A gorgeous pink and purple twilight sky can provide a stunning backdrop for real estate pictures. If you want photos of your home that will make a potential buyer stop scrolling and click into a for-sale listing, sunset pictures can help your property stand out from the pack. Done well, a twilight photo shoot of your home captures a buyer’s attention. However, taking pictures in low lighting can pose challenges, so prepare to spend some time experimenting if you want to get the best shot.
How to Take the Best Pictures of Real Estate
Real estate photography focuses on showcasing a home, often as part of a sales listing. While a professional photographer knows how to maximize light and angles to showcase your home at the perfect time of day, amateurs may need several attempts under varying conditions to capture photos worthy of an online listing. What’s more, the elusive perfect picture of your home may look different from those of other properties. You may need to shoot around visual disruptions, including shadows, obstructions like large trees that limit the view of your home, and even the position of the sun relative to the front of your house.
To determine the best timing and placement for a photo of the outside of your home, you’ll need to study the sky throughout the day. Depending on where the sun rises and sets in relation to your home, a twilight photo may work better than those taken at dawn or in the middle of the afternoon. If you’d like to try a sunset photo, you’ll need to work with rapidly changing light in a compressed time frame. Plan to spend some time before and after sunset shooting photos to capture the varying colors of the sky. Allow yourself several days for photos, as changing weather conditions could affect the quality of the photos.
Why Take Twilight Photos?
A bright blue sky and the green lawn framing your home in the daytime provide a basic, expected background for most real estate photos. But if you want to try something different and make your home stand out, try snapping a few pictures of your home during twilight hours. The cotton candy colors of a dusk sky may complement your home and heighten the artistry of your pictures. When scrolling through a plethora of available listings, a different color scheme may catch a buyer’s eye and draw them into your home quickly. On many real estate listing platforms, a photo is the first impression and can effectively capture a potential audience.
Reasons to Consider Adding Twilight Photos to Your Listing:
Sellers can consider the following benefits to adding twilight photography to their listings:
- Certain home features appear more attractive when captured during sunset, such as exterior or landscape lighting, a swimming pool, or a deck with a fire pit.
- Twilight photos may work well for homes with many windows as they allow you to contrast the soft glow of interior lights with the darker sky.
- Shadows from trees or fences that show up and distract the eye in daylight photos will disappear during sunset.
- The color of your home exterior, landscaping, or hardscaping may look better at sunset.
- Homes in warmer climates, like Los Angeles or Miami, might benefit from including twilight photos in for-sale listings as they can help potential homebuyers envision themselves spending time on the deck or in a pool during evening hours.
*Photo courtesy of RealtyHop
Tips for Twilight Photos of Real Estate
Sellers can consider the following tips to capture high-quality twilight photographs of their property:
Use the Right Equipment
If you want to try to take the type of twilight photos real estate buyers will love, you’ll need a high-quality camera that can adjust to lower levels of light. Before investing in a camera, lenses, and other equipment like a tripod, consider how often you might use them after taking pictures of your house.
Those who wish to hire a professional real estate photographer can expect to pay an average of $120 per hour, according to Thumbtack. This upfront cost may save money over buying camera equipment that’s destined to collect dust in your basement.
Search for Inspiration
If you already own a high-quality camera and want to take your own real estate pictures, spend time reviewing online listings, also known as comps, before you schedule time for your photo shoot. Look at examples of pictures that capture your attention for inspiration. Study photos of homes similar to yours in style and price range. This can help determine if your twilight photo will stand out positively or if you should stick with a typical daytime image.
Spruce up Your Exterior
Next, analyze the scenes of your home you’d like to capture with a critical eye. You may even want to take a few sample pictures to determine if anything jumps out at you positively or negatively. Spend time staging and cleaning the outside of your home to increase curb appeal and enhance your real estate photos. Trim your landscaping or add drama with colorful flowers. Turn on exterior lights and move unsightly items out of the way to present a neat, uncluttered space.
Try Different Lighting and Angles
Once you start your twilight photoshoot, don’t just take the same picture repeatedly. Try different angles and lighting. You may have your heart set on a straightforward picture of the front of your home, only to find out that a more creative side-angle photo looks much better.
Edit appropriately
Editing can enhance your photos, but you don’t want your home to look different in pictures when compared to reality. Resist the urge to over-filter or photoshop items in and out of the picture. The touched-up photos might attract interested homebuyers, but you don’t want anyone disappointed when they pull up in front of your home. Try to present images of your home that will live up to the promise of what’s viewed online.
Conclusion
When finalizing your real estate images, always remember the goal of successfully selling your home. To attract a buyer, you may need to cast a wide net. Use photos that appeal to a greater number of people rather than striving for something too creative or artistic that could turn off the everyday buyer. Try to choose pictures that present your property in the best light, no matter what time of day they were taken. Successful twilight photos will enhance the beauty and architecture of your home while also encouraging potential buyers to click on a listing for additional information.
