How do I take a photo that is actually useful for a claim or listing?

An evidence photograph has a different job from a nice photograph. It has to establish what, where, how big and when — and most people take only the first.

Safety

Step by step

1. Take the wide shot first.The whole room, the whole car, the whole item in its setting. Without context, a close-up of damage could be anywhere, and that is the first thing an assessor or buyer will wonder.
2. Then medium, then close.Three distances, every time. Medium establishes which part of the thing; close shows the actual detail. The sequence is what links them together.
3. Include something for scale.A coin, a ruler, a hand. A crack photographed close up with nothing beside it could be a millimetre or a centimetre, and that difference matters.
4. Photograph before touching anything.Before cleaning, moving or making safe. Insurers and landlords ask about the original state, and once it is tidied the evidence is gone.
5. Get the light right.Daylight where possible, and do not stand between the light and the subject. For dents and scratches, light from the side at a shallow angle shows what flat light hides.
6. Turn the flash off for glossy surfaces.Flash on a screen, a car panel or anything varnished produces a hotspot that hides exactly the detail you are documenting. Move to a window instead.
7. Capture the identifying information.Serial numbers, model plates, registration, meter readings, the label. A separate legible photograph of each — these are the shots people forget and later need.
8. Keep the metadata.Photos carry date, time and often location. Do not screenshot them or send in a way that strips it — the timestamp is often the most useful part of the evidence.
9. Take more than you need.Storage is free and you cannot go back. Photograph angles that seem unnecessary; one of them usually turns out to matter.
10. Photograph what is undamaged too.For a listing or an inventory, showing the good condition of everything else makes the whole record credible rather than selective.
11. Check the background before sending.Paperwork, screens, keys, house numbers, other people. All of these appear in photographs and none of them should be in one going to a stranger.
12. Keep the originals.Full resolution, in a dated folder, backed up. Send copies. A compressed image forwarded through three apps loses the detail that made it useful.

Tips

• Wide, medium, close — every time. It is the whole method.
• Put a coin in the shot. Scale is what turns a picture of a crack into evidence of a crack.
• Never screenshot an evidence photo. It strips the date and location that give it weight.

Common mistakes

• Only taking close-ups — A close-up proves damage exists but not where it is or how large. Without the wide shot it can be disputed as being from somewhere else.
• Cleaning or moving things first — The original state is what is being assessed, and it cannot be recreated. Photograph before doing anything else.

If it doesn't work