We’re so excited you’ve decided to share your unique piece of land with our community of outdoors-lovers and adventure-seekers, and we’re even more excited that you want it to look its best.

Listings with beautiful photos get more clicks, so it’s important that you spend some time taking good photos. We’ve put together a quick guide on how to take the best pictures of your listing, no previous photography experience necessary.

What You’ll Need

• Smartphone or DSLR camera
• Bright lighting; avoid shooting on a rainy day or at nighttime
• Optional: Model (this can be you, a friend, family member, or pet)

1. Clean up clutter and prep the scene

To help make the land more inviting, clean up anything you think might deter a camper, like trash, debris, or clutter.

🛏️ If your listing is a structure (like a cabin, yurt, or treehouse), you should tidy it up, make the bed, and open all the curtains. It can be helpful to pretend that you’re the camper walking into the structure for the first time—how would you like it to be presented to you?

⛺ If your listing is a tent site, clear the spot where the camper’s tent will go. This might mean mowing the grass and trimming back brush. Have a tent? Set it up on the site for the photo.

No tent? No problem. Simply lay down a blanket and have someone (person or dog) or something (cooler, chair, etc.) sit on top of it. This helps the camper get a sense of scale.

2. Use bright, natural light

💡If you’re shooting an interior, you’ll want as much light as possible, so make sure you’re taking these photos when it’s bright outside during daytime.

Also:

• Open all curtains and turn on all lights.
• Make sure you’re not focussing on a window or light source when you take your shot, as it’ll make the rest of the interior appear very dark—instead, tap your finger on a darker area of the image and take your photo once it’s brightened up.

☀️ If you’re shooting an exterior or tent site, avoid shooting when it’s dark or rainy outside. Bright, sunny photos are always a safe bet, but if you want to go above and beyond, you can take your photos during the Golden Hour—an hour or so before the sun sets when everything is warm and glowy.

3. Take horizontally-oriented photos

There’s nothing more important than a nice wide, horizontally-oriented photo of the site overview, in other words: where the camper will be sleeping. And we don’t mean the bed, we mean the entire site (be it a cabin, yurt, RV, or tent spot.)

The more zoomed out, the better: the camper will want to see the area surrounding where they’re sleeping too, whether it’s the forest around a cabin or the grassy meadow where they’ll pitch their tent.

If you were making a feature film about your land, think of this photo as the “opening shot.”

4. Take photos of the land and what makes it special

Show Hipcampers what makes your land special. Do you have goats or chickens? Is there a water body on the land? Views of rolling hills? An outdoor pizza oven or bathtub? Hipcampers will love seeing how unique your land is.

Remember, the top three photos that are the most successful on Hipcamp are:

• Site overview: Think, where the Hipcamper will be sleeping i.e. zoomed-out shot of the tent, cabin, etc.
• Landscape: Vegetation, views, flora, fauna
• People and activities on the land: Petting horses, hiking, swimming, etc.