- Well, with this much equipment,
you often need some way to pay for it.
Now you don't need all of this gear,
but panoramic photography,
particularly 360 degree panoramic photography,
is on the higher end of commercial photography.
And it's often used for professional results.
Now Ron, you shoot this a lot for clients.
What are some of the applications,
or use cases, for 360 degrees?
- Well, we've all seen some of the examples,
like in homes that we're considering,
in resorts that we're considering maybe.
They're using them now for interiors of cars
and for hospitals and for every street
being captured in the world by Google.
So the 360 degree photography's really taking off.
- So with these types of applications,
there's different shoot scenarios, but it really breaks down
to making sure that you capture everything that you need.
Let's break that down a little bit.
For real estate, the ability to actually see
the interior of a home could be pretty important.
Now, real estate is a pretty high priced item,
and you want people to be confident.
When I talk to realtors,
one of the things they hate the most
is actually having to take people out to homes.
They walk right through the front door,
and within 30 seconds, they go, "No, this won't work."
So if you can cut down on all of that traffic
and just get it so that people who are really
interested in buying can see it,
it's gonna improve confidence.
How about a situation like a hotel or a resort?
How could they use this to drum up more business?
- They could show the resort in its best light.
Another interesting use that maybe most people
aren't thinking of is the banquet space,
where someone can view the banquet space
prior to showing up just to make sure
that they're more likely to be interested in that space.
They could also see that when it's set up as a room,
rather than an empty room when they walk in physically.
- So if you're looking
to capture a location that's photogenic,
or is really something that's hard to visualize,
the ability to create a virtual tour,
or really showcase that space, goes a long way.
Plus, if you're looking to make great prints,
well, there's a lot that can be done with this.
I've seen people take 360 degree photography,
print it out, and wallpaper rooms with it,
make interactive presentations for online.
It really just comes down to immersive images.
And remember, if you're using commercial photography
to sell a product, the more immersive the technology,
the more it holds the viewer's attention,
the more likely it is to convert into a sale.
Now, with this Ron, give this just a little
high-level thought process.
When you're hired for a commercial job,
obviously you can't tell everybody the pricing model,
but what are the basics
with commercial photography and panoramics?
- Pricing is a lot like normal photography.
We start with a day rate,
and then a charge per panoramic image,
and I think that's fairly standard in the industry now.
Then we do scouting, and we decide on the shot list,
and we spend the time on property to capture.
That shoot can be done, depending on the size of the job,
can be done in one, two, three days.
Afterward, there's a considerable post-processing,
so it may be some weeks before that final delivery is done.
But I think our business is much like
other types of photography and photographers,
where the same rules apply.
- And once that's all done, you have to of course
budget though for more post-production time.
This isn't like apply a Lightroom preset
and you're done, right?
- That's right, yeah, the bigger jobs, the more time.
With some of the tools that are improving all the time,
we can do more with batch processing,
but personally, I think post-production is important
to work on each individual one, so that is an issue.
- Alright, well you got the idea a little bit
on commercial use, let's move on
to some more personal uses that are bringing
360 degree panoramic photography to the masses.