Interior vs Exterior images: which are profitable?

[tricky]

We've created hundreds of images over the years, but usually find that interior images are far less profitable than exterior images. Not only that, but they take much longer and require far more changes to be made as interior designers start to get involved (oh joy!): changing furniture/lights/people etc etc.

Essentially, we find that we make far less 'profit' on an interior image.

Are we alone in our findings?

[dlparisi]

Generally the same thing here for me. It's not so much that I don't make as much profit on interiors (I don't), it's just that most clients don't want to spend the money for what it really should cost to get an interior outfitted with real world objects. Putting in all of the knick-knacks, flowers, books, rugs, sofas, tables, placesettings, then changing them all, etc. etc. takes a lot of time, time that clients are not usually willing to pay for unfortunately. The ideal clients for me are ones that do interiors and exteriors as I can usually bump up the cost of the exterior a bit to balance the interior.

I think another problem with the interior costs for clients is that they will often ask for several spaces to be modeled and rendered, i.e., "Let's see the living room, dining room, kitchen, master bath and bedroom", and don't realize that these are all pretty much separate jobs with prices to match. This is unlike the exterior where details are typically repeated around the building and once it's all built taking several shots of it doesn't add to the cost that much. So 4 interior shots should cost a LOT, LOT more than 4 exterior shots, but it doesn't always work out that way on what I can charge for them.

[thablanch]

I do agree with you..

Way easier/faster to do exterior images. Plus everybody can figure out what a sunny day feels like in terms of light.
The worst part about interiors is not to light them correctly, but is to figure out what the designer wants it to be. ..

[tricky]

I agree. Whenever we are commissioned to work on an interior, our clients assume we are interior designers. Now, don't get me wrong, I am perfectly able to interior design a space, but I am not being paid to do that as well!

Another thing that often happens:
I relish getting stuck into a new interior rendering. You can start to push the levels of realism further than you have in the past. You can add more detail. You can play around with IES lighting. You could maybe employ some of VRay's DOF and bokeh effects. The reality is that most of this has to almost go out of the window as you end up spending most of your time just trying to get the right sofa/chair/light fixture/artwork to keep your client happy!

When I see some of the renders on this forum - there's one chap whose name I don't recall, but his/her stuff is bloody awsome - I am *amazed* by the detail, composition and realism. We never tend to reach this quality because of the points at the end of the previous paragraph.

[Morne]

I feel your pain. Something I get a lot is "can you come over for a quick one, it's just a very small reception with not much detail". I already have a price in my head on the way to the client, but on arrival I find out that they want the views in such a way that I have to model and render the whole bloody building as behind the reception counter is a glass partition and you see everything past that. Then they don't understand why the price is 5 times higher than usual. Try to explain to them what needs to be done, and they just stuck in their minds "but it's just a small reception". You end up cheating the glass as frost or some other crap camera angle and the client gets his "quick one" but you won't show that useless pic to anybody.

[glyph]

I think its a process of educating the client and explaining what takes time and what doesn't

bottom line is its about estimating the price accurately and then every time client changes brief add to the price - I know, I know, it just doesnt work out like that

but at least with an informed client they can begin to understand the process

I also do easy changes at low price so they know I'm not ripping them off at every chance (though an easy geometry change may seem to the client a bigger deal than a lighting revision..)

[trick]

If the client is briefing you correctly, I actually think interiors are more fun: modeling an interior scene is not that hard, and putting in all furniture and accessories from libraries is not that hard either. You relatively need more time to do good lighting and make a decent layout, which generally is the bigger artistic part. And there are some rules you have to respect for a pleasing image. But if the client did not brief you correctly, of course he should pay for the changes !

[Morne]

problem here is that with the furniture I usually have to model as the stuff they wan't you can't get in a library. Sometime I cheat and just use something similar and modify it a bit. Sometimes I think clients will never understand the process. And yes they do think a "quick change" is just a quick change, but 2 days later you're still changing stuff. Man it's hard to educate the client sometimes. So far interiors seem more profitable to me...

[voltron7]

Exteriors

I tend to have more profit from exteriors. However, it really also has to do with the landscaping. I've had some exterior projects for landscape engineers that took longer than any interior I've done because of all the specific shrubs, flowers, trees, etc. But, overall, I still think exteriors earn more profit. I agree with DVP3D about furnishings and equipment. And I also would agree with trick that interiors are more fun!

[deflix]

.........we find that if we do our exteriors in Vray and our interiors in Maxwell they turn out similar. Broadly speaking you need an unbiased renderer for interiors so that the more complex lighting is handled automatically, and controlled offered by 'multilight' whereas exteriors need a biased solution to give control over the temporal quality of a large object lit with a single light source.