The Photography Specialist is often called upon for needs related to commercial buildings, properties for sale, progress photos for properties under construction, or simply when a professional image is needed such as for use in an annual report, a board meeting, and for common marketing purposes.
Many architectural images by TPS have been published in The Orange County Register.
What makes a professional image, and why hire a professional when your friend has a nice DSLR? Good question. First of all, a high-quality camera and sensor is the key along with professional grade lenses which combined, give the client a much sharper, crisper image than your standard consumer-grade DSLR's. This also allows for larger prints and for tighter custom cropping to your specifications. Moreover, the exposure latitude with high end cameras provide incredible dynamic range, as shown in the images you see on this page.
Before the general processing even begins, every pixel is manually polished. That's right, TPS goes further by visually scanning the images at the individual pixel size and manually "polishing pixels" to look for any fine dust spots or other anomalies to clean up. In addition, the camera sensor is cleaned and calibrated on a regular schedule to help avoid this time-consuming process. We could stop right here, but there's much more.
Additionally, TPS uses a special technique to pull more detail out of every image in both the light and the dark areas, so you do not get the standard blown-out highlights or very dark shadows common in a standard photo. All cameras have a very limited dynamic range compared to the human eye (and digital much more so than film), and by taking multiple images of the same scene at various exposures, TPS subtly manipulates the high-contrast areas with professional HDR imaging software that allows manual adjustments to every image, bringing out the details and balancing the overall exposure for print to mimic what the human eye actually sees.
Wide-angle camera distortion is evident in many photos you see from other photographers. Another TPS advantage is applied lens correction. Many times a wide angle lens is required to get the full view needed in a fairly tight space. TPS uses lens correction software to straighten the walls, building, trees, lightposts etc so they aren't "leaning" due to that distortion. There are some photographers that use "automatic" lens correction software which simply identifies the lens and adjusts the image accordingly, but the results are sloppy as it makes only a small effort to do so and routinely arrives at less than 50% correction. A manual correction is always necessary for a true image representation.
It's important to understand the technical advantages that go in to a professional image created by TPS, but experience is the backbone of every output. John has 30 years of professional photography experience. In addition, with over 20 years experience in Photoshop you can be sure that if the building requires a new paint job, or if you need a tree uprooted or leaves picked up off the ground, well, it's all done for you in the TPS post-processing. Take a look at the before and after sample below, and then note the final image delivered to clients taste.
When you can't afford to settle for less, that's when you need TPS!
Laminated, mounted prints complete with graphics come ready to hang. All prints are discounted with digital file purchase.