Better exterior photography of your Bed & Breakfast.

One of the most challenging aspects of photographing exteriors is to correct perspective. Correct Perspective???? What is that???? Correct perspective means the vertical lines of your image are straight. Exaggerated perspective makes your Bed & Breakfast look like its leaning away from you. See the below samples.

The image on the left was taken at ground level. The image on the right was taken atop a 12 foot ladder. That is a significant difference! Agreed? Get as high as you can to level out those camera perspectives. This makes a for a much better image.

Post production software such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom have great perspective correction tools if you can’t get it perfect in camera. The best social media App for similar perspective correction in Instagram.

A healthy Portion of Food Photography is an Essential part of a balanced Website!

After all, you are a Bed and BREAKFAST! So many Innkeepers have amazing breakfast dishes and treats that they serve to their guests, but do not showcase these in their marketing. Food photography is challenging! That’s probably a big reason why food is not featured on a lot of websites. Taking a snap with a smart phone of a savory dish usually fails to capture a stomach rumbling photo. With a little work, we can create an image that makes your potential guest want to jump through the computer screen to have a taste! Better yet, your potential guest will book a stay with you in order to have a taste in person! Your scrumptious dishes are a big part of the unique experience of staying at your BnB. I’m here to help!

There are many important factors in creating a mouth watering food photo but it all starts with lighting! Yes, it’s that lighting thing again! (This could become a theme) Depending on the dish, I use a variety of artificial lighting and natural light to make tasty photos.

The below image was taken at the Inn on Lake Wissota in Chippewa Falls, WI. I really like to show this image. This is an example of how artificial lighting is extremely beneficial for food photos. I used a spotlight to skim light across the the surface of the dish. I believe this approach gave the image a warm “breakfasty” feel that also revealed a lot of texture. This harder light quality created more contrast and the resulting shadows give the image some nice depth. YUM!

Hungry yet? Let me take your mind off of food for a minute. Let’s briefly talk cropping! Another reason I like this image is because it can be cropped multiple ways. Most websites these days are very horizontally orientated, particularly when viewing on a desktop computer. WAIT!!! WHAT???…who still uses a desktop computer???!!! (that is so 2015, right?) The point is, an image composed like this works horizontal and vertical. It also can be cropped multiple ways in any orientation and still be graphically strong. It works well on desktops, tablets and smart phones. A great image will be rendered useless if it does not represent well on your site.

Hopefully I have given you some food for thought.

Come back soon to the Photo Inn! I’ve got plenty of egg-cellent blog posts in the works. Now, that I have made myself hungry from all this gorgeous food talk, I’m going to dinner!

Keep it real,

Tom Krueger

Lighting for Interior Photography

There are many factors in creating a great photo of a guest room but it all starts with lighting. Every room in your B&B offers a unique experience and deserves to be shown in ideal light. When we walk into a room our eyes are amazing at capturing light and color. On the other hand, our cameras are not. There is some work to do here in order to show a room in the best light and get those heads in beds! Below is an example of a room that was captured without lighting and with lighting. The difference is clear. Agree?

This is an example from a shoot at the Inn at Wawanissee Point in Baraboo, WI. It’s an amazing room with an incredible view. In order to capture the beautiful room, along with the deck and view of the lake, I needed to use a considerable amount of lighting.

TK