Interior Photography

[Juggleballz]

As some of you may know, and some of you may not know, my girlfriend Veronica is an interior designer. As she started her own  company not so long ago she cannot afford professional photographers just yet, so I have been helping out were possible.

http://hammondandclarke.com/gallery.html
 <---Images used in flash gallery and i'm too lazy to link them directly

My photos are in the groups "Residential Home - Donnellys Hill" and "Residential home - mulroy bay"
The rest of the photo groups here are images given to her by suppliers, and the "ARC" group is photos done by her friend, who I took over from.

Camera: Nikon D3000
Lenses: Standard kit lens, 18-55mm, and also an architectural lens 12-14mm

I am content with them but I know they can be better. There are a few funnies, like warped walls, slanted verticals and horizontals which I need to perfect. I can see progress every time I take photos for Veronica, and of course having good subject matter to photograph is one half of the battle.

I find the 12-24 mm lens is great for interior shots but can easily distort images. There are some great resources online where I did some research into interior deisgn photography. There is so much skill involved in taking photos so I am happy for any tips, critiques and advice
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I love photography and the science behind it but I have yet to get me a decent camera. But i managed to borrow my dad's camera and my boss' lenses and took on the task of photographing Veronica's work. It's weird. I've been amateurly photographing for a while and self taught but i still have not bought a camera. I needz fundz.

If I were to get a camera it would be between nikon and canon. I'm considering a D80 as its the camera I am most used to. Or a camera with a great HD video function included...Or a Canon...

[the.crippled.dreamer]

Nice work Jugglz; I like the reflection of the port style window, and the colours used in the bedroom of the other home. Don't worry too much about the distortions. Warping in an image can be played around with and used to our advantage (using a wide angle's distortion as part of the style in an angle shot depicting a large counter, for example).  Honestly, the biggest challenge with interior photography comes from the lighting (which is frequently coming right at us, or enough to tangle with) teaming up with how to properly frame the shots. This latter improves mostly with time, but I like taking a couple corner bits of matting and playing with different ways to crop my printed images.  Whichever style of camera you go for, just make sure to master the white balance, even if shooting in RAW, which is my preferred format for editing later on.

I still don't get the recent fascination with chandeliers though; they've always seemed like such a difficult feature, getting them to work with the rest of the setting. They are currently all the rage, however, so it must just be me. 

[Juggleballz]

Ah cool man. Great reply Thanks.

Do you photograph interiors much? Or what is it you do? I'm intrigued.
I have been working with white balancing recently trying out different settings and what not, and I think i found the perfect setting for taking photos of overly warm lights up close. (Which i have now forgotten as I don't have the camera in front of me...damn lol)

A few things I read up on and are considered "rules of thumb" for interior shots:

Mostly try to shoot into corners, making rooms seem larger.

Make sure your verticals or horizontal lines (depending on the angles) are parallel, so if I'm shooting into a corner my verticals shuld be parallel, or if Im shooting straight on (vertically angled or not) make sure the horizontal lines are parallel. Prevents rooms looking distorted. This can sometimes be a little tricky.

95% of the time shoot a room with all lights on regardless of how bright it is outside.

Don't use built in flash. If flash is used use soft boxes or light guns with a diffuser.



A few things I personally do are:
Shoot with a low F Stop - 2.8-4, but coupled with a high shutter speed, like 1/25 sec.
I sometimes flip it to say F Stop 8-16 with a 1/3 sec - 1 second shutter speed using a tripod.
I find switching between 2 modes (low ftop & high shutter, hi fstop & slow shutter) can result in the same photo but with very subtle changes in lighting.

For example, when I as taking a photo of one of the rooms that had a great view of outside I found that because it was bright outside the windows were over exposing and blowing out. So switching to the alternative setting i managed to get the room really well lit but could see the view outside too.  Essentially the same amount of light is entering the camera but not as intense...if that makes sense. Like the light enters in large amounts but doesn't "burn", or low amount of light enters but is allowed to burn...not sure if i'm making sense but i find it changes things a bit.

By the way, any critiques or advice you have for any of the photos please let me know. I'm all ears (eyes)

Thanks man.

[the.crippled.dreamer]

Hi Jugglz,

Profuse apologies for the delay in responding (ill and then playing catch up on projects = free time/ social life are...even less than usual...how sad)

Sounds to me like you have a handle on most of it. Switching the F stops and shutter speeds can give similar results, except for depth of field. The higher the F stop, the greater range that can be captured, so using lower ones intentionally is useful for capturing a vase of flowers while leaving everything else blurred out. Here's an example using my shop since I'm here (disregarding any and all settings except the F stops), with F8 on the left and F22 on the right with the amazing Post-It man to help compare:



Wow...that's actually more half-assed looking than I thought

Here's an actual attempt to redeem myself:



I don't have a slave flash or anything else nifty on me, and it's later in the day rather than the middle, which a flash would probably screw up more anyway with the reflections: I just flipped off the far bank of lights (breaking that rule of thumb) and shot F11 at 1/20 with an ISO of 400 using my wide angle (I'm still running with my Canon 10D, though I want the 50). Those reflections in the windows are still irritating me though, and it looks like I need to clean my sensor again...*sigh*
Some people are obsessed with particular settings (more so I've noticed when shooting portraits). I treat my camera settings the same way I handle kerning and other areas frequently obsessed over: simply by what feels right. Which is probably why I prefer outdoor photography (loads of happy accidents and more flexibility to play with).

That's probably not much extra help, though I'd see if there's a way to try some of those shots at night (the next best time to take interior shots after the middle of the day with the sun directly above); she has a very elegant style in many of those designs and sometimes those shots work very well relying on just the interior illumination without anything creeping in through the windows (or reflecting back from them...). As for watching the lines of the room, if this is going to be a regular thing, perhaps invest in a tripod with a gauge to make sure the camera is aiming straight ahead (probably the simplest thing to do in order to avoid distortion regardless of the lens, and ironically one of the most difficult things to adjust by hand even after years of shooting). This is even more important when shooting straight at a wall (I sometimes have a curse of angling what seems like a barely noticeable smidge down for some reason, which glares back at me accusingly later).
As for what I do: everything but sleep. I do primarily print and design work to earn my coin, but I have a grab bag of skills that I'm always adding to. As for the photography, I focus mostly on the outdoors (I don't need to lug about multiple spotlights, fill flashes, or a bin of flood bulbs),  and am always on the lookout for interesting lighting and reflection shots...which the one above isn't.

[Pieter]

Just remember to use your histogram to reference global exposure.
The field and central light meter setting aren't always reliable I found out,
I tend to shoot a even gray surface and try to key it as middle value, or a more white surface as a bit overexposed (one stop at max).
When I reference this to my histogram it tends to give good results with little over and under exposure and enough middle values (depending on scene and your subject ofcourse).

Also, gray surfaces such are concrete are great for white balance as well as light metering.