Taking site photos is a fundamental part of the architectural process.  You may use them for before and after photos, monitoring progress, marking up items in the field or creating more accurate drawings and models.  But when it comes to photography, I’m an amateur at best, so I reached out to Emma Davies of Photography for Blogs to outline these 6 easy tips for taking great site photos. p.s. anything you see italicized in this purple color was added by me.

6 Easy Tips for Taking Great Site Photos

Emma Davies

PROGRESS PHOTOS

Pick a spot at the beginning of a project that you can take a photo from every time you visit. And make sure you DO always take a photo from that spot when you visit, come rain or shine, no matter how busy you are. It’s easy to put off taking it until the next time you come because it doesn’t look like progress has been made or the weather’s not great. But you’ll be pleased you did take all the photos once you come to use them at the end of the project.

So what can you do with all your photos?

– make a hyperlapse style video of the building going up (this post has great advice on how to do this).

– make a collage showing the progress made

– pick the best ones for a blog post or a social media update

KIT

You’ll need a wide angle lens to capture whole rooms or entire buildings, and it’s worth investing in one if you will be taking lots of site photos. I use a 16-35mm for my Canon, and it’s always been plenty wide enough.

But don’t forget the best camera is the one you have with you. Better to take 3 or 4 photos on your phone than not take any just because you don’t have the right lens.  

WEATHER

It’s not always going to be blue skies and sunshine. If it IS, make the most of it and take 100s of photos. If it’s not, try to cut out the sky as much as you can – there’s nothing you can do about a flat white cloudy sky:

LIGHT

It’s not always going to be daytime either. If you have to shoot inside or at night, consider a tripod and a long shutter speed to get the best photos. Otherwise, make the most of the on-site lights, and hold the camera as steady as you can. Prop it up on something, set a longer shutter speed and use the self-timer if you don’t have a tripod but can control the shutter speed.

INCLUDE PEOPLE

Action shots are always more interesting.  Architecture is about people so don’t be afraid to include them.  As a reference for scale, they’re helpful too. But be careful about including identifiable people if you are going to publish your images – you may need model releases from anyone who is recognizable.

CONVERGING VERTICALS

Unless you’re using a tilt-shift lens, you will get converging verticals to some degree or another (where the vertical lines slope inwards and upwards). The wider angle your lens, the more pronounced the convergence will be. It’s not always bad – you can create some striking images exploiting this effect. But if you want a more realistic looking image you will need to correct the image in post-processing. Adobe Lightroom is the cheapest and easiest image editing software to learn – look at this video to learn how to fix converging verticals in one click

WANT TO LEARN MORE?

I dispense free photography advice at Photography For Blogs, a site for anyone with a website or blog who wants to make the most of their images online. I run an online boot camp for website and blog owners who need to kick-start their photography.