just do the best you can. Regardless of the perfection of the shot, sunshine just works. We’re shooting for emotion and sunshine always improves everyone’s mood.

It ain’t rocket science.

Sunshine On My Shoulders

February 29th, 2008 Good Vibes, Photography, Rules of Good Photos No Comments »

I’m just gonna hammer this point home

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy
Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry
Sunshine on the water looks so lovely
Sunshine almost always makes me high

Words by john denver, music by john denver, dick kniss and mike taylor

Sunshine just makes you feel good.

Make Hey! While The Sun Shines

February 28th, 2008 Photography, Portfolio, Rules of Good Photos No Comments »

If you’ve been following the plot, I’ve been going crazy over sunshine in the last week.

Anyway… yesterday after hours of tweaking I salvaged this from an overcast day.

It’s okay, but as I said yesterday it was fixing up dog food as meatloaf.

Today the weather forecast is off, and BOOM! We got sunshine baby! Fortunately the house is two blocks from my own house so after my frou-frou date breakfast with wifey I swung around and the first shot out of the camera is this one.

NOM NOM NOM NOM!!!

Filet Mignon!

Just compare the two photos. Which one makes you feel good inside?

Think the front was dramatic? Try the overcast vs sunshine shot of the backyard. I couldn’t even do anything with the backyard editing yesterday.

Pure natural feel good sunshine simply can’t be faked. I keep saying this over and over, the photos do not need to be technically perfect photos, we’re trying to create an emotion for the buyer. Real estate purchases for anyone except the most hardened investor, are highly emotional and positive emotion helps sell homes.

Raise the emotional tone, positive energy, feel good, use The Force…

…Flow.

Just A Quiet Day Screaming Into Pillows About The Sky

February 27th, 2008 Photography, Pimp My Listing Photo, Rules of Good Photos 3 Comments »

First up, if today was sunny, none of this would be happening.

Let me correct that…

…I was told NOT to come and been held off for two weeks of pretty good weather, and now we have a week of crap weather and I’m told to come, right away!

Anyway… overcast day, but gotta get something up for photos ASAP.

I get a minor break in the sky for all of two minutes and get this…

Which is about as exciting as a bucket of dirt.

Can yo’ feel da love in dis photo? Me neither. I keep saying real estate photos don’t need to be perfect, but they need to make you feel good.

Seriously… BLEAUGH!

So I start my usual editing thing, but to be honest…

It’s just not working today…  

The problem is all the dang trees with no leaves in the background. Welcome to fluffy bunnies New fluffy bunnies England in fluffy bunnies Winter. You simply can’t “cut around them” and paste a different sky into the photo. There are simply hundreds of little tiny pieces of sky inbetween the tree branches. It’s mindlessly impossible to edit this way.

My usual edit technique is to color change the white sky to a blue, then apply a Graduated Blue filter to it all. But this eludes me today as the actual sky is a mix of white/gray clouds with hints of blue in spots. It shows up as obvious editing no matter how I try.

Time for a new tactic…

Just selected the entire sky trees and all. Then did a RGB tweak. RGB standing for Red/Green/Blue. It’s counter-intuitive what you do here – you don’t dial the blue UP, but you dial the red and green DOWN. Just a squeeze, littl’ dab will do ya. It’s like drinking. Two drinks and you’re having a good time, six drinks and you’re kneeling in the bathroom shouting for Ralph.

The net result is that the clouds become kinda less dense and oppressive. More blue, less white = more happy = better.

I brightened up the photo a lot and did the Skylight Filter as well.

Anyway the good news is that after messing about I got a half decent lead photo.

The bad news is that I’m serving up dog food as meatloaf… this is NOT Filet Mignon. The real solution is as I’ve said before…

SHOOT WHEN THE DANG SUN IS SHINING!

Sunshine Is The Bomb For Real Estate Photos

February 21st, 2008 Photography, Rules of Good Photos 3 Comments »

You are my sunshine

my only sunshine

you make me happy

when skies are gray

you never know dear

how much I love you

please don’t take

my sunshine away

I hear lots of oohs and aahs over evening twilight shooting, but honestly not many homes are perfectly suited to it. You really need the right light, right house, the right lot and perfect weather to pull it all off.

What the overwhelming majority of homes do well with though, are photos of the sun hitting the front of the house. To me the frontal shot weighting in importance is 50% of the total photo shoot. The frontal shot = as important as all the other photos put together.

That’s because on Realtor.com or where ever the listing is online, that’s the photo buyers will click on to get to see more about the house. So the front shot better be good as you can get it.

To a large extent, luck of the weather plays a big factor in the outcome of the photo of the home. Ideally it’s sunny. We can get away with some overcast and cloudy days, but yucky weather just equals yucky photo equals yucky house. I do the best I can on the day, but sometimes I have to visit again and reshoot the front. We’re selling something costing six or seven figures here, not the Can-Can sale at Shoprite, so we can push for the best we can get can’t we?

Also not every home squares off to face the sun all that wonderfully. Just do the best you can. Regardless of the perfection of the shot, sunshine just works. We’re shooting for emotion and sunshine always improves everyones mood.

So the first question I always ask is “when does the sun hit the front of your house?”

Not everyone knows the answer to that, but we figure it out!

And here’s your easter egg video. The Muppets take on “You Are My Sunshine”. My kids watched it over and over tonight after I found it. 

Simple But Cool Trick With A Tripod Part 2

February 14th, 2008 Photography, Rules of Good Photos No Comments »

Just in case anyone felt in the prior post some of the other editing made the after photo look better than just the change of perspective, here’s a pair of unedited photos, changing only the height of the camera.

From about 5ft up with the tripod on the ground.

Notice how the house is “leaning back” from the camera.

From about 12ft up, hold the tripod over head.

Notice how 90% of the perspective issues are gone now.

I’d like to be a little further left so as to avoid the tree on the right a little more, but left is the yard sign and a telephone pole. The tree is a better choice to be in the shot.

Plus with raised ranches if you move too far off center the door starts getting hidden behind the overhang of the other rooms.

I wish the sun hit the front of the house too, but we’re mid-winter and it swings across the left side and rear of the house.

Simple But Cool Trick With A Tripod

February 13th, 2008 Photography, Rules of Good Photos 1 Comment »

I held off on getting a tripod for too long when I started off photographing homes. It seemed like an extra expense, an extra piece of equipment to lug about and without a lifetime of realtor juice abuse my hands didn’t shake either.

So why bother getting a tripod?

Clutter Control – You can set the tripod up and set the camera in position. Look at the view screen and see exactly what you’ll be shooting. Which frees you up to wander over to the couch and move offending objects out of shot. Sometimes all it takes is pushing something half a foot to hide it. Without the tripod setting the shot up you’re always kinda guessing where you had the shot set up if you’re walking back and forth moving stuff. Then you get back to the office to edit and discover the can of Flea Killer was still on the kitchen counter and not quite hidden enough.

No Blurring – I did notice I wasted far less time having to reshoot the shots I had botched through accidentally moving. Apparently I breathe heavy or something. Personally I just set the camera to the two second shooting delay option. I.e. you push shoot, then take your hands off the camera completely and two seconds later the camera shoots the picture. No touchy.

No Floating Orbs – You know how you sometimes get those floating light colored circles in your photos? It’s the light from the camera flash reflecting off dust floating in the air. Homes with old dusty carpets are the biggest culprit. With a tripod set up you just take a second back up shot once you have everything set up perfect. Takes you about three seconds to do it and dozens of times I’ve used the back up photo because of orbs.

Protects The Camera – Picking the camera up and putting the camera down seems to be the time when accidents happen. Once on the tripod it’s usually out of harms way. Well… unless you trip over the tripod, which basically assures the camera will slam into something. I strongly advise you not to trip over the tripod.

Okay okay, I know, I know… get to the cool trick.

Okay here is one of my back up frontal shots. I just set the tripod up and popped a photo making sure I had something to work with once I’m home and editing.

This photo is unedited.

And here’s the actual front shot we used. It has been brightened up a little and a slight sunny yellow tone added in editing.

But the big difference is simply the angle the photo was taken. It’s up higher and really accents the front veranda.

For some reason shooting from a higher perspective just makes homes look friendlier. It also tends to naturally correct some of the problems of converging verticals. Notice how in the first photo the house appears to be leaning away from the camera.

I use the tripod overhead thing a lot. Frontals and decks are the main places.

So anyway… the trick. Just set the camera to delay shooting for a few seconds and hold the tripod over head. I set the camera for a four second delay and then have the camera shoot three pictures. Then bring it down and check them out. Rinse repeat as needed. It does take a little trial and error to get a properly lined up shot using this method, but the results are worth it. Don’t forget you can fix minor rotation and crop once you’re in the editing phase.

If you’re using the Canon SD800 you can set the custom timer by hitting the “Menu” button, then selecting “Self-Timer” in the menu. You get select the customer timer for use from the timer menu and it’s right under the two second timer. It’s cake to do.

Blown Out Windows In Photos (aka I Pimp Ardell)

January 7th, 2008 Photography, Pimp My Listing Photo, Rules of Good Photos 1 Comment »

Just for the record, Ardell does some nice photo work. So this isn’t an assassination attempt. But if you rub the lamp Ardell, you no complain if the genie appears.

Ardell had a question…

“I want to take this master bedroom shot with the view showing through the open double doors. I can lighten up the photo after the fact, But how do you do that without totally washing out the view?”

…and she baits the hook…

“Lord knows I don’t want to make Athol Kay’s Bad MLS photo of the Day blog category.  Maybe Athol will stop by with some tips on this problem.”

…And I wrote an entire blog post in her comments.

Attempt at pimping #1.

I straighten the photo. We lose some of the room, but the focus is the view.

I section off the windows, invert the selection and start dialing up the brightness. Going really well until I start getting too fancy and end up having to clone brush out some of the window edge stray pixels after I try and tweak up the blues.

It’s brighter, but a couple passes of sharpening and noise removal kinda dull out the clarity of the view.

Botched it!

Pimping attempt #2.

Straighten. Histogram auto fix. Still not enough…

Select windows, invert selection. Up the brightness more.

Whole photo with the Brilliance and Warmth filter, kinda heavy handed on that one. That’s what is giving the yellow/honey tone.

High pass sharpening. Select windows, invert selection, high pass noise reduction.

At this point the walls and ceiling look indistinct, so use the Clarity tool to throw some “fake shadows” to get a little more definition back.

Final thought. This is too much work. The second attempt is better than the original, but I have a vague sense that after a while I’m just rearranging problems than fixing them. Pushing close to the line of looking not quite natural.

Buy some lights Ardell!