# Need help taking photos of buildings.



## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 3, 2016)

Hey Guys,

I am a real estate agent.  I have a Canon t3i and I have these 3 lenses.

10 -22
18-55
55-250

I am only looking to take exterior building shots and city shots.  These photos will be compressed on my website to make things more mobile friendly.  These photos are ONLY for the web.  I notice when I take photos the sky doesn't look nearly as crisp as other photographers?

Do you guys recommend a particular lens?
Do you guys recommend a particular filter?

I am a total novice and looking for the cheapest way possible to accomplish my goal.  Thank you very much for your time.


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## otherprof (Oct 3, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> Hey Guys,
> 
> I am a real estate agent.  I have a Canon t3i and I have these 3 lenses.
> 
> ...


Please post a couple of shots you are unhappy with.  Lack of crispness is too vague. My first guess is you mean the sky is overexposed, and there are ways to correct that. But I think of sharpness and contrast when I hear "crisp."


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## Overread (Oct 3, 2016)

As said there could be multiple reasons why you're not getting the result you want so we need more information from you about what you're doing and examples to see so that we can put context to your question. What you have should work for good shots and with the right approach some great shots.

You want ot note how you took the shot - what settings; mode; if you used a tripod etc... everything and then show the photo too. With that we can start to put together an idea of how you took the shot and what thoughts you had as you were taking it (ergo how you choose what settings you use - even if its just to set it to auto mode).


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## KmH (Oct 3, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> I am a total novice and looking for the cheapest way possible to accomplish my goal.  Thank you very much for your time.


The cheapest way is to spend the time and effort it takes to learn how to make the gear you already have do what you want it to do.

When shooting a building(s) from outside you'll need to know about the various kinds of camera perspective distortion plus evaluating light quality and direction.


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## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 3, 2016)

Thank you very much for your responses.  I do have a tripod, but I'm not looking to use it.  I use the tripod when I shoot video for pans.  I am looking to point and click.  Here are some photos I shot of one particular building.

Dropbox - Fifth and Poplar


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## Light Guru (Oct 3, 2016)

Nothing un crisp bout those skys.  Some of them are below out but thats normal, if the sky was properly exposed in them the building would be really dark.


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## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 4, 2016)

So, what lens should I use then to shoot with?


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## KmH (Oct 4, 2016)

Many DSLRs have a feature that evens out dark and light areas of a scene.
Nikon calls their's Active-D Lighting.
I'm sure Canon has a similar function.

Again, it's about learning to use what you have. You might want to re-read the T3i Instruction manual.
See - *Auto Lighting Optimizer *(ALO) - pages 49 and 109.


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## beagle100 (Oct 4, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> So, what lens should I use then to shoot with?



Canon 10-18  *refurbished* -  $199 
but the 10-22 should work fine -   shoot in *RAW* and adjust 'blue' sky levels


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## table1349 (Oct 4, 2016)

First use the tripod.  The buildings not going anywhere, there is no need for snap shooting when you can have the best of stability.

As for lens, use which ever one works for the shot.  There is no one perfect lens.  The 10-22 is by far the best quality lens in your group as well as being better quality than say the 10-18.  Use DPP to adjust the angle distortion of the buildings.  

The best lenses for shooting architecture are Tilt/Shift lenses.  The 17mm f4L and 24mm f3.5L are both in the 2k range so I would guess that they are out of your price range.  The 45m f2.8 is in the 1.4k range but that is getting a bit tight.


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## titaniummd (Oct 5, 2016)

Go with the widest angle.  See of you can take pictures without street signs, cars, people and someone's red long Johns hanging off off the balcony.  Shoot in raw and edit the photo.   


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 5, 2016)

What is DDP?  
Why shoot in RAW?
I don't have any software to edit these photos.  Outsource to Fiverr?
I am looking for the easiest, cheapest solution and thank you for your responses.


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## table1349 (Oct 5, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> What is DDP?
> Why shoot in RAW?
> I don't have any software to edit these photos.  Outsource to Fiverr?
> I am looking for the easiest, cheapest solution and thank you for your responses.


When you bought your camera did you see a CD in the box?  Did you put it in the computer to see what was on it?

DPP is Digital Photo Professional. It is a software editing program that comes FREE with your camera.  In it is a lens utility that allows you to among other things correct distortion.  On the disk is other helpful software you might like to be aware of.  Free is pretty cheap in my book. 

Why RAW.  Because it records and saves all of the possible data that the camera can capture.  You can do non destructive editing on the files and export them into the format you wish.


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## AlanKlein (Oct 5, 2016)

For your purpose, RAW isn't necessary.  Shoot jpeg.  Increase the saturation and sharpness in the camera.  That will give more attractive pictures for your viewers and clients to see.

One problem though with shooting buildings is the keystone effect.  If you look at your shots, you will see that the vertical lines of the buildings are not parallel. They kind of come together as they go up.   That's due to a 3D image being printed or shown in 2D and the camera is shooting up.  You can correct for that with a post processing program.  However, there are cameras I believe that can do that in the camera.  That would save you the problem of post processing these problems in a computer.  Call _B and H Photo_ in NYC.  Ask their technical people which cameras will do that.  I believe there may be some relatively cheap ones that will.  Explain to _B and H_ your problem.  They are very helpful.  Good luck.


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## KmH (Oct 6, 2016)

There is no EASY button if you want to _consistently_ make high quality photographs.

The camera makers make tilt/shift lenses that correct for keystone and camera perspective distortion that are used for architectural photography.
Nikon's is only $2200:
Nikon PC-E FX NIKKOR 24mm f/3.5D ED


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## Designer (Oct 6, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> I am a real estate agent.
> 
> .. looking for the cheapest way possible to accomplish my goal.


I shall assume your goal is to sell property.  Forget about taking pictures yourself.  Hire a photographer.  Done.  

If you think that is not the cheapest, consider this:

You have already purchased a camera and lenses.  How much did you spend?

You have invested some time already.  What is your time worth?

In order to be as good as a professional photographer, you're going to have to spend a couple more years learning, several thousand dollars in additional equipment, editing software, file management, etc.

How many listings could you have gotten in that time if you hadn't been spending time learning how to be a photographer?  

See how expensive it is trying to do it yourself?

Now start interviewing photographers.


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## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 6, 2016)

Designer said:


> USCRugbyNo1 said:
> 
> 
> > I am a real estate agent.
> ...




Do you honestly think I'm going to lose one potential client via the web if my photos of buildings are not as nice as a professional?  Esp, when the photos I uploaded will be reduced down into a web easy format?  Sorry, that isn't going to happen.  This is for my website and other social media outlets.  I'm not selling a unit or a building if that makes sense.  So, no it doesn't make any sense to hire a professional.    

Let's keep on task from my original post.  I have no problem walking for three hours and taking photos.       =]


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## table1349 (Oct 6, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> Designer said:
> 
> 
> > USCRugbyNo1 said:
> ...


Yes you would.  I closed on my mothers house just today as the seller.  The realtor brought in a professional photographer and the photos showed it.  Had over 30 viewings in the first 2 days and a contract on the third day.  Several of the potential buyer comments were on how nice a house it was and looked JUST LIKE THE PHOTOS.  Got full asking price as well.   So if you were in the real estate business you would be wise to hire a professional.


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## Designer (Oct 6, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> I'm not selling a unit or a building if that makes sense.


Oh, I apologize.  I misunderstood your reason for taking photos.  Carry on.  

And what do you mean by "I have no problem walking for three hours and taking photos" ?  What does that have to with anything?  Maybe it's like "I am a real estate agent."  Doesn't have anything to do with anything, you just threw that in there.


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## USCRugbyNo1 (Oct 6, 2016)

THIS IS NOT FOR LISTINGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!          Goodness guys.  Please stay on TOPIC.


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## TCampbell (Oct 11, 2016)

USCRugbyNo1 said:


> THIS IS NOT FOR LISTINGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!          Goodness guys.  Please stay on TOPIC.



Regardless of "why" you want the photos... I looked at the images and other than some lighting issues, the images are "focused".  "Sharp" gets abused from time to time.  There is nothing strictly called "sharpness" in photography.  There is focus, there is contrast, the chromatic aberration, there is meridonal or saggital distortions, there is field flatness, there is acutance... there is even "noise" (and the list goes on).  And you when you pile all of these factors together people will make a value judgement about the combination of factors and decide that they do like or do not like an image and say "it's not sharp."

So based on your sample images, what I'm noticing is parallax distortion.  That's the #1 distraction that I see.

Parallax distortions classically show up in images of buildings because the camera was not "level" when the shot was taken (the lens was usually looking upward) and Parallax is exaggerated even more when you use a short focal length lens (wide-angle lens) which tends to be very common for architecture.  This causes buildings to appear to "lean" away.

Here's a comparison:




Riverhouse (uncorrected) by Tim Campbell, on Flickr

vs.




Riverhouse by Tim Campbell, on Flickr

These were both shot with the same lens, same camera, both on a tripod, and in the same location... nothing moved.  The "change" between the first and second image is that these were shot with a tilt-shift lens.  The first image is shot with no adjustments in the lens (no shift, no tilt... as if it was a normal lens).  The second image has a "shift" adjustment dialed in.

To take the second image, the camera is "leveled" so that the lens is no longer pointed upward.  But this cuts off the top of the building.  So I dial in some "shift" adjustment (the lens physically slides upward on the camera body even though it is still pointing straight ahead) and this causes the lens to capture the top of the building so I get the framing that I want (compositionally) but I eliminate the parallax distortion.

These lenses are typically considered very expensive (usually a couple thousand dollars).  Also there is a bit of a learning curve (all adjustments are manually performed and it can be confusing to learn.  Also, all tilt-shift lenses are manual-focus only... there (currently) no such thing as an auto-focusing tilt-shift lens and there are many reasons why it would generally just be a bad idea to have an auto-focusing tilt-shift lens.)

The cheaper way to get the images is to do the parallax distortion correction in image editing software such as Photoshop (I think even Lightroom supports it).  The image can be "keystoned" (pinch in the bottom and stretch out the top) to make the vertical "lines" of the building parallel again.  There is one tip... the human brain typically expects the buildings to get slightly narrower as they get tall.  So you can adjust the image to "perfect" (lines are exactly parallel) and then back off the adjustment just fractionally.  The image will seem parallel and correct to your eye even though if you used a grid overlay you'd see they are fractionally non-parallel.  If they are perfectly parallel it can create the optical illusion that the building is really wider at the top (which looks very strange and unnatural) even though technically it's not wider... it's just how the brain perceives it because the image failed to pinch inward the way the brain expects.)

When you make the adjustments in software the resulting image will now be a trapezoid (keystone) so you need to crop it back to a rectangle.  This means you'll lose data on the sides.  For this reason if you plan to use software to correct for parallax distortion you need to leave a lot of extra space in your image for the crop (shoot wider than you think you'll need.)

There are other issues such as exposure, lighting, reflections, etc.  Usually a polarizing filter will work well to improve the look but these can backfire on wide-angle lenses.  Polarizers usually don't look as good if you use a very wide angle lens.


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