REAL ESTATE PHOTO EDITING TIPS

WRITTEN BY MD. SHAFIUL AZAM

For a real estate photographer, it is essential to show customers first-class images in order to win interest of potential buyers. Most people search online for catchyphotos of the property before visiting it or contacting a realtor.

That is why Real estate photo editing plays an important role in any real estate business. Using various image editing tools and tricks, you can improve colors, remove unnecessary objects, enhance lighting and alter settings to receive an eye-catching image.

What Is Average Real Estate Photo Editing Pricing?

Most shooters find it rather difficult to set a price for their services. It may be even more challenging if it comes to real estate photo editing pricing.

To determine your price policy, it is necessary to learn your local market. For instance, in Texas local market, real estate shooters usually chargefrom $100 to $500 for photos only. Prices are higher for taking twilight pictures or video tours. It is possible to charge more for large properties. This price also includes image editing. 

However, a lot of photographers more often use real estate photo editing services and outsource their photo editing forabout $2 per image. They are cheap, efficient and always of high quality.

Basic Real Estate Photography Editing Techniques and Tools

Using Photoshop, Lightroom and other picture editing programs, you can receive the “ideal” image. Have you ever overdone with image enhancement? What will be the buyer’s reaction when they see that the house or apartment differs from the eye-catching picture they saw online? You should understand that there is a distinction between the imageediting and cheating the audience.

Here are some real estate photo editing tips which will help you understand what it is better toedit and what to leave intact.

Color Correction

Indoor lighting, weather, window tint, different camera settings and other aspects may change thecolor of the house or interior. Do basic color correction. They shouldn’t be different from the onesof the actual property. Read more about HDR real estate photography that is the most universal way of editing property photos.

Exposure

When the shadows become too deep and you cannot see all the features of the property, useLightroom, go to the Edits tab to adjust Exposure. Here you can experiment with Brightness, Contrast, Backlight and Shadows to make the true colors in the photo more vivid.

Levels

If you want the entire picture to look a little lighter (or darker) and not just in certain tones, use Levels. Using this tool, you can create a great balance between complex control and usability.

Cropping

When it comes to real estate photo editing, you may need to crop the photo to enhance framing, change the aspect ratio or give emphasis to the subject.This way you can make the property stand out among the neighborhoods. However, pay close attention tofixed features, such as electrical fixtures, water towers or other permanent structuresin order not to crop them.

Vertical Correction

To make a final look more expressive, you can vertically align your photo. This part of real estate photo enhancement is absolutely expected.

Sky Replacement

You can replace the gloomy sky with cloudless, sunny and blue sky. It is a rather easy and fast process that allows you to fully change the entire look of the house. Download Photoshop sky overlays and make it in several clicks.

Object Removal

Non-fixed objects like cars, waste bins, electric line, garden tools can be removed during the image post-processing. This way you can clean up your picture which allows the viewers to see all the peculiarities of the building without getting distracted.

Even if you always take professional-looking pictures, there will be some visible undesirable objects such as watering hoses or garbage bins. If you are short of time, you can use the Clone tool to quickly fix this defect. This toolallows you to copy pixels from any area in the picture to the place with distracting elements. This worksperfectly for real estate photos and doesn’t mean that your image is deceiving.

Minor Additions

Some customers want to add some life to an empty room. You can add small things like fire in a fireplace, a movieon a TV screen, or pot plants on the shelves.

Some real estate agents prefer to show a virtually staged empty house. There are services which will virtually stage houses for $20-$50 per picture. Everything depends on the client’srequirements and photo post-production time. Download free real estate photos to test all these photo editing steps on raw photos.

Things That Are Not Allowed in Real Estate Photo Editing

This is very important since the image processing capabilities of the programs are almost endless. The property photos are considered to be consumerproducts and you need to show them as natural as possible. Here are some things that are prohibited during imageediting of interiors and exteriors.

Removing Permanent Fixtures

It is not allowed to remove the permanent fixtures, for example, telephone poles, railway lines or fire hydrants that are located near the house. By erasing such fixtures, you are likely to be charged due to hiding or fabricating material facts. Nevertheless, it is possible to take photos from different angles that hide or minimize those objects.

Changing Background

You will probably want to alter the background to make the image more striking. For example, instead of a city skyline with hazy smog, you may wish to change it to aseaside view.

It is not allowed to perform such photo manipulations as it completely misrepresents the building. It is essential for the potential buyers to see the actual property and the objects located near it. This will help them make a well-considered decision. Imagine how much the buyers will be surprised when they see a lot of skyscrapers near the property instead of a marvelous seascape view.

Unfair Presentation

Is therea big hole in the wall of the house? Don’t even try to fake out the buyer by removing it in the image. The experienced photographers recommend shooting the current state of the property.

Be careful in order not to overdo. Do not forget to maintain your reputation avoiding distortion of information.

Real Estate Photo Editing for Creative Marketing

Usually, realtors hire professional shooters. Some decide to take the photos themselves. But no matter how they get pictures, it is essential to perform top-notch real estate photo editing for creative marketing. Striking visuals can help a novice real estate agentfindnew clients. Experienced realtors may remind their customers about their excellent work.

In the era of social networking, there are many ways to connect with regular or potential customers. Obviously, you need to send messagesthat are informative and unique, or you will be at risk of becoming spammy. Here are some of our favorite ways to attract customers:

Social Posts

Makeyour Facebook, Instagram or Twitter feed catchy using graphics adapted to each channel. (This can also be a place to create an unusual effect if you want.)

If you have established relationships with a group of customers, you can take this idea of a postcard and make it strange. Use postcards showing strange holiday capers, districts full of money tsunamis, comical before/after pictures of a house being staged. This will amuse your clients. Since they understand you are doing a great job, they won’t find all this silly.

Postcards

Postcards allow you to draw attention to your achievements,avoiding information overload. In addition, their design is rather modest: basically,a postcard is a particular image and a colored text field.

VIP Invitations

Our recommendation for realtors is to occasionally make housewarming parties for their customers. Moreover, you can ask your clients to bring their friends to the party. If you decide to organize such kind of event, why not make this occasion extraordinary preparing an individual invitation in advance?