Hi John,

 what camera do you use?

Nice photos. How do you get the warm feeling from a home that empty? My clients do not want to pay for staging. 

Hey John,

Glad to see your first post is up!  Hope you enjoy the Rain!

If I may address Donna Oehler's comment (hope you don't mind John), "how to get a warm feeling from a home that is empty".

You really can't do it without some furniture and accessories.  People have a hard time envisioning an empty room as "warm", rooms appear smaller and every detail is exposed. 

I'm not going to link the post here but Donna, please check out my blog on "Redemption for the Soulless- Staging Saves a Vacant House".  There are some tips for you and your sellers on what you can do yourself to get your vacant from COLD to SOLD. It doesn't have to cost a fortune.

When a client says, " I don't want to pay for X" in order to get my house ready for sale, I always say you may not want to pay now, but you will later, in holding two mortgages in many cases as the vacant sits month after month (in some cases here year!), the utilities, landscape and general upkeep for showing the house.  Staging is an INVESTMENT just like a good paint job or new carpet, proactive sellers in this difficult market understand that. Why not put your best foot forward when the time is crucial? The first 2 weeks after listing.

Karen is right you need furniture to add warmth, an empty room is a cold start don't make it worse by using a camera with a flash. To answer Randy I use a nikon D70 for my homes.  Thanks for the feedback and I'll talk with everyone later.

John I wanted to just add that what you wrote,

"So as  your professional photographer, my goal is to not only show the house but the feeling of the house as well."

Is so important! Good quality photos can achieve that.  Thanks again for everything and I look forward to building our businesses together!

Hello John: Welcome to Active Rain. As Karen has spoken so highly of you, it is nice to finally "meet" you. Thank you for the information about how to warm up the look of the photos. I haven't been able to find a professional photographer that doesn't charge an arm and leg here yet, so I invested in a good camera (Nikon D40 - not the best, but light years ahead of the camera it replaced) and a tripod, so I could turn off the flash and not wind up with blurry photos. I look forward to reading your future blogs.

hello Michelle Minch If you can invest in a bogen tripod or something large and learn your white balance and how that can change the room Temperature you will have perfect photos.   Try using 15 to 20 of a second exposures. Fluorescent light is green, Incandescent light is blue.  Your best to leave lights on and counter this green or blue with your white balance.  If you you have alot of sun use that.  Good luck and let me know how it goes!

John McConnell

Thanks for the tips, John. I will use them on my next staging. I see you are starting to get this blogging thing down.

Karen Otto your work is amazing and easy to showcase, I look forward to building or business together as well THANKS FOR EVERYTHING YOU DO!

We make a good team John! : )

Welcome John! Your photos are wonderful. My sweet friend Karen let me know you were here so I just had to pop in. I'm so glad I did. I love your work!

Hello Yvonne Its a pleasure to meet you!  My favorite part of the world is where you work that's great, your very lucky I have many photos of Northern Arizona!  I have family in Sedona,  Karen is such a great friend I feel blessed to have her as one.  Have a great day I look forward to talking with you more soon!

John McConnell

Well thanks John, We do like it here too. Sedona and all the surrounding area always seems to me as if it is a photograph waiting for a photographer to snip it out of time. When you get a chance you may want to put up some of your landscape photos on your blog. You know there are folks like me who will always enjoy the pleasure of seeing the results of good work. 

Hello Anthea pleasure to meet you, she's to kind! I couldn't do it without her! LOL  Thanks for your comment.

Actually John, incandescent light is not blue.  It is yellow and is corrected by adding blue.

Great post, John!  And FABULOUS photos!  We are so pleased to have you here!

I used to take great photos with my 35mm cannon rebel (film, not digital), but now that I moved to digital (Nikon), a lot of the pictures have turned out grainy.  I have brought my camera in to see what I have been doing wrong, and they couldn't tell me anything!  Any advise?   Also, do you bring portable lighting kits to your homes that ? 

I can't wait to hear your input!

FIRST I'll comment on Ansel's comment,  your right the photo will turn a blue due to the yellow light from the light on an sunlight white balance blue to counter incandescent and magenta to counter florescent.  Sorry for that mess up!  thanks for the help!

Kristina Mosloski, KFM Staging & Design  It sounds to me that your ISO is set HIGH make sure it stays at 400 or below and I wouldn't go above 200.  Use a tripod and a longer exposure.   I'm sure you've checked the quality of your images LOW, MED and HIGH make sure your on High and that you have a camera with at least 4magapixals  Let me know if its not your ISO and I'll look into it more!  Give me the model camera you have?  THanks have a great day!

John McConnell

Fabulous shots!  I have been staging for 4 years and take my own lousy pictures.  Finally after all this time I just received an email from a photographer who shot a house we staged and sent us a proof sheet...we could buy any shots we wanted for $15.00 each.  I was thrilled.  The photos were so good and so easy to buy them.  The pictures make such a difference for the agent marketing the property online and for our portfolios on our web sites as well.  

Donna Lynch; Welcome Home Furniture Rental & Staging

THATS GOOD news I charge $125 per house and give about 20 or 30 shots per house.    But you don't pick through them you get them all. LOL  THIS GUY IS EITHER IS REALLY PROUD OF HIS WORK or works to hard to get them.  Each house should only take an hour to shoot!   BUT pictures are very importaint in this market so glad you have them!  Talk with you later!  THANKS DONNA!

John

If you want warm pictures you can always just change the col.effect (color effect) to warm.