Teresa 's Blog

Sunset silhouette

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 09:27:17 -0500

Sometimes I see a sunset that I want to shoot but there isn't anything to shoot except sunset. Just about anything will look nice as a silhouette with the sunset in the background. I got some gulls to pose for these shots. They work for popcorn.

I need four more words to make my 50 so here they are.

I love my wide angle lens, I hate my wide angle lens

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 12:40:46 -0500

For taking interior property photos a wide angle lens is a must. I don't know what more I can say about that. So I bought a wide angle lens. I was so excited when it came, I couldn't wait to use it.

It is a heavy lens. A 12-24 Tokina, that weighs 10 pounds. That is an exaggeration but it is heavy enough so that sometimes I leave it at home. It was also expensive and for about a year all I have used to for is property shots. I wanted to get more out of it. A friend convinced me that a wide angle lens can be fun. What is fun about having a lens that has to be held level and works best close up?

So I put the dang thing on my camera and left it on for a few days and made myself use it. On some of the photos I straightened the converging verticals and cropped off the distortion that occurs on each end of the shot when the lens is set as wide as it can go and on some I did not. I guess I am learning to like the lens of at least I am learning to get the most out of it. They are not cheap.

The lens is noce for shooting long trains. . . yah I know that doesn't come up very often unless you live by the river in St. Paul like I do.

I thought it would be fun to shoot a whole street so I did in the most colorful part of St. Paul, District Del Sol. It is a little distorted on one side but what the heck.

Taken from the river side of the science museum of Minnesota. The shot doesn't wow me but I have to admit I could not have gotten the building and the maze with any of my other lenses.

For this one I deliberatly took it at a wierd angle, just for fun. It is the Ordway Theater in downtown St. Paul.

Again with this one I chose an angle just for the heck of it.

I guess I will keep playing with it. If you own a wide angle lens for your business, take it out and play with it sometime. I still think it is more fun to use when my husband is with me and carries the camera bag.

The beauty of darkeness

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 07:58:54 -0500

Settings: Exposure 5 Aperture: f/11.0 Focal Length: 18 mm ISO Speed: 200

Under the Wabasha Bridge on Raspberry Island, on the Mississippi River looking at downtown St. Paul, MN

Exposure: 15 Aperture: f/22.0 Focal Length: 18 mm ISO Speed: 200

The Covington Inn a bed and breakfast docked on Harriet island.

The best time of day to take low light outdoor photos is just before the sun sets or before it rises, not when it is pitch black out. I get asked questions about the photos. Night shots are kind of a specialty and I wish I could go out every night. I include night shots with some of my listings and my clients love it. Those need to be taken at dusk and I have the sellers turn on all the lights.

The night shots are not all that hard to take it just takes patience. The star pattern that the lights make can be created using a special filter but I make them by using a lower shutter speed. On the bottom photo it was too slow and the upper photo is just about right. Usully and aperture size of 9 to 13 does that job when it is pitch black out, at dawn or dusk about 16 to 22 seems to work best. I usually have the ISO at 200 so the photos don't have a lot of noise in them. Each lens is different star pattern my wide angle lens makes an eight point star.

I can't take these shots without a tripod. sometimes I don't have one with me and I can get by with setting my camera on a flat surface, or I use a monopod, but a tripod works best. I also use a remote so that I don't have to touch the camera. The slightest vibration will ruin the shot. Camera remotes are inexpensive, I have two of them one is cordless and the other has a cable. The remote with the cable is the one that I use the most, because it give me the most control. The self timer on the camera can be used instead of a remote but it takes a lot more battery power.

I have seen people use a flash for night shots but I don't. It doesn't take any fancy equipment to take night shots. Most point and shoot cameras have a night setting. I tried the night settings on my DSLR camera once and didn't like the result and have not tried it since.

When I travel I carry a light weight monopod. I just bought a new one yesterday that weighs less than a pound It isn't ideal for night shots but I can get by with it. Airport security doesn't always understand monopods so sometimes I get my bag unpacked and repacked courtesy of TSA. **Travel tip: Put the monopod on top so they don't have to dig through the case to find it, they don't do a very good job repacking.

There aren't many people who like to go out at night and shoot. I have traveled all over the country and I often end up going out alone, unless I am attending a conference and Kristal Kraft is there. Sometimes the people I am traveling with advise against it but it is so irresistable to me that I end up doing it anyway. I understand cities at night and they feel safe to me as long as they are well lit and there are people roaming around, and I have to say I have met some interesting people that way. They see the camera and they want to talk, I stop and chat. I plan to spend most of a night out shooting the transit system in the twin cities this summer and will be spending next Sunday night shooting the in chicago. If you see me please don't run me over.

Photo Contest - A picture is worth 1000 words and $200.00

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 11:42:44 -0500

Inman news is having a photo contest.

"Send us your best single photo that captures the state of the residential real estate market, for a chance to win a $200 gift card from Amazon.com. Your photo submission should be in digital form and must be sent via e-mail or available for viewing on the Web. The photo can be color or black and white. The photo should tell a story about the housing market and it should not be a marketing or promotional photo for a particular property, company, business model or individual. The contest deadline is March 31, 2009."

See the complete rules here: Inman News Photo contest

I can't enter because I am one of the judges.

I got the picture of the power lines in Central Illinois. It was a very lucky shot as it was taken from the car window. I wasn't driving but we were going about 70 at the time. I focused and put my camera in burst mode. Burst mode comes in handy. It works for capturing sporting events and some times in low light situations, or when taking photos from a moving car.

This must be localism

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 19:40:24 -0600

These photos were taken locally, by a local resident, me. They are in black and white because we are in a depression and I can't afford color any more. These pictures may be offensive to those who live in the burbs or those who live in warmer climates.

They saved Mickey's dinner, sometimes the little guy does win. The 1940's art deco street car stood in the way of progress but the City of St. Paul in their infinite wisdom made the insurance company stop building so Mickey's could stay.

The man sits on the bench on West 7th plaza in downtown St. Paul, eating a bagel. The white speckles on the bench are pigeon poop. It is on the bench because there are a lot of pigeons on the plaza eating bagel crumbs.

W.A. Frosts on the corner of Selby and Dale. You just can't get any more St. Paul than this. They have a lovely patio but I didn't bother taking a photo because it is winter and no one is using it.

One of the lovely homes in St. Paul in the cathedral hill neighborhood. The roundish thingy to the left is the cathedral. This photo screams St. Paul so you might want to cover your ears.

Hardware on a brick building downtown. When I stopped to take this shot the people I was with thought I was kind of nutty. They have probably thought that for a long time now but the truth is I will stop to take a photo of a random water valve from time to time.

I love where I live even though there is pigeon poop and it is cold out and I can't afford color any more.

More fun with HDR

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 07:46:32 -0600

HDR is a photo processing Technique, also called HDRI, for High dynamic range imagining. Three or more photos, each with a different exposure value, are combined into one photo. The process brings out details that don't show up in a single photo. I use photomatix to process the photos. All of the photos were taken with a camera.

Como Park Coservatory in St. Paul

Cafesjian’s Carousel, at Como Park in St. Paul

The officers quarters at Fort Snelling in St. Paul

The Minneapolis central Library in Minneapolis, MN taken from the second floor, using my trusty wide angle lens, the kind that every Realtor who takes interior property photos should have.

Learning . . Experimenting and Learning more

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 19:19:47 -0600

About nine months ago I wrote a post about high dynamic range photography, commonly referred to as HDR, or HDRI. It is a photo processing technique where several photos are combined to create a photo that is something more. It has not been easy for me to learn. I bought a book which has been helpful: "Complete Guide to High Dynamic Range Digital Photography" The book is not all that easy to use but has amazing photos in it and it helped me get started.

I am using a program called Photomatix Pro to process the photos, and I am shooting them all in the RAW format. The process can make the photos look cartoonish. As I am learning how to create these photos I am also learning which type of photos it works the best with. Here are some of my latest.

This one is a bit extreme. Taken at City Center in Minneapolis. It was an OK shot to begin with but the windows in the background were just a white blob. The HDR processing brought out the windows and even the buildings in the background. I combined five photos. I used a wide angle lens which is kind of fun in a wide open space.

This photo isn't so extreme, it was taken at Mears Park in St. Paul. I have taken this shot many times and I have never gotten what I wanted. It is a place I go to often and really enjoy. Located right in the heart of the lowertown art district in our downtown. There is a band shell with live music in the summer. The HDR processing brought out the leaves on the trees and other details that seem to disappear. Five photos were used to create this.

On this photo I used HDR to bring out the reflections in the water and to make the Lillie stand out. I combined three photos and I did very little processing. The photo was taken at Como Park Conservatory in St. Paul.

This one is a little more extreme. I took it yesterday on my way home from a meeting. I had to drive by Oakland Cemetery, one of the oldest grave yards in St. Paul. I like to photograph it in the winter because I love the old oak trees and the way the tombstones look in the snow. Strange I know but we all have our little quirks. I used three photos to create it and did a lot of processing.

These photos don't come close to being as wonderful as the photos I find on the interent but who knows maybe with more practice and better photos mine will improve. HDR can be used for property photos. I am thinking the less extreme processing will work the best.

Got Loft?

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 21:43:06 -0500

I wrote this post a few months ago but neglected to put the 50 words in it that are needed for points. Can you imagine that this would not count as a blog post? There is a lot going on with it but heck I don't make the rules and I mostly don't follow them either which is why I sometimes end up with pointless blog posts.

Some things in life are free

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 16:09:19 -0500

Here in Minnesota we have seasons. They occur every year no matter what. Enjoying the seasons is free. Recession proof and depression proof. Most of the best things in life can't be bought, but you already new that. This year is no different. Well I guess it is different in some ways but I really don't want to write about it just now. I guess I could but I just used up my 50 words and so any more words would not make a difference.

Sugar maple.

The old Oak trees in Oakland cemetery, a great place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there.

The walking paths along the Mississippi River - Upperlanding park -

My neighbors fence, I almost never hit it when I back out of my drive.

Sights and Sounds of RNC 2008

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 19:18:14 -0500

The Republican National Convention starts tomorrow. There isn't a lot of real estate being sold this weekend and I have listings that are inside the safety zone and will be unavailable to show during the convention. I live about 1/2 a mile from the main event. I have been giving directions to lost Republicans as I walk down the street with my camera. Here are some of the photos I have taken in the last day or so.

Either a reporter or the CIA, lurking in front of a local resturant

Law enforcement are every where. They seem to travel in groups of 4 and they rented all of these nifty green jeeps.

This was the Xcel Center yesterday. I couldn't get nearly as close today.

Local antique shop, has a sign that says: "look political display".

Roads and sidewalks are blocked off. There have been protests, and some arrests. There will be some larger protests after the convention starts.

Photo taken through the fence. CNN is to the right. They have taken over the Eagle Grill and remnamed it the CNN Grill. The sign in the window says "CNN Brew since 2008"

Local buisinesses in the immediate area are getting some good traffic. We all hope that convention attendees will tip well.

Have a great labor day!

Guide Spot

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 07:38:31 -0500

With almost every listing I try an experiment. I use my normal online marketing and I add something new. If it works, or helps sell the listing I keep using it. I found this site a few weeks ago for making guides and decided to try it. It is called Guide Spot.

Very easy to use, I didn't need to read any instructions. I can take my photos and put them on maps. For some of the local attractions there are already descriptions written which saves some time.

The only problem I had is when I tried to add new addresses, they didn't always show up in the right place on the map.

Home buyers like pictures, and want more pictures. This gives me a way of showing what the home looks like and the neighborhood, and one more place to use the photos I take. Check it out and try it on one of your listings.

Loft Photography

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 18:17:56 -0500

Sometimes I just have too much fun. Lofts are fun to photograph. They have huge windows and a lot of light. I like to take my property shots using natural light. I warm up the photo or cool it down by adjusting the temperature when I process it.

It is possible to take a small loft and get ten or more photos of it. The trick is to mentally divide it into seperate spaces. Maybe there is a desk in the corner so I will shoot it seperatly and just show the area around the desk. For this loft I have 20 photos.

Taking pictures of rooms is a huge challnege, I find most anything to be easier to shoot than a room. When this one is put on the market I will incude a link with more information about it, just in case the general pbulic really does look at active rain.

Details about unit #507, 9th Street Lofts

304 Exchange Street #3

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 06:58:50 -0500

304 Exchange Street This renovated mansion has three units in it. Unit 3# is on the top floor. The deck on the back is kind of like having a tree house. This unit is very cute and it has a new furnace and air conditioning unit. It has a one car garage behind it and it is just half a block from Irvine park.

Minnesota Wildflowers

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 06:58:09 -0500

Here in St. Paul we have many large and small city parks. I am finding wildflowers in them and started taking pictures of them. I ended up with so many pictures that I started a Minnesota wildflower blog. When I find pictures of flowers online often they are not labeled, or if they are they are labeled with the wrong name or simply called "yellow flower". I ended up buying a book about local wildflowers so that I can identify more of them. I found some resources on the Internet for identifying flowers and included links in the sidebar of my blog.

The Minnesota wildflower blog is just a way of publishing and labeling the photos. I noticed that it started getting traffic from google immediately. The traffic is coming from people like me who are trying to identify flowers. The blog is just a hobby and more of a web site than a blog. When I have a picture I post.

Blue Vervain

Black eyed susan

Butterfly weed

I Like to Shoot Ducks

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 10:27:48 -0500

I like to shoot ducks because they don't shoot back. These were taken at our local city zoo, the Como park zoo, on a cloudy morning. The ducks in the pond are very tame. The water lillies are blooming too.

I am not exactly sure how to make this a 50 word post. I always struggle with that. We all know that brevity is the soul of wit and that one picture is worth a thousand words. OK, done, that must be 50 words.

At the Zoo

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 11:47:21 -0500

Most cities have zoo's. I don't go very often but last week my neice and nephew were visiting so I took them to como park zoo just for the heck of it. I can't remember what it is they were fighting about but it seemed like they had a good time, but they did get on aunties last nerves when they started arguing about who started arguing. I guess my kids did that too. We have a very nice Zoo and this summer there is a wonderful butterfly exhibit. I am going to go back alone as soon as I get the chance and take more pictures.

Want to see more of St. Paul, MN? visit my photo albums on the St. Paul Real Estate Blog.

Spring comes to St. Paul

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Wed, 07 May 2008 11:09:12 -0500

I know I complain during the winter about being cold and having to show houes when it is "I can't stand it" below zero, but there are many reasons why I love living in St. Paul, and spring is one of those reasons.

In the spring the grass turns green again and people come out and walk or ride along the bike paths. I get to see my neighbors again. The shipping seasons has started so I can hear the boat horns again too.

In the spring the tables and umbrellas come back outside. We like to eat outside.

People plant flowers every where.

I grow flowers every where. These are the tulips in front of my house.

The trees are getting leaves on them and everything looks wonderful. I guess the landmark center always looks wonderful.

Saturday Night in St. Paul

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:31:32 -0500

Quiet down along the river. Too early in the season for those wonderful moon light cruises.

The Ordway is packed.

There is a Minnesota Wild game going on at the Xcel center and a large roof top tail gate party on the parking ramp.

The local bars in and around downtown are packed.

Fun to walk around on a Saturday night and take pictures. Now that the weather is warmer the streets are full of activity again.

They don't build them like this any more

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 16:11:30 -0500

St. Paul Cathedral, St. Paul, Minnesota. I never get tired of photographing this building, both inside and out. Built in 1905, Emmanuel Louis Masqueray, a French architect trained at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, was selected to design what we know today as the fourth Cathedral of Saint Paul. The church is made of Granite stone from St. Cloud, MN

The Cathedral's most prominent feature is a 120-foot-wide dome made of curved steel beams, covered with a clay tile surface and overlaid with copper. A copper-clad lantern, approximately 30 feet tall, sits on top of the dome. From the base to the very top of the lantern, the Cathedral stands 306 feet tall.

I am working on getting some more pictures of the interior. They don't allow tripods so it has been tough to get good shots in low light.

High dynamic range imaging

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 09:48:29 -0500

High dynamic range imaging, HDR. Just playing around with it. The photo was taken at dusk and is of the Wabasha bridge which spans the Mississippi River in downtown St. Paul. HDR is a photo processing technique where multiple photos are combined. This photo is made from three photos of the same scene. The techique allows the photograph to contain more than the human eye can see.

The technique has gotten more popular. It does take some software and some computing power. I like to think of it as what happens when geeks start using digital cameras.

I am so confused

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 14:54:10 -0600

Did I just join a group on a social network for people who belong to another social network?

**more**

Here I am pouring my heart out to my virtual friends who hang out with me on numerous social networks and no one understands my confusion. I don't understand why one social network would form a group, made up of people from another social network. Bye see you on twitter.

Como Park Conservatory

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 06:55:22 -0600

Another great place to go on a cold day. The fern room is not a good place to take a camera because it is so damp inside. Not a cold damp but a warm damp, which is nice because we have enough cold here in Minnesota. The McNeely Conservatory at Como park is free. They ask for a $2.00 donation. It is a great place to go anytime but during the cold winter months people tend to linger.

The plant is called "little wart" funny name for such a beautiful flower.

Painted daisies.

Pictures and Numbers

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 16:40:28 -0600

An unusual photo essay even for me. I did not have to drive far to get the pictures and they are not pretty pictures. They are pictures of dispair, and of urban decay. There are more pictures like this each month.

There are currently 1624 registered vacant building in St. Paul, MN. The number goes up every month, and many of them are in foreclosure. Of the 2009 single family homes currently on the market 716 or about 36% of them are in some stage of foreclosure. Many of the homes that are in some stage of foreclosure that are on the market are vacant but not registered , many do not have for sale signs in front of them .

The data used to determine how many homes are on the market in various stages of foreclosure came from the MLS. Since listings are not categorized as foreclosures much of the data had to be gone through manually looking for phrases like "bank owned", "corporate owned", or "subject to bank approval".

Banks can not sell real estate. They do not have the staff or the know how. My clients make good offers on the vacant properties and have to wait so long for a response that they move on. The homes remain vacant.

First time home buyers who would like to live in some of the vacant homes can not get financing for them. This is only the begining. It will get much worse before it gets better.

Now I have new neighbors in St. Paul who own property here but live far away. They are not responsible property owners. They are banks, they can't sell real estate. I watch as our housing stock decays under their ownership.

Also see The Man on the West Coast
When the Bank is the seller

Birds of the Skyway

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 05:39:51 -0600

Downtown St. Paul has about 5 miles of indoor skyways connecting the buildings. In the wonter when it is cold out and I want to go for a walk without freezing I head for the skyways. I only wish I could bring my dog with, she would love it.

Walking in doors might not seem like fun but it is. Here is some of the wild life that can be found in the skyway between the trade center and the children's musuem of Minnesota.

Not all of the skyways are open on Sunday so the trick is to not get stuck in a dead end and have to turn around or go outside to get to the next building. Some of the skyways are heated and some are not. Some are full of people and others are empty. Most are well lit and much more pleasant than walking out side in the cold.

Property Marketing with Flickr Toys

Teresa Boardman (Saint Paul Home Realty) — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 05:48:06 -0600

If the word "Toy" is involved I am all over it.

The picture for the magazine cover is of a Murial in the lobby.

A Mosaic of the pictures I have uploaded into Flickr. Check out Flickr toys. The loft is for sale. The price has been reduced to $129,899.

Where is this loft? Downtown St. Paul Map

Basic Info:

Taxes: $406
Association Dues: $130 - low monthly dues cover all untilities.
Air Conditioning: Central
Parking: Surface lot

About 550 Square feet of finished living space. Gourmet kitchen has marble counter tops, all new appliances, and a large window. The unit has exposed brick and timber, large windows, ceramic tile floors, and 11 foot ceilings. New renovation, formerly apartments, but originally a carriage factory.

More Pictures of Downtown St. Paul

To see this unit: call Teresa at 651-216-4603 or email: Teresa(at)Tboardman.com