What Poor Photos Cost You
The first cost is actual money. Not completely documenting damages with images always cost you in lost labor and/or parts purchases. If you can see it then you can get an image of it so, why don’t you? An insurance payment is not all you stand to lose. What about liability? The liability that you may face if someone is hurt or killed in an accident where a repair may have played a part. The ability to show complete visual evidence of the damages, repair processes and quality control may prevent a court date.
What about time? Poor images cost body shops billions of dollars in wasted time. Just follow an estimating blog on social media and you quickly find out that most estimators spend a great deal of their time negotiating with claims adjusters. Completely documenting all the damage with images greatly increases the percentage of covered repairs and reduces time negotiating with insurance companies. Better customer service as estimators do not have to bring the customer into those negotiations. What about the time technicians spend advising estimators what they missed on the estimate? It is the job of the estimator to understand how the vehicle is repaired, what methods are used in repairing the vehicle and how to properly apply OEM and industry guidelines to the repair estimate and plan.
Photography Skills
Taking good quality images that accurately and completely capture all of the damage, required repair processes and finished quality of the repair work, requires knowledge of your camera’s settings and practice to achieve. It is not as simple as pointing your device at the vehicle and pressing the shutter button. While todays cameras and smartphones have done a fantastic job of simplifying the complexities of the older cameras, knowledge of proper lighting, achieving proper focus and knowing how to frame the image correctly, are all important skills to learn and practice.
We don’t want to give you the impression that we are advocates for any one device to take your images. Each device has its pros and cons that should be weighed and considered before making the final decision. Ultimately, it is up to the individual management at the shop to determine what is best for that particular shop. What we do advocate for, is getting to know the device you are using very well. Learn how to use all of the features of the device. ISO or exposure settings, the flash settings, knowing how to focus where you need it to focus, the zoom or telephoto feature, the close-up or macro feature etc. Once you know and understand all of the settings of the device you are using and when to use them, you will be well on your way to taking higher quality images.
Consider the Lighting Source
On any given day, an estimator may take images in many lighting sources such as; outside in the sun, inside under fluorescent lighting and within the various compartments of the vehicle that are dark. Using the same settings in each situation will not produce the same outcome. For instance, many times, the built-in flash can work against you when you are trying to show the severity of a dent in a panel. The flash can actually “fill in” some of the shadows that you need to show. Think about this, if your daughter was getting married would you hire a photographer or just have everyone at the wedding share the images they took? The reason we hire a photographer is because of their skill. The skill of knowing how to frame the subject of the photo and adjusting to the conditions is necessary for the estimators in the same way.
Look at the image in Photo 1, the camera automatically chooses a focal point (subject) and, because of the bright sunlight behind the image, adjusts the ISO, reducing the amount of light into the camera, causing a large shadow to hide the damage. The subject of the image is very under exposed, while the surrounding area is correctly exposed. In Photo 2, the focal point was adjusted by the photographer to increase the amount of light and remove the large shadow. The subject of the image is exposed correctly, while the surrounding areas are overexposed.