Lens for interior building shots?

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Veritas

Senior Member
We live in an historic home and our local heritage group wants to do a feature on it plus gather images for archival purposes. The house is really hard to shoot inside and the last time they wanted to do something like this they sent a fellow over with a point and shoot camera and I said uh huh...won't work. And it didn't. So I had to completely restage the house and do the shots myself with my way less than optimal mirrorless camera and they were better but not by a lot. This time I am going to take the pictures myself with my nifty new D7100.

Normally I would do the research but this just came up a couple days ago and they want something soon. Anyone have any recommendations? What sort of lens is available for the crop camera body that is the widest angle possible but stops short of being a fish eye? And what to I need to watch out for in terms of distortion/perspective? I haven't bought all my lenses yet--saving up for some--so all I have at present is a 50mm prime lens and a 55-200mm lens. If the necessary lens is too expensive I may have to rent it.

The other problem is lighting. The house can be dark in certain rooms, particularly in the oldest part of the house (ca 1700's) which was a frontier log cabin. If I can avoid artificial lighting I want to because I have zero experience with it and generally never even use the flash on a camera. But in this instance it might not be practical. I was at a friend's house during a photo shoot many years ago (she was having pictures shot for a B&B ad) and the photographer arrived with a mountain of equipment (we are talking pre digital) and reflectors and lights which he meticulously set up to shoot even the bright rooms. Hopefully that is not necessary here, but whatever I do, it has to result in uniform looking pictures whether there is lighting or not.

Cheers!
 
cwgrizz

cwgrizz

Senior Member
Challenge Team
I will start off by saying that a Tokina 11-16 f2.8 would probably be a good lens for this. I haven't done any real work as you are attempting, but I do own that lens and it performs well. At 11mm it may give some distortion, but usually easily corrected in post processing. It is a DX lens that will work very well on your D7100.
 
Horoscope Fish

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Veritas said:
We live in an historic home and our local heritage group wants to do a feature on it plus gather images for archival purposes. The house is really hard to shoot inside and the last time they wanted to do something like this they sent a fellow over with a point and shoot camera and I said uh huh...won't work. And it didn't. So I had to completely restage the house and do the shots myself with my way less than optimal mirrorless camera and they were better but not by a lot. This time I am going to take the pictures myself with my nifty new D7100.

Normally I would do the research but this just came up a couple days ago and they want something soon. Anyone have any recommendations? What sort of lens is available for the crop camera body that is the widest angle possible but stops short of being a fish eye? And what to I need to watch out for in terms of distortion/perspective? I haven't bought all my lenses yet--saving up for some--so all I have at present is a 50mm prime lens and a 55-200mm lens. If the necessary lens is too expensive I may have to rent it.

The other problem is lighting. The house can be dark in certain rooms, particularly in the oldest part of the house (ca 1700's) which was a frontier log cabin. If I can avoid artificial lighting I want to because I have zero experience with it and generally never even use the flash on a camera. But in this instance it might not be practical. I was at a friend's house during a photo shoot many years ago (she was having pictures shot for a B&B ad) and the photographer arrived with a mountain of equipment (we are talking pre digital) and reflectors and lights which he meticulously set up to shoot even the bright rooms. Hopefully that is not necessary here, but whatever I do, it has to result in uniform looking pictures whether there is lighting or not.

Cheers!
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I fully admit doing interior architectural shots is not my forte but, based on what little real-estate photography I've been roped into doing, I would HIGHLY suggest you get comfortable with the idea of using (at least one) off-camera flash if you want to get really good, really consistent results. Properly lit interiors are a going to be Job 1, even in what appear to the naked eye to be well-lit spaces and, simply put, that means using flash and most likely multiple flashes fired remotely. That being said if someone with in-depth knowledge on the topic can explain how good results can be had otherwise, I'll most certainly bow to their input.
 
B

Bikerbrent

Senior Member
I also as not an interior specialist but will off some general suggestions. First, you definitely want a wider lens than the 50mm (which will be 75mm on your d7100). Walt's suggestion of the Tokina is a good one. The Sigma10-20mm F3.5 EX DC HSM is also one to think about. What kind of flash equipment do you have? The built in flash is not ideal, but it may be useful if you add a diffuser. Do a google search on, "built in flash diffuser" and and will see some cheap DYI and commercial suggestions. If you ceilings are a light neutral or white color, a small inexpensive flash unit set up to do bounce flash will work pretty well. Also using it direct with a diffuser and mounted off camera would be a great solution.
 
V

Veritas

Senior Member
Bikerbrent said:
I also as not an interior specialist but will off some general suggestions. First, you definitely want a wider lens than the 50mm (which will be 75mm on your d7100). Walt's suggestion of the Tokina is a good one. The Sigma10-20mm F3.5 EX DC HSM is also one to think about. What kind of flash equipment do you have? The built in flash is not ideal, but it may be useful if you add a diffuser. Do a google search on, "built in flash diffuser" and and will see some cheap DYI and commercial suggestions. If you ceilings are a light neutral or white color, a small inexpensive flash unit set up to do bounce flash will work pretty well. Also using it direct with a diffuser and mounted off camera would be a great solution.
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That is a great idea. And based upon what Paul said I definitely see the logic in this. Many thanks for the tip.
 
V

Veritas

Senior Member
cwgrizz said:
I will start off by saying that a Tokina 11-16 f2.8 would probably be a good lens for this. I haven't done any real work as you are attempting, but I do own that lens and it performs well. At 11mm it may give some distortion, but usually easily corrected in post processing. It is a DX lens that will work very well on your D7100.
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Thanks--the Tokina lens sounds like one I would like to have. I will look into it!
 
D

Don Kuykendall_RIP

RIP :(
I have the Tokina 11-16 and use it on my D7100. It is a great lens for what you are doing. Any wide lens you are going to use will have some distortion. I use DxO Viewpoint 3 to correct all those problems.

Overview | DxO.com

I shoot in a mid 1800s factory documenting it before they renovate it. DxO Viewpoint really get all those lines and angles to look like it is supposed to.
 
V

Veritas

Senior Member
Bikerbrent said:
I also as not an interior specialist but will off some general suggestions. First, you definitely want a wider lens than the 50mm (which will be 75mm on your d7100). Walt's suggestion of the Tokina is a good one. The Sigma10-20mm F3.5 EX DC HSM is also one to think about. What kind of flash equipment do you have? The built in flash is not ideal, but it may be useful if you add a diffuser. Do a google search on, "built in flash diffuser" and and will see some cheap DYI and commercial suggestions. If you ceilings are a light neutral or white color, a small inexpensive flash unit set up to do bounce flash will work pretty well. Also using it direct with a diffuser and mounted off camera would be a great solution.
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Brent, the Sigma is selling for $399 new - says it is an "instant rebate" but they all seem to be going for that. The Tokina however, is (used) roughly the same price. I like it a lot from the specs, so guess I will see where I can find one quickly. I haven't used any post production software to correct distortion, so would not mind some quick tips on what to look for/do. I should be able to figure it out. Can I use Photoshop? I have CS6 and my daughter has a monthly subscription to all the Adobe creative products.
 
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V

Veritas

Senior Member
I am getting kind of excited about this. I love old buildings/historic homes. This should be fun, not to mention it is my latest excuse for buying some new equipment ;).
 
V

Veritas

Senior Member
cwgrizz said:
I will start off by saying that a Tokina 11-16 f2.8 would probably be a good lens for this. I haven't done any real work as you are attempting, but I do own that lens and it performs well. At 11mm it may give some distortion, but usually easily corrected in post processing. It is a DX lens that will work very well on your D7100.
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Walt--I went to the link and there is a newer version of the lens with autofocus/AF-S. Is that necessary with the D7100? The price point for the newer lens versus the older, used lens is not huge. Sometimes newer is not better, however...
 
V

Veritas

Senior Member
Don Kuykendall said:
I have the Tokina 11-16 and use it on my D7100. It is a great lens for what you are doing. Any wide lens you are going to use will have some distortion. I use DxO Viewpoint 3 to correct all those problems.

Overview | DxO.com

I shoot in a mid 1800s factory documenting it before they renovate it. DxO Viewpoint really get all those lines and angles to look like it is supposed to.
Click to expand...

Wow, DxO looks like a huge assist. I have wonky eyesight--nearsighted in one eye, farsighted in the other, and have two different types of astigmatism on top of that--so a product that can do this for me would be great. Thanks for the tip Don!
 
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lokatz

Senior Member
Veritas said:
Walt--I went to the link and there is a newer version of the lens with autofocus/AF-S. Is that necessary with the D7100? The price point for the newer lens versus the older, used lens is not huge. Sometimes newer is not better, however...
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The older one will serve you just as well. The main difference between the two is that the newer one now has a built-in focus motor, which the older one lacks. That makes the newer one suitable for Nikon's D3xxx/D5xxx cameras (and a few others) but makes no difference to you since the 7100 has a motor anyway. I've had the old version with my 7100 for a number of years and was happy with it.

One more thought: depending on the layout of your house, you may find that even that lens is not wide enough for you. If you are willing to do some fairly simple computer work, look for and download Microsoft ICE (Image Composite Editor), a free and fairly simple-to-use tool for putting together panoramas and even matrices of single shots. It'll allow you to, for example, take a series of 12 shots of 4 across in 3 rows, and composite all of them into one large image (without distortions!) in a very short time. The results are often stunning. Because ICE is such a great tool, you could even use a more standard lens, say, a Sigma 17-70 F2.8 (also cheap and very good optically) to do the job.
 
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V

Veritas

Senior Member
Awesome! I am off to order. And ICE sounds great! Wish I had known/thought about something like that when I tried to get a photo of the front of our house. I had to have a friend use a drone camera so we could get above the treeline and still take in the whole house.
 
D

Don Kuykendall_RIP

RIP :(
Veritas said:
Wow, DxO looks like a huge assist. I have wonky eyesight--nearsighted in one eye, farsighted in the other, and have two different types of astigmatism on top of that--so a product that can do this for me would be great. Thanks for the tip Don!
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The latest version of Viewpoint (3) is fantastic. It has auto settings for several categories that you can click and see if it does what you want. You can still fine tune many settings per photo to get it exactly like you want. I have found the auto settings do a good job on most photos.

I liked the Tokina 11-16 on my D7100 so much I bought the Tokina 18-24 which is the FX lens for my D750 That is approximately the same field of view. That lens stays on my camera more than any other lens.
 
L

lokatz

Senior Member
Veritas said:
Awesome! I am off to order. And ICE sounds great! Wish I had known/thought about something like that when I tried to get a photo of the front of our house. I had to have a friend use a drone camera so we could get above the treeline and still take in the whole house.
Click to expand...

Great. When taking shots, make sure to take them all from the same vanishing point. ICE will then give you different options to remove any distortion.
 
B

Blacktop

Senior Member
Veritas said:
I am getting kind of excited about this. I love old buildings/historic homes. This should be fun, not to mention it is my latest excuse for buying some new equipment ;).
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One thing to remember is, that when shooting with these Ultra Wide Angle lenses is to try and keep the camera straight as possible. Any upward or downward angle will amplify distortion. It can be fixed in post but it is best to keep distortion to a minimum to start with.
 
R

RocketCowboy

Senior Member
Blacktop said:
One thing to remember is, that when shooting with these Ultra Wide Angle lenses is to try and keep the camera straight as possible. Any upward or downward angle will amplify distortion. It can be fixed in post but it is best to keep distortion to a minimum to start with.
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Definitely this.

One of the first things people tend to look for when critiquing architectural photography is straight lines. An ultra wide lens tends to distort the walls closer to the edges already, and as Pete said ... any movement off level with the camera will magnify that distortion. And unlike Jimi Hendrix, distortion here isn't good. :D
 
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