PHOTO INSTRUCTIONS

Instructions for taking photos of homes and appartments for holiday rentals

• Only take pictures in landscape format to avoid problems in OTA’s and portal websites.
• Take photos at maximum ppi.
• Take day shots and 1 or 2 night shots when possible, just after sunset, so that the sky is still a bit blue and not completely black.
• Hold the camera horizontally to avoid skewed walls and doors, this avoids a lot of work when editing afterwards.
• Do not hold the camera too high, but about 1.5m from the ground.
• Use a wide-angle lens.

Outside: pictures of garden, swimming pool, terraces, views, of the surroundings if it is worth it.

1. Only take pictures on sunny days, small white clouds are no problem.
2. Always take pictures with the sun in your back to get a blue sky. Sometimes you have to take photos at different times of the day to achieve this. So do not photograph against the sun.
3. Open all blinds and doors and curtains visible from the outside
4. Make the photos in such a way that the neighbouring houses are not or barely visible, if that is not possible at least try to prevent the windows of the surrounding houses from being visible.
5. Garden and swimming pool

• Prepare the area to be photographed well, as customers would find it on arrival.
• Place the sun loungers and garden furniture in such a way that they look well organised, tidy and clean and use decoration.
• Towels on the loungers and arrange the loungers next to each other to create an orderly whole.
• Place garden hoses, and put messy looking things out of sight.
• Before you take a picture of the pool you move the water in the pool with for example a broom, this prevents any leaves and dirt on the bottom of the picture to be visible.

6. Terraces

• Clean and tidy
• Set the table completely with plates and cutlery and for example with a bottle of wine and some fruit as if you wanted to start dining.
• Use decoration

7. Views

• Take pictures with as few surrounding buildings as possible
• Make them with the sun in your back
• Make them so that you can see on the picture that the view was taken from this particular home or appartment.

Inside: Take pictures of all the rooms and bathrooms so that the pictures match the description of the accommodation.

1. General Indoors

• Turn on the lights, all of them!
• Tidy up as much as possible.
• Use a wide-angle lens (anything that does not need to be in the picture can be cut off during editing).
• Take the photos from about 1.5 metres high off the ground with the camera horizontally.
• Take the picture so that there are never more than 2 walls in the picture. This creates a better spatial feeling. You prevent the space from appearing narrow and long. So stand in a corner to take the picture and photograph along the wall without having it in the image.
• Move furniture to create more space! Put the furniture further apart. Avoid photographing benches or sitting areas from the back, slide them towards you and keep the back of the furniture out of view as much as possible.
• If too much sunlight comes in through the windows, close the curtains and cover the windows on the outside with a blanket to prevent overexposure.
• If there is a lot of sunlight outside and you are photographing through the window or from the covered terrace to the garden, it is good to use a tripod. Take 2 of the same photos. One where the view through the window or garden is well exposed and one where the interior space or terrace is well exposed. Later you can use Photoshop to mount the photos on top of each other, the well-lit window on the well-lit interior space.
• Hide wires running along the wall of, for example, lamps and other electrical equipment.
• Make sure that the cushions on the sofas and chairs lie neatly straight or remove them to avoid a messy picture.
• Use decoration but don’t exaggerate it.

2. Living- and dining room

• Remove carpets, sofa covers, do not leave too many cushions behind.
• Remove very personal items such as family photos and personal items from the owner.
• Remove anything that seems to be messy.
• Open windows and doors when the sunlight is not disturbing.
• Switch on all the lights.
• Take interesting detail pictures.

3. The bedrooms

• Make the beds only with white sheets or duvets, put rolled-up towels on the bed and use multiple pillows where possible.
• Remove all personal items from the owner or tenant.
• Sometimes there is not much space, in that case you only take the detail of the bed with the bedside tables, it is important that you can see what kind of bed it is, a double or single bed.

4. Bathrooms

• Remove all personal items.
• If there is no room for a landscape photo, take 2 photos and mount them next to each other as a landscape photo. Leave a white space of a few mm between the photos.

In general

• Use a wide-angle lens. Afterwards, check the photos and cut away what should not be visible.
• Straighten walls and doors with a photo editor.
• Make sure the photos look bright, you can add light and sharpen them when necessary.