Architectural and interior shooting process

Architectural photography (including interior photography) is a specialty that, beyond the basic knowledge and skills of photography, requires a strong sensitivity to shapes (curves, lines and perspectives) and a mastery of the techniques proper to this practice.

Its purpose is to take exterior and / or interior shots of a building, its structure and its facilities and especially to meet the different customer expectations (specific points to highlight, communication, advertising ... ).

You will find below the main steps of the process of realization of architectural images. This description is not exhaustive, it aims to present in a few lines the important points.

Preparation of architectural and interior shots

The first important step for me is to interact with my client to identify his expectations, but also the constraints to take into account for shooting. (Importance of the customer relationship)

To plan the shots, it is essential to identify the orientation of the facade or the place to photograph. This allows me to identify the best time of day to shoot. The day of shooting is determined according to the weather and other constraints previously identified with the client (eg access request, end of work, delivery of building, vegetation ...).

For a better result, I remind you that it is advisable to store and clean the premises the day before the shooting.

Preparation also means planning the shooting equipment, selecting the gear you want to take with you, making sure it's in working order and that the batteries are charged.

Shooting architecture and interiors

If no location scouting has been planned in advance, it is carried out once arrived on site. This will enable me to understand the constraints and define the different points of view for the photos to be taken.

Before each shot, as far as possible, to remove all the elements that will interfere with the final image. It can be objects that have no reason to be (for example cigarette butts in the foreground, a car ...), but also objects that can either unbalance the composition, or too attract the eye .

Beyond the mastery of the fundamentals of photography, the challenge of architecture photographer is the management of distortions and verticals.

To allow accurate composition, shooting is done on a tripod. Depending on the case, I use a tilt-shift lens. This type of lens allows me to straighten the verticals when shooting.

At high contrast such as an interior containing a window with a very strong outside light, it is sometimes difficult to have the entire dynamic range of a scene (dark areas become black and / or bright areas become white). In order to restore this dynamic range, the interior shots can be made with one or more methods. The first method is to perform "bracketing". This method consists of shooting several shots of the same scene at different exposures. This allows post-processing, from these different exposures, to restore the full dynamic range. The second method is setting up extra lighting (flashes). This method requires a lot more time to shoot (therefore more expensive) but allows to obtain a better quality of image by the control of the lighting.

Particular attention should be taken to any reflections in the scene. A bad reflection can sometimes make a photo look much less good.

Another important point, especially indoors, is the colorimetry management. In an interior with tungsten lighting, the light has a yellow cast. When we are in this place, the human brain itself corrects the colors and tends to neutralize the yellow of the lighting. In order to correct this dominant, I take additional shots with a color chart. This is then used in post-processing to restore faithful colors.

Architectural and interior photography post-processing

Post-processing will reveal the image. This step requires more time than shooting by themselves, often 2 to 3 times more. It can be even more depending on the case.

Beyond the basic settings (brightness, contrast, etc.) performed on the entire image, it may be necessary for some settings to be applied locally.

When shooting "bracketing", HDR processing is performed to restore the entire dynamic range. The treatment can be manual or "automatic" through specific applications.

For each image, distortions and verticals are corrected.

For colour management, the white balance is performed using photos taken with the colour chart. This neutralises the dominant effect of artificial lighting and then allows the atmosphere of the location to be reproduced.

In specific cases, such as a shot of a facade with a brand logo, a colour profile is created, enabling the exact colours to be found.

Architectural and interior photographs retouching

Unlike post-processing, retouching changes the content of the image. It will consist of deleting objects that could not be moved at the time of shooting. This can be the removal of a poster stuck on a wall, the removal of a fire extinguisher ...

Captioning and assigning keywords to photographs

Once finalized, the images are captioned and keywords are attributed to them. When archived, this will allow to find them quickly by performing a search on keywords. Also, when the images are published on the web, the caption and the keywords will be interpreted by the search engines. They help strengthen the SEO of your website.

Delivering images

Once the images are ready, they are delivered in various formats via a file-sharing and/or file-sending platform, depending on the customer's requirements. Without any particular request, they are converted into web and print (HD) formats, which correspond to the majority of requirements.