Everyone knows that multiple property photos have become essential for every listing. The listings with the best photos get the most action, right? Well, not if the photos are poorly done. I hear from my real estate peers about two recurring issues they face in using photos in listings. The first is that their photographs appear too light or too dark in print and online.<\/p>\n
Why do digital cameras usually default to an underexposed image rather than to overexposure? The reason is that dark images can usually be lightened. But images that are overexposed (too light) can\u2019t be darkened because there is simply no information captured in the brightest area of the digital image. Therefore, many cameras simply default to underexposed images, and this almost guarantees dark photographs in print and online, unless the images are corrected prior to use. An image editing program is an essential tool for users who need to correct exposure and color, resize and crop images.<\/p>\n
There are many software options, but not all of them are practical. After all, who wants to spend hundreds of dollars on a complicated photo editing program? I\u2019ll bet you\u2019ve heard the old \u201cJust fix it in Photoshop\u00ae\u201d suggestion. In reality, the most common complaint I hear is that it costs $699 to download Photoshop CS5. And an even bigger issue is that some real estate professionals buy this software and then find out it\u2019s incredibly difficult to use. Photoshop CS5 is a powerful, complex program that\u2019s worth every penny to a graphic designer or professional photographer. But, for a beginner or someone who doesn\u2019t want to spend months learning new software, Photoshop CS5 is total overkill.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve checked out many photo editing programs, and in my opinion, Photoshop Elements 10 is ideal for real estate professionals. Priced at $99.99, it can be downloaded directly from www.adobe.com for use on a Mac or PC.<\/strong> Using it, amateur and even advanced photographers can lighten and darken images either automatically or manually in levels, allowing darker images to be easily lightened for the MLS.<\/p>\n Other imaging programs can accomplish this as well, but Elements\u2019 strength is that it does the lightening process with very minimal image degradation. Color corrections are easily accomplished in the advanced user \u201clevels program\u201d or through beginning user \u201cauto level\u201d controls. Adobe Photoshop products are famous for allowing image modification with a minimal amount of file degradation.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s just one feature: If you work in commercial real estate, you\u2019ve likely taken photographs of tall buildings, resulting in images that make the building appear wider at the bottom and narrower at the top, or out of perspective.<\/p>\n In the past, it took a professional photographer with a perspective control lens to correct this issue. Now, however, Photoshop Elements allows users a tool called \u201cFree Transform\u2014Perspective Control\u201d to bring tall buildings into proper perspective with a few mouse clicks.<\/p>\n The Improvement in digital camera software and cameras continues to improve our ability to market homes. In this Internet age, great images can make or break a sale so make sure your photographs are the very best you can create. More to the point, if your home were for sale in this market \u2026 would you want the \u201cOK\u201d images often seen on Realtor.com, or would you want those offered by a sales associate who considers high-quality photography a key part of his or her marketing effort?<\/p>\n Written by:\u00a0 John Frank, Realtor\u00ae, is also a photographer whose work has been featured in such places as USA Today and the cover of TV Guide.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Everyone knows that multiple property photos have become essential for every listing. The listings with the best photos get the most action, right? Well, not if the photos are poorly done. I hear from my real estate peers about two recurring issues they face in using photos in listings. The first is that their photographs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1401,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19459"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1401"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19459\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.myewm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}