Architectural & House Photography, Dublin
House photography is often something which people imagine to be simple. However to photograph a house properly requires skill, technique, experience and the right photographic equipment.
I recently photographed a house for an interior designer and property owner in Malahide, Dublin. The owner had planned to rent the house out on the website airbnb.com. The interior designer also wanted some portfolio shots to showcase her work.
In approaching this job, I was prepared to photograph two sets of images. One set of house photographs for the owner, and another set for the interior designer. I would need to approach each from slightly different points of view.
The interior designer wanted magazine style photographs, like what you might see in such home style magazines as homeinteriors.ie, or houseandhome.ie. The photographs often don’t show the whole room, but capture certain angles and features, with nice natural light coming through. More focus is placed on the design features, and how well the different features work together. Often this would involved only capturing a small section of the room, where many of the design features meet.
For the airbnb photographs, although some of the interior design photographs would work well, we also needed to show the living space. The viewer must be able to imagine living or holidaying there. It’s important to show an abundance of space, comfort, style and luxury.
To light each room I like to combine natural light with flash, in order to create a very natural, well lit composition. Normally the natural light of a room is not even. This is because the light will be strongest at the window, and weakest at the furthest point from the window. To compensate for this, I will use fill in flash. This creates even light throughout the room. I can even make it look like there is another window in the room if I wish.
When photographing the exterior of the house, it’s very important to use a ladder. This is so that the building does not distort towards the top, as a result of perspective. Like when you view a tall building from the bottom. The building looks as if it’s getting narrower towards the top.
House photography is something which you have to be patient with. It takes time to get things right, but when it works, it really works. The viewer can feel transported into the house, feeling the visual style and elegance. I was very happy with the way these photographs came out. We managed to portray the house in the way that we had planned to.
If you have any questions regarding house photography sessions, please contact me using the form below:
