Anonymous real estate media company

Video editing, HDR photos, booking, calendars and invoicing for a real estate media business

Three tools that took the slow, skilled parts of every shoot off the team's plate, from editing and photo processing to booking, scheduling and invoicing.

Hours back: 26.5 a week
Hours a year: 1,272
Saved a year: $152,640

The problem

Every property shoot meant hours of skilled work after the camera was packed away. Editing a video took 4 to 6 hours. Every set of photos needed its bracketed exposures sorted, merged and rendered, about an hour a job across 6 to 8 jobs a week. And every booking meant emails back and forth with agents, calendar entries, reminders and an invoice at the end: around 6 hours a week of admin.

None of it was hard. It just took a trained person a long time, every single job.

What we built

A semi-automated video editing program. It takes the raw footage and does the heavy lifting. The editor checks the result and makes the creative calls. A 4–6 hour edit now takes about half an hour.

A bracketed HDR photo program. It manages the files from each shoot, groups the five-shot brackets, renders them to HDR and produces the final images, saving about an hour on every job.

A booking system built into their website, which handles:

Online booking. Agents pick a time and book the job themselves.
An automated calendar. Every job lands in the calendar the team works from.
Invites, confirmations and reminders. Agents get a calendar invite, a confirmation email and reminders before the shoot, without anyone sending them.
Semi-automated invoicing. Invoices are drafted from the booking, ready to check and send.

Because it runs on their own site, there’s no booking service to pay for every month.

The maths

What each tool saves

Semi-automated video editing program

Brings in the footage, assembles the edit from a template and exports it, leaving the editor to check it and make the creative calls.

Before: 4–6 hrs per job
After: 30 min per job
How often: about 3 video jobs a week

4.5 hrs saved × 3 jobs = 13.5 hrs/week
13.5 hrs × 48 weeks × $120/hr (charge-out rate)

Hours a year: 648
Saved a year: $77,760

Bracketed HDR photo program

Manages each shoot's files, groups the 5-shot brackets, renders them to HDR and produces the finished photos, filed where they belong.

Before: about 1 hr of sorting, merging and rendering per job
After: done automatically
How often: 6–8 photo jobs a week

1 hr saved × 7 jobs = 7 hrs/week
7 hrs × 48 weeks × $120/hr (charge-out rate)

Hours a year: 336
Saved a year: $40,320

Booking, scheduling and invoicing system

A booking system built into their website. Agents book jobs online; each job lands in the team's automated calendar; agents get calendar invites, confirmation emails and reminders; and invoices are drafted from the booking, ready to send.

Before: about 6 hrs a week of booking emails, calendar entries, reminders and invoices
After: runs itself
How often: every booking

6 hrs/week saved
6 hrs × 48 weeks × $120/hr (charge-out rate)