The grot shot and the hot shot

Magazines and journalists are increasingly looking for the before and during shots of interior design projects. It's all very well looking at lovely, gorgeous afters, but it's far more fun to see the initial grot shot too, so you can really get a feel for the transformation which has taken place, when the hot shot is taken.

• Use a decent camera, and get some high resolution, high pixel shots in case local press can't send a photographer out.
  
• Remember to get the same angle of the room before, during and after, so test shots can be sent to magazines easily on email
• Get shots of the property before you start ripping it out, to get that lived in look.
• Visualise where you are planning to really make a statement - it's no good getting a before shot of the original kitchen if the new one is going in a totally different corner of the room and you didn't get a shot of the latter corner!
• Take portrait and landscape shots of each angle.
• If you can invest in a fisheye lens they do make rooms look bigger but go easy, as they can distort the room if overdone, and it looks like you are cheating (or were once an estate agent :-)
• You don't really need to pay someone to take fab pics, your own will do as the test shots to send off initially (and you can then take some lovely pics when the magazine dresses and lights your place on the day of the shoot!)
• Be extra nice to the photographer and he/she may let you have some of the images taken as long as you don't re-use them for print elsewhere (very bad manners and you could get sued!)