Wide angle lens for Property Photography on Full frame

DaelpixPhotography

DaelpixPhotography

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David
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Currently have the full frame camera and lenses below. Looking to invest in a wide angle lens for property/real estate photography.

I was thinking that the 24-70mm would be enough, but it really isn't.


What could I buy?
 
My choice would probably be a Canon 16-35mm f/4 L IS. However, if you can't afford that then perhaps think about a mint used Canon 17-40 f/4 L until you can (you should be able to find one for around the £350 to £400 mark from a reputable dealer/shop with at least 6 months guarantee - there's plenty of 17-40 Ls around so be picky!).
 
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Sure, I have lens down to 14mm but I would not use them
for your intended purpose unless for artistic approach.

I opted for the 24 ƒ2.8 PC and prefer to stitch rather than
correcting distortions.
 
If you can afford it a 24mm TS-E Mk2
 
I 2nd the Irix 15mm F2.4 or there is the Irix 11mm f4 but it's more bucks for the wider view.
 
Sigma 12-24 is pretty much as wide as you can get without going fishy. Over 90 degrees AoV across the long side so you can get the whole room in if you're backed into a corner. Perspective is pretty extreme though!
 
You don't have to get the entire room in one photo, in fact if you do it can give an unrealistic expectation to potential buyers and put them off.

I know the agents that do this and they were last on my list when I was house hunting over the last year.
 
Sometimes in RE photography you simply have to make the best of a bad job when it comes to making a documentary photo of some awkward feature, such as leaning out of a toilet window to photograph the side passage leading to the garden which you have no key to access.

Sometimes you want the widest angle you can get, and to hell with aesthetics. In which case on full frame you want 12mm if you want to preserve straight lines, or a fisheye lens if you (and your client) will accept fisheye "distortion" (which isn't really distortion at all, it's just a different way of mapping 3D onto 2D). What 12mm gives you is a horizontal angle of view a touch larger than the critical right angle. That means you can encompass all four walls of room from just inside one of the corners. Here's an example showing all four walls of a quadrangle. (Shot at 8mm with a crop sensor, the equiv in view angle of 12mm on FF.)

The four walls of the Old Quad by Chris Malcolm, on Flickr

I've retired now from gainful employment, but when I was doing RE photography I considered such a 90+ degree view angle an essential part of my RE toolkit. Best avoided when not needed, but so useful when it was.
 
troutfisher said:
If you can afford it a 24mm TS-E Mk2
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This, and stitch for wider views - but the great majority of work for estate agents won't pay well enough or allow enough time for anything fancy, so 16-35/4 L or 17-40/4 L, plus flash.

The comment about not going too wide is valid. Often better to take two shots though some agents prefer to leave a little to the imagination to encourage viewings.

Also, get good at comping blue skies ;)
 
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HoppyUK said:
This, and stitch for wider views - but the great majority of work for estate agents won't pay well enough or allow enough time for anything fancy, so 16-35/4 L or 17-40/4 L, plus flash.
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I'd add to that: flash plus a diffuser to reduce harsh shadows all over the place and/or no light in the corners when using ultra-wide lenses. One of those dome type Gary Fong/Lambency type replicas from eBay for less than £10 might do the job of spreading the light around if used on a 580 EX or 430 EX II or III, and be portable enough not to knock bits off people's light fittings if used with due care?!

And before anyone has a go about that sort of diffuser, remember, the OP will probably be scuttling from room to room as quickly as reasonably possible, not lighting a wedding party or a studio set? Unless of course someone can suggest something else that's portable and not too unwieldy? Oh, and if you do use some sort of diffuser then don't let it drop off the speedlite and damage someone's furnishings, etc.! (y)
 
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16-35mm f/4 L IS. There is no need for much more expensive f/2.8.

I do real estates and use this 95% of the time except some details and outdoors shots where 24-70mm frequently serves better.

Distortion is minimal and sharpness is great.

I would stay well away from 17-40 which suffers from massive distortion at 17mm and mushy corners.
 
troutfisher said:
If you can afford it a 24mm TS-E Mk2
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This could make a life a living hell if you need to do a lot of stitching later on post. Its a great lens and well worthy owning but only after the staple UWA zoom.
 
Mr Badger said:
Snip:

I'd add to that: flash plus a diffuser to reduce harsh shadows all over the place and/or no light in the corners when using ultra-wide lenses. One of those dome type Gary Fong/Lambency type replicas from eBay for less than £10 might do the job of spreading the light around if used on a 580 EX or 430 EX II or III, and be portable enough not to knock bits off people's light fittings if used with due care?!

And before anyone has a go about that sort of diffuser, remember, the OP will probably be scuttling from room to room as quickly as reasonably possible, not lighting a wedding party or a studio set? Unless of course someone can suggest something else that's portable and not too unwieldy? Oh, and if you do use some sort of diffuser then don't let it drop off the speedlite and damage someone's furnishings, etc.! (y)
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Flash can help in a lot of situations if used carefully but then it can break it just as easily if overused.

Flash has to be fill flash only until you really know the trade. Also watch out for some nasty shadows cast by lamps, curtains and furniture.

Typically it works by turning flash head backwards and using white bounce card. 600ex / 580ex is much preferable to 430 as it has double power and it too easy to max it out so much so ISO400 f/9 has to be invoked on some occasions
 
Sadly I cannot afford lenses over £600. In all honesty I would use natural light and lights already there.
I've never done this type of photography but from seeing the local companies around my area, I'm sure I'll take better photos than they do with their crappy cameras and mobile phone.

Been out of work since the beginning of this year, feel like I'm going downhill again and I won't find another job for 3 years again. Needed a career change than the 11 years experience that I have in production work.

Already written a cover letter up but don't have the correct lens. I used to have a wide angle last year, but it was for crop sensor and changed my camera since then.
 
David, I have the Irix 11mm which I use for interiors for a holiday property client (they particularly like ultra wide interiors). I see you're in West Yorkshire and the lens is within your budget so if you'd like to have a look at it and you're not too far from Harrogate then just let me know.
 
When I replied to your first post and suggested a TS-E, I was not aware that this was a new venture for you .Having done this job for a few years prior to fully retiring I hope you will permit me a few observations and perhaps pointers.
I used a Canon 40D with a sigma 10-20 and a 580 ex flash quite happily and that, with PS was more than adequate, very little editing, contrast boost, sharpening and verticals was sufficient in most cases.
I worked for the local estate agent as an accompanied viewer , showing people round houses both for sale and to rent.
Before being interviewed for the job I produced a Powerpoint presentation as if I was selling my own house, put this onto a DVD together with Powerpoint viewer ( this is a free download which allows powerpoint to run on a computer which does not have it installed ) and showed it the boss who was suitably impressed and I got the job.
As a result of this and having a better camera and better photography skills than the boss, I ended up doing the photography.
When I finally retired I offered to do this for a fee and surprise , surprise they went back to doing it with a Point and Shoot.
Remember that the local estate agent puts photos on a web site and prints on A4 using a colour laser printer-photographic masterpieces they are not.

Which brings me to potential markets of which I identify 5

1) Online estate agents where in a lot of cases the client takes their own photo's and uploads them. These are going to be taken with anything from a Phase 1 to a cheap phone, some will be excellent and others will be rubbish.

2) High St Agents with low to middle price properties-these will invariably do them in house and if they pay at all it will be peanuts.

3) As (2) but high end properties £500K upwards-this is a potential market for better photographs where the client / agent may well pay for good photographs.

4) Very top market , those in the " Life" magazines , this I suspect is very difficult to crack.

5) Rental Inventories. This at first sight seems odd, but with the tenancy deposit schemes now in operation an inventory for a Landlord is a must, if you don't have an inventory its not worth taking a deposit as you cannot prove the condition of the property if any damage has been caused during the tenancy and a picture of any existing damage/ faults, or lack thereof and overall condition is worth a thousand words.
I think you have a potential market in 1, 3 and 5.

For (1) Keep an eye on online agents web sites, look for poor photos and properties not selling then try and contact the client direct.
2 and 3 develop a portfolio, practice doing friends houses , look at online inventories and try and develop an easy ( for you ) system to produce them, ( preprinted form with tick boxes -that's what I used) in short sell yourself ( Blow your own trumpet).
As far as a wide lens is concerned 17-40L or if budget extends a 16-35 and a 580/ 600 EX Flash and a satnav if you don't already have one.
Best of luck with it , give it a try if it does not work you have a new lens anyway.
 
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Done a bit of research and got the lenses down to

Tokina 17-35mm f4
Nikon 16-35mm VR FX f4
Canon 17-40mm f4 L

The top two are supposed to be sharp lenses.
 
I wouldn’t recommend the 17-40 but do whatever you need to get the canon 16-35 F4 and you won’t regret it.
 
gerry s said:
I wouldn’t recommend the 17-40 but do whatever you need to get the canon 16-35 F4 and you won’t regret it.
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Sadly it's too expensive and out of my budget
 
Dael_Pix said:
Sadly it's too expensive and out of my budget
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Well worth saving up from your first assignments to get it. Alternatively rent or borrow one when you need it until you can buy?

My favorite lens for this is an 17mm TSE with this you can shoot from the corner and shift up or down to correct perspective and the amount of floor or ceiling you want to include. It’s more again, worth looking at when you are up and running.

Good luck.
 
OK, let’s put things in perspective here; the 16-35 IS L is a better lens than the 17-40 L but it’s not within David’s current budget. The 17-40 is within budget and a used one in excellent condition can probably be bought for around £300 and there are plenty around to choose from. So, rather than just harp on about the 17-40 L not being as good as the 16-35, let's see some examples of how it might work in real world type usage for property photos.

Before anyone start critiquing the following photos they were taken purely as a quick test to check that my second hand (but mint and boxed) 17-40 L worked OK. So do excuse the poor taking angle and the lack of any lighting to compensate the contrasty winter sunlight (if you look you can see the packaging the lens came in lying on the worktop just beyond the sink – the photos really were taken that quickly!).

The following pics are JPEGs taken straight from the camera (a 6D) without any tweaks in Photoshop, and were all taken hand-held at f/4, at between 1/30 and 1/40 of a second, so there’ll probably be a bit of camera shake there to influence the sharpness, so please bear that in mind

First off 17mm:



Then 20mm:
[URL='https://flic.kr/p/251PEu5']

Then a comparison from a 24-105 L


So there you go, some real-world examples with the ability to click on them and pixel peep. However, I doubt any estate agent or potential house purchaser is going to do that (just how big do photos display on the Rightmove website?!). So I can't imagine them saying "Those corners look a bit soft at f/4, the photographer obviously doesn't have a 16-35 IS L"! For a start, depth of field will take account of that anyway in most house interior shots, unless you're taking a photo a flat wall straight ahead, and how may houses are big enough for that?

I hope this is useful to the OP, sorry the composition of the photos isn't better, etc. Anyway, take your time deciding what's right for you and best of luck choosing. (y)


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Just to add to the above, it shows that IS can work wonders, that shot at 20mm is decidedly soft due to camera shake! However, if you're looking at a photo of a room with a view to buying a house (rather than critiquing the sharpness of the photo) then would the average home-buyer notice that (bad as it is!)? Don't get me wrong, photography-wise I would not want that going out in the advertising package (and wouldn't have submitted it to a client anyway), but it raises a point!

The contrasty lighting also shows that you'll be unlikely to get away with just using available light (and a tripod) when taking photos of house interiors. The appropriate use of flash could have sorted that out, so I'd be budgeting for a good flash and a suitable diffuser (or two) and putting some serious time into learning lighting techniques if I were thinking about going into this sort of photographic field.
 
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If I had the money I would go all out for a lens and lighting equipment but I have no experience in this type of photography. I'lll have to think about buying a lens first. Might opt for the 16-35 f4 as it looks to be a great lens.
 
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Mr Badger said:
Just to add to the above, it shows that IS can work wonders, that shot at 20mm is decidedly soft due to camera shake! However, if you're looking at a photo of a room with a view to buying a house (rather than critiquing the sharpness of the photo) then would the average home-buyer notice that (bad as it is!)? Don't get me wrong, photography-wise I would not want that going out in the advertising package (and wouldn't have submitted it to a client anyway), but it raises a point!

The contrasty lighting also shows that you'll be unlikely to get away with just using available light (and a tripod) when taking photos of house interiors. The appropriate use of flash could have sorted that out, so I'd be budgeting for a good flash and a suitable diffuser (or two) and putting some serious time into learning lighting techniques if I were thinking about going into this sort of photographic field.
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It depends who you shoot for. Some agencies and bnbs like to print brochures, and display images large so out of focus or mushy areas may not work out so well.

That kitchen is not particularly contrasty as it gets. In many cases it is perfectly OK to let the windows go a little on the bright side and in most cases you shouldn't get too much of these hot highlights on the surfaces. When you do things get interesting. Sometimes lightroom HDR merge is all you need to bring it back - just be careful to edit as a normal photo without giving any hint of extreme processing. Flash - absolutely can be handy but as I said you can easily make the matters a lot worse. In the kitchen shot from that angle you'd get away with fill flash very easily. However you can soon get nasty shadows and reflection of the flash in the windows, shiny fridges, etc.

Also it must be said in any decent real estate shot verticals must stay vertical and ideally have to be shot that way in camera. Here a three way geared tripod head becomes almost inevitable.
 
There's not a lot wrong with the 17-40/4 L and it's been a staple for many professionals, including this chap Mike Kelly (check out his tutorial vids below*) who's one of the better guys doing high-end real estate http://www.mpkelley.com/gallery/ For that matter, I used it alongside a 24mm TSE-II to shoot a £20m mansion and I couldn't tell you which was which, apart from when the TSE's unique features were used.

17-40 was state of the art when it was launched, though that was quite a few years ago and the 16-35/4 L is undoubtedly a better lens, particularly corner sharpness and the IS can take hand-holding down to serious tripod territory, but the 17-40 can also hold its own if you stop down a bit and good ones can be had for sub-£300. There's a couple in the classified section now.

Edit:
*Try the third one down here, How to Photograph Real Estate... where he explains the modern high-end method of lighting individual areas with a flash gun then blending them all together in Photoshop. It takes a lot of time, skill, and more than a little art, but gives total control and stunning results
http://www.mpkelley.com/for-photographers/

We also have TP member Oliver Pohlmann who is pretty handy ;)
http://wearesophoto.com/editing-raw-interior-real-estate-photos-6/
 
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I decided to dust off the 17-40 L and take some proper comparison shots this afternoon (mainly for my own experience and curiosity!) and I believe they're quite telling. The camera (Canon 6D) was tripod mounted and the first 3 shots were taken at f/8, which I'd probably use as a minimum when doing shots like this. I've included one at f/4 too, just so people can pixel peep and see the difference in edge softness... but the question is, would you see any obvious difference viewing the shot at normal screen (or brochure print) size?

You'll notice the lighting difference between the first two, the first one is taken with natural available light, the second using a cheap (about £9 inc. postage on eBay) Pot-R dome type diffuser with the white insert cap on, fitted to a Canon 430 EX II flash. See which you think looks better? The remaining shots were also taken with this flash set-up. So do you think a 17-40 L might do the job until you can afford a 16-35 IS L?

17mm f/8 no flash
17mm Available light by J White, on Flickr

17mm f/8 with dome diffuser
17mm Dome diffuser by J White, on Flickr

21mm f/8 with dome diffuser
21mm f8 by J White, on Flickr

21mm f/4 with dome diffuser
21mm f4 by J White, on Flickr
 
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Far too often the humble 17 - 40L is labeled as inferior when in fact it is more than capable, OK the later 16 - 35 IS may have an edge but not one that is going to stand out in normal usage in property/architectural photography...

For someone on a tight budget it is a good option that will deliver.

BTW Mr. Badger, although our kitchen was here when we bought our house a few short years ago, it looks like it came from the same supplier as yours :)
 
Dael_Pix said:
Done a bit of research and got the lenses down to

Tokina 17-35mm f4
Nikon 16-35mm VR FX f4
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I'm curious as to why you've included a Nikon 16-35 on your list if you shoot Canon? Anyway, the Nikon 16-35 is a good lens but 16mm is where it's weakest - big, BIG, distortion and mushy corners.
 
I would go for the Tokina 17-35. It's about half the price of the Nikon and will have similar performance to the Nikon when it's stepped down to f/8 which is where you will use it most.

If you buy a used one you will have a bit left over for a couple cheep remote controlled speed lights.
 
Dael_Pix said:
Done a bit of research and got the lenses down to

Tokina 17-35mm f4
Nikon 16-35mm VR FX f4
Canon 17-40mm f4 L

The top two are supposed to be sharp lenses.
Click to expand...
Stu Meech said:
I'm curious as to why you've included a Nikon 16-35 on your list if you shoot Canon?
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Dael_Pix said:
Stu - It looked to be a good lens when I found it on the net
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Call me old fashioned, but I tend to prefer lenses which will actually fit on my camera. Don't you?
 
StewartR said:
Call me old fashioned, but I tend to prefer lenses which will actually fit on my camera. Don't you?
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Come on Stewart, even I know you can use Nikon lenses on Canon bodies. AFAIK there are people doing just that... dunno if the Nikon 16-35mm is so stand out good that it's worth the hassle but certainly I think it is possible. I think...
 
I would seriously look at who will pay for photos and what they will pay before you buy a lens for the job. If an agent is doing their own and is happy enough with the result to put them on the net you can’t just pitch up and say pay me I can do better and expect a job. If they already have someone doing photos will they change? less money and better photos might swing it but less than what and can you do better for less.

I did Interiors for quite a while and used a variety of bodies but ended up using a 5Dii and 17-40 which worked vey well. I had no issues with the 17-40 lens so it will do the job if you are going to try. As I progressed I realised using a tripod was a real benefit, though a pain in smaller properties. Bracketing shots were easier as were lower shutter speeds. I then started using a couple of speed lights which greatly reduces windows being blown and time in PP doing hdr. The key to it all was a quick turnaround and as many jobs as possible as close to each other as possible which then affects how good you can do the job and any enjoyment.

What I realised even after getting pretty good at it was getting high paid jobs was getting rarer as estate agents and vendors were not willing to pay decent money as they felt the financial pinch. The market is now flooded with people doing photos, floor plans and an EPC’s as a package for cheap fees. Estate Agents have been hit with lower fees to compete with on line agents and they are even tighter. I know someone who runs an online agency and what he pays for photography must be just about minimal wage when you add in travel and PP time. I have turned down jobs from him when he has been caught out as they would hardly pay for petrol.

My best paid jobs were for developers selling new homes. If a developer has dressed a show home as they have not sold it off plan, they have spent serious wedge renting furniture so if you can take decent photos of their property that will sell it you can potentially get a good fee but it is a tough nut to crack.

Have a look on line what jobs are available as a property photographer for established companies and you will see what you can earn or what you will be up against. You can certainly earn more from being an estate agent than taking pictures of their stock but then if you are lucky they might let you out with their camera or even yours.
 
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Personally didn't rate the Nikon 16-35F4, I used it for my landscapes for a few months but distortion at 16mm and corner softness were too much for me. It's in need of an update IMHO.

Simon
 
Sadly I cannot afford anything right now. So won't be buying another lens for quite a while.
 
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