indoor real estate pictures

Totally clueless. I have a nikkon d60 and i'm looking for a lens to shoot indoor real estate pics, one that

would especially help with smaller rooms? Make the pics looks wider and/or brighter? Maybe a wide angle lens?

Don't want to spend a fortune, but would love some help on picking the right lens. Thanks so much in advance!

<p>tokina 11-16/2.8 is the brightest DX ultrawide but you will need to manual focus with a d60. next brightest is sigma 10-20/3.5. assuming you want to shoot natural/ambient light. if you can use flash, then the widest DX UWA is the sigma 8-16.</p>

<p>You want some sort of 10-24mm DX type lens. I would get one with an AF motor built into the lens so that you get auto focus, and you need a decent tripod to shoot from that. Typical real estate images for the purpose of selling residental houses do not require a lot of quality. Stopping down the lens to f8 to get more depth of field should get the job done; you don't need f2.8. That is why a tripod helps.</p>

<p>If you are shooting for architecture magazines, that would be a different story.</p>

<p>If you're on a budget, stitching multiple overlapping exposures in software is an entirely acceptable solution for wide views. </p>

<p>Use a tripod under low light and blending 2 exposures under high contrast situations are also acceptable options. </p>

<p>Which 10-24mm DX lens and f8 specifically would you recommend? Thanks</p>

<p>Tokina 11-16 works great for this, so do the 10-24 lenses mentioned. On a budget, the Sigma 10-20 is very popular.</p>

<p>I think even the relatively cheap Tokina 12-24 would be wide enough, if you're on a budget.</p>

<p>With a D60 body, I would avoid the Tokina 11-16mm/f2.8 since you will not have AF. Nikon makes a decent 10-24mm/f3.5-5.6 DX AF-S, but that is a $900 lens and could be an overkill. If cost is a consideration, I would choose among the Sigma 10-20mm and Tokina 12-24mm/f4, 2nd version with AF motor.</p>

<p>In theory an 11mm lens on a DX camera will be able to take in all of <em>any</em> room. The horizontal angle-of-view is over 90 degrees, so if you back into a corner the lens will cover most of the room. The problem with a lens this wide is that you have to keep the camera dead level for the walls to appear square and true. </p>

<p>Flash will not help with a very wideangle lens because you won't be able to light the room evenly with a single flashgun, especially one stuck on top of the camera. You're better off buying a tripod instead and relying on natural light or the electrical room lighting. A tripod will let you get the camera further into corners as well. Also, you might want to acquaint yourself with the exposure compensation feature of your camera. Usually, if you point the camera towards a window the interior of the room will be made to look dark. Applying some + exposure compensation will help make the room look lighter.</p>

<p>How are your shots with the stock zoom lens set to 18mm?<br>

Your stock camera is already considerably wider the typical camera used by other real estate professionals. <br>

You might look into getting an external flash to brighten up the room with your lens set to 18mm. As Rodeo Joe points out, going wider and making the whole room brighter at the same time is likely to be tough.</p>