It’s fair to say that the job of a home inspector is far from being convenient. It involves several stages, each with its fair share of difficulties. From checking structural components like the roof and the foundation to the electrical system, the plumbing or safety issues like CO detectors and smoke alarms, the tasks are quite diverse and challenging. And it doesn’t stop there, as any check-up has to be followed by a detailed property inspection report and photos that depict as accurate as possible the condition of the property.
In the past this might have caused concern due to the lack of suitable tools to streamline the processes, but not today. Now it’s quite easy to find apps that can help professionals in this industry substantially improve their productivity. As a property inspector you have to take dozens of shots of both the exterior and the interior, shots which require some post-processing work. And this is where a bulk photo editing tool steps in and makes your job considerably easier.
Add a Customized Date/Time Stamp
Having a date stamp on your photos is important to illustrate the exact condition of the property at the time it was inspected and also to keep a better track of your activity. All modern cameras enjoy this feature and can print such information on the image. But there are some major drawbacks if you opt for this alternative. First of all, once you apply the stamp, it stays there, you can’t remove it. Second of all, you won’t be able to set the position of the stamp or adjust things like color or size.
In this case the optimal solution is to transfer the images from the digital camera on your computer and create backups. Then use a specialized tool to stamp them in complete accordance with your preferences in terms of placement, size, font, color or transparency. In addition to that, you can add a stroke or shadow effect and select the exact date and time format you prefer. There’s no need to worry if your camera has incorrectly recorded the date and time: you can fix this error by simply adding or subtracting from seconds to years.
Resize Multiple Images in No Time
In order to properly exemplify both the strengths and weaknesses of a home, you have to take multiple photos from various angles. The only issue here is that these photos have larger sizes than we would want and hence tend to take up too much space. In this case the best thing to do is batch resize them with the aid of a specialized software.
The process is simple: you add your photos and then apply the Resize filter. Here you can change the size of your images by selecting the width and height desired in either pixels or percentages. Then just select the output folder and begin processing.
Auto Rotate Pictures in One Session
Another filter that may come in handy in this stage is Auto Rotate. Now you no longer have to manually straighten each and every picture and therefore waste valuable time, as the tool will allow you to automatically rotate the shots you took in a single session. The software will detect which pictures don’t have the correct orientation and will rotate only those.
Watermark Your Home Inspection Photos
The main reason behind watermarking photos is to protect them from theft. We can all agree that It’s not normal for someone else to come in and simply take credit for our work It’s true that applying a watermark is not an impregnable measure, but at least it will make copy cats think twice before using something without prior permission from the original author.
Using a software particularly designed for these operations is the best path to choose. This way you’ll gain time and save energy because you’ll be able to watermark dozens or hundreds of images at once in an extremely quick manner. Depending on your needs, you can apply a watermark in the form of a text, a logo or even both, all of them being fully customizable. The tool also gives you the opportunity to save your current settings for later use.
Rename Dozens of Images at Once
It’s only natural to want to change the name of your photos. This is due to the fact that digital cameras are manufactured to assign to our pictures meaningless names like DSC043531 for instance. As a home inspector, you most surely want to rename your images according to the space and area they illustrate in order to better document your activity. With the aid of the right batch editing tool you can quickly rename your pictures and give them relevant names like driveway, patio, roof, gutters, plumbing or electrical system.
Give Your Pictures a Professional Look
In order to improve the final aspect of your photos you can resort to the Touch-Up filters. For that purpose you can use the Auto Contrast feature to automatically adjust the contrast of multiple photos at once. In addition to that, you can apply the Sharpen filter to get a crisp, professional look or Brightness in case you feel your pictures came out too dark and you wish to lighten them.
Bulk Edit All Photos in One Session
And as always the best tip is kept last… With BatchPhoto for Windows and Mac OS X, you can combine all the edits mentioned above in one session and perform them on thousands of property inspection photos at once!
Additionally, you can save all those filters as a profile and apply them to a new set of photos at a later date, even directly from Windows Explorer’s right-click menu.
Be smart, be productive!
