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Make Shift Bounce - Anchorage Real Estate Photographer
Creating Light w/a Make Shift Bounce
My job as a Real Estate and Architecture Photographer is to bring a space to life by adding and enhancing the light. Not all homes and spaces are created equal. Some require a lot more work and some creativity.
I recently was commissioned to photograph a home for sale in Anchorage that was the perfect example of a home that required some creativity and additional lighting techniques. The large majority of homes I photograph have white walls or at least a white ceiling that I can use for my lighting technique. This home, however was almost all wood. Wood does not bounce light. This poses a problem.
Over the years I have acquired a lot of little tricks to get light where I need it. Luckily, I had all the tools in the back of my vehicle I needed for this job.
Walk through
I make it a habit to walk through each home I photograph first, so I can start to get an idea of what tools I will need to make it stand out. As I walk around the house I am looking for areas that I need to add some additional lighting. I am looking for ways I can hide those lights and still get the look I am shooting for. When I saw this shot above, I knew immediately that I would need to bring in the whole tool kit to make this one work. I needed every light. Every stand. Every bounce, tape, etc. that I had on me.
A lot of my peers take the easier road and photograph homes with no additional lights. They are able to get in and out in a few short minutes and then spend more time on the computer processing the images to get the desired result. I, however feel that lighting the scene with lights gives a much better image, so I take the time needed to do it. This home took me about 4 hours to get all the lighting I wanted.
White Boards
I have found having some white boards handy really makes a difference, especially in homes like this. The following images show how I use white boards or foam core to bounce my lights in areas I need. I am always trying to find new ways to hang them, prop them up, or whatever I can to get them in the right spot.
The little boards give me just the right amount of light to make the area look how I envisioned it when I walked through the home.
Here are a few more images from this photo shoot.
Family News
ANNOUNCING...
We've been debating and praying about having another baby for several years and finally felt confirmed that now was the time. With such fun news to share, it seemed natural to want to find a unique way to spread our joy.
The subject matter
Yes, I usually am posting images of commercial architecture or real estate photography, but today was a day for something out-of-the-box and creative. My wife says I am like the mechanic that doesn't keep a car running at home and while this still doesn't give us a true family photo, it does have every family member represented.
Given the time of year and having three kids who just carved pumpkins, we grabbed a smaller fourth and started to put a few ideas together. After looking at myriads of images on the internet of baby clip art and pumpkin images, we finally agreed on a theme.
Set Up
Daemon, age 4, and mom lighting pumpkins. The wind was not helping. Neither was the four year old. :)
Dayton, age 8, ensures that his rather large pumpkin is in good view of the camera.
Staging
Every photo starts somewhere.
The pumpkins were cute, but the image was a little lack luster.
Nothing that a few fall items from the front porch couldn't resolve.
Photo Bombers
There's one in every family, several in ours. :)
Introducing the CamRanger
Favorite tool in my bag!!! Not only can I get a sharper image from using the iPad to trigger the camera, but anyone helping stage the image enjoys knowing what I'm capturing, especially interior designers and in this case, my wife, who happens to be looking over my shoulder.
CamRanger App for iPad
Final Image (with photo bomber)
Final Image (no photo bomber)
Manipulated in Pages and saved as a jpeg. No actual photo editing needed. Shot with my new favorite camera - Cannon 5DmarkIII.
