Hotel Photography: A Complete Guide to Planning the Shoot

List every place your photographs appear, including the direct booking site, Google lodging profile, online travel agents, brochures, proposals, press, and social media. Record what is missing, old, inconsistent, or tied to a room that has changed.

Separate essentials from campaign ideas. Essentials include every active room type, bathrooms, exterior, entrance, reception, common areas, food and drink, key amenities, and accessibility. Campaign images can then build emotion around the complete factual set.

If you already have a public hotel gallery, run it through the free photo audit and read the notes against the actual images. It can flag weak coverage, image quality and ordering in the photos it can access. Some booking sites block a pasted URL, so use the browser extension or upload up to 20 photos in gallery order. Then check your own room-type and channel inventory: a sampled visual report cannot tell you which rooms you sell, whether an amenity is open or whether an image is current. Treat its score as a review prompt, not a booking forecast.

Walk the property at the same times you expect to shoot. Note when rooms receive daylight, when public areas are quiet, when the restaurant is set, and when exterior light is strongest. Coordinate housekeeping, engineering, food and beverage, front desk, and events so each space is ready when the camera arrives.

Photograph clean architectural views before adding models or allowing a setup to change. That gives revenue teams a dependable base library and lets lifestyle production continue without risking the essential room coverage.

Document each sellable category rather than relying on one attractive room to stand for the hotel. Capture the full bed, floor around it, windows, storage, work area, bathroom, and the real view from the room. If rooms within one category differ materially, photograph the variations or explain which version is shown.

Keep vertical lines straight and avoid lenses that stretch beds or make circulation space appear larger. Guests compare images with the room they receive, so accuracy is part of the service promise.

Give each bookable category its own row in the brief. Record the representative room number, what distinguishes it, the photographs still needed, when housekeeping can release it and who will approve the finished set. This makes a missing bathroom view or an unavailable room visible before the shoot.

Here is an illustrative example, not a record of a client shoot. Replace these categories with the rooms your hotel actually sells:

For a pool, spa, gym, lounge, breakfast room, restaurant, bar, terrace, or meeting space, create at least one clear view that explains the facility and one closer view that captures its character. Include opening context and seasonal setup where relevant.

People can help explain scale and atmosphere in communal areas. Use them with intention: a couple checking in, a family at breakfast, colleagues in a meeting break. Keep room and amenity features unchanged, and obtain the releases required for commercial use.

Online travel agent galleries often prioritise factual coverage. Your own website also has to carry the brand. Create horizontal hero images with clean space for responsive crops, vertical options for mobile and social, and detail images that support packages or stories.

Do not force one photograph into every shape. Capture alternate compositions while the room is ready. The cost of an extra frame is small compared with organising another shoot.

Before handing over the files, check what each destination actually accepts. Google Hotel Center currently recommends landscape images at 2048 × 1366 pixels or larger, with a minimum of 1024 × 683 pixels, a maximum file size of 10 MB, and JPG, JPEG, WebP or PNG format. Those are Google lodging specifications, not a universal rule for your website or every booking partner.

Export from the sharp edited master rather than enlarging a small photograph. Check that each active room category has its own accurate images, then review the crop, file size and labels in the version you will deliver. Keep the original masters and channel-ready exports separate so a later resize does not replace your best source file.

Name files by property, space, room type, orientation, and date. Record model releases, photographer licence terms, expiry dates, and any channel limitations. Keep edited masters separate from web exports.

Review the library after renovations, seasonal changes, rebranding, and operational changes. Remove old images from every distributor, not only the main website.