Matterport ShopTalk Webinar: a Photographer's Journey to Success

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	Video: Matterport ShopTalk #31: A Journey to Success with Jo Hailey of Striking Places \| Video courtesy of Matterport YouTube Channel \| Monday, 6 December 2021 Transcript (Video above) [00:00:02] Amir Frank: Welcome webinar listeners. Thanks for joining another ShopTalk. This is Episode #31, where we are talking with Jo Hailey. Jo, thank you very, very much for joining us today and taking the time to be with us and tell us all about your story. [00:00:19] Jo Hailey: You're welcome. Thank you for asking. [00:00:23] Amir Frank: Of course. For everybody coming in and attending, check your audio and make sure everything's working all right and you can hear both of us. We don't have any kind of presentation for this webinar. This is just Jo and I talking and telling you all about Jo's story, how she discovered Matterport, and where she's taken it, and how she's made real success out of it. With that said, the questions panel is always open as it is with all of our webinars. If you have questions for Jo, myself, about whatever it is that we are talking about, please go ahead and throw them in the Q&A. We'll go ahead and focus on the questions later on. But if we see them, we'll certainly go ahead and address them as they come in, if anything does get flagged. You may notice that we also have Charmaine with us to help with questions in the backend for anything that is not necessarily specifically for Jo. With that said let's get cracking, I guess. Hi, Jo. [00:01:29] Jo Hailey: Hi. [00:01:30] Amir Frank: How are you? [00:01:31] Jo Hailey: I'm good, thank you. [00:01:33] Amir Frank: Fantastic. We were talking and I know you discovered, I think, Matterport it was back in 2016, I think? Was it that long ago? [00:01:46] Jo Hailey: I can't remember actually. Yeah, I was in San Francisco, at the Google Street View Summit, having lunch with Kirk. [00:01:58] Amir Frank: Right. You discovered Matterport through Kirk, our mutual friend, and Kirk told you all about Google Street View and how that's coming out for Matterport. [00:02:14] Jo Hailey: Exactly. [00:02:15] Amir Frank: Before we get into Matterport, you do Google Street View photography? [00:02:20] Jo Hailey: Exactly. That's how I started my business in 2012. I was already taking photos but mainly at festivals, and not for money really. Just enjoying getting in to see the bands close up. Then a friend from South Coast found that Google was launching Google Business Photos, as it was called at the time. I applied and jumped through all the hoops and found out I was quite good at it and I enjoyed it as well. So that was great. I had hardly equipment. I started, I became a Google trusted photographer, and I got some great work through it, actually, a national contract with [inaudible 00:03:05] . Then late of 2015 licensed directly with corps, [inaudible 00:03:12] and the top-performing female Google photographer in the UK, and the company's one of the world top ten companies. Google recognized this as being quite prolific as what we'll be doing. [00:03:30] Amir Frank: Nice. With Google Street View, other than something pretty spectacular like Westminster Abbey, most of your work was focused around small businesses basically, is that something that. [00:03:44] Jo Hailey: Location-based businesses. To extend Google Street View inside location-based businesses to get them all out to exposure, to enhance a Google My Business listing, and to familiarize people who are looking for businesses of that type with the business, which then encourages them to come inside to buy stuff. [00:04:04] Amir Frank: Yeah, exactly. Just out of curiosity, is that something that Google helped connect you with these stores, or did they just say go do your thing? [00:04:18] Jo Hailey: Some. They used to be and I just went in the other day. I think they took it out, there used to be a person in Google My Business backend that said, get Google studio inside and we would take that, and then if it was in the local area and we would list them on website. Then they would contact us and come through. So that's where Westminster Abbey came from, to be fair. I did check with them because I know they've got special collections team. But they said, "Yeah, you're good to go, you can take that one." [inaudible 00:04:49] about that. Then various others, from leads that aren't so great and people just pressing it because they want to find out what happens when they press the button. Actually, they've got a [inaudible 00:05:00] company and they have done [inaudible 00:05:01]. Yeah. Some and some, but it's like any business. You get your needs and your inquiries from many different places. I'm actually networking for my English followers. [00:05:17] Amir Frank: Did you say networking? Nice, I definitely want to ask you about that as well. But before we get into networking, you are doing Google Street View photography, going around knocking on doors, seeing if businesses, kind of introducing them to the whole concept of Google My Business listings. Then you got into Matterport basically because of Google Street View. You realized that Matterport could do that for you? [00:05:49] Jo Hailey: Yeah, because I was demonstrating Matterport. It's like a marketplace and all of the providers come along. It's about 200 of us come from across the world to the Google Street View Summit and we'd hear about what other Google photographers have been doing, and we see what the latest tech is, and if we're lucky we'd get a discount. Matterport was one of those. I found out about it and I said, "Look, it looks to me like it's for the sale agents, it's for the property and that's what they've been using it for, but I don't know how it's going to satisfy the needs of my clients, my location-based businesses. And then Kirk told me that they were going to put into beta to publish onto Google Street View and I said, "Well that sounds brilliant because then I've got even more for my location-based businesses. I can offer them funky little models that show great for the marketing, loads of photos, the interactivity, we can put videos inside them, etc, and they get the bonus between improved global SEO. [00:06:55] Amir Frank: Yeah. Did you find that businesses, that you went ahead and used Matterport to get the scan positions up to Google using Google Street View and all that. Did those businesses take any advantage of the 3D aspect, like the Matterport model, are they using that in their landing pages or anything like that? Or is it mostly using, yeah? [00:07:17] Jo Hailey: Yes. [00:07:19] Amir Frank: Using the app? [00:07:19] Jo Hailey: Yeah. That's a good one. EYES on St Albans. That's a really good local business that it's done. It's really improved because while you can embed Google Street View into your website, having your 3D virtual tool on there is really compelling for people, and it's fun to use, and it's really cool. So people stay [inaudible 00:07:42] more, which is what you want on the website and through the SEO as well. I guess you become a bit of an expert in all things when you become a Google trusted photographer,. [00:07:54] Amir Frank: Is that something that Google still requires for Google Street View photographers, or can anybody with a 360 camera today go ahead and do that? [00:08:06] Jo Hailey: You can qualify. It's not as hard as it used to be. I mean, we used to have access to actual Street View via their backend and now it's delivered by third party providers like GoThru. Or directly if you got a Mac support we can just close them directly on there. [00:08:24] Amir Frank: And with GoThru or other third-party companies can you, I guess, align or sink the Google Street View photos from the street itself so that people can walk their way into storefront? [00:08:38] Jo Hailey: Yeah. You can't link it directly to the existing Google Street View. But it will link by the time it kind of gets to understand where it is. [00:08:51] Amir Frank: It takes a bit of time with the Google? [00:08:51] Jo Hailey: Yeah. Exactly. So if you put it really close, because I usually check out where's the nearest node, if you will, and then I put my first one closest to that, hoping over time it links out. We can also create new line as well, so replace, or update, or add new Google Street View. [00:09:14] Amir Frank: I would assume same thing is true for Matterport, that if you look and check where that nearest position is, that scans a little x in the Google Street View's outside the store that you're scanning, you just kind of scan your way out and try and get as close to that as possible. With time it should align and work itself out. [00:09:37] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:09:38] Amir Frank: Yeah. That's a good tip. I wasn't sure if that was confirmed with Google or not. I know it's just kind of up to Google, and their algorithms, and how they figure all that stuff out. There's really not much. [00:09:52] Jo Hailey: I don't guarantee it. [00:09:53] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:09:55] Jo Hailey: But the power for it is having [inaudible 00:09:56] on Google My Business listings. That's where they get lots of views. [00:10:01] Amir Frank: Good. Okay. You got Matterport now and you're doing Google Street View. Are you still using traditional photographic, your camera and set up and what not, to do some Google Street View and Matterport and do other Google Street View? What's the difference? How do you decide what to do, when to use what? [00:10:21] Jo Hailey: It really is up to the client. But for a large automotive client, and they don't want Matterport. They're not interested, they just want the Google Street View because that wasn't what I was providing before and they're happy with that. Actually, Matterport doesn't work very well with cars. The shiny surface ends up looking a bit raggy. They're happy with that. Now I don't have to do the stitching. We used to use a fish eye lens and a panoramic head, and now I use the Z1. [00:11:00] Amir Frank: Soon I have to run away. [00:11:01] Jo Hailey: Yeah, I just have to hide. Yeah. Crouching down. [00:11:05] Amir Frank: Crouched behind the car. [00:11:07] Jo Hailey: Yeah. Exactly. You've seen me, right? [00:11:14] Amir Frank: Good. What else? You've gotten into Matterport and you're doing Google Street View still with Matterport, but Matterport does open up other doors outside of Google Street View that you can use it for other things. Are you doing anything else with Matterport other than Google Street View? [00:11:35] Jo Hailey: Yes. All things yes, it's really that my latest and greatest and most amazing thing I'm enjoying at the moment is the galleries. [00:11:46] Amir Frank: Okay. [00:11:47] Jo Hailey: Particularly, although there's been a few more since I started shooting the Moon Galleries in London, in the Queen's house. They have regular royal society exhibitions. You could imagine how much time, effort, energy, and money is spent setting up these exhibitions that run for a couple of weeks, and then it all comes down again. If we capture it with Matterport, then they can continue having the artwork out there so lead to a much wider audience which is fantastic. Artwork by individual artists who rent the space have also been jumping on the bandwagon because that's a lot of time, effort, energy. This one lady had her exhibition up for four days. There's so many people who can come and visit and appreciate the artwork in four days, but now she's got it on forever and we've typed it all out so they can find out more about the artwork, see how much it is, and you're looking through to buy it. [00:12:52] Amir Frank: You can do the whole e-commerce process and what not right through the Matterport model if you really wanted to. That's great. That's actually a brilliant use case. I love that. Galleries, like you said, these artists spend so much time and energy putting together these galleries and they're taken down after a couple of weeks, basically. This just allows them to live on indefinitely, as long as the artist chooses. Basically, they're not limited by the space, the gallery itself. That's great. Cool. How how did you go from Google Street View to galleries? What was that transition like? [00:13:40] Jo Hailey: Unless there is a transition, it's just a different job, really. [00:13:44] Amir Frank: Did you pitch some Google Street View or was it something else completely. [00:13:52] Jo Hailey: This was a referral from another MSP. [00:13:55] Amir Frank: Okay, well, there you go. [00:13:59] Jo Hailey: Their client was exhibiting in the States and they're in Scotland. They'd give me a call and said, "Can you go and shoot that for us?" I said, "Yeah, of course." Then [inaudible 00:14:13] talked to me and they said, "Well, we really like that. We've got some things that we might like doing, " and so it just went on from there. [00:14:22] Amir Frank: It's interesting all the galleries see and what's the other galleries are doing and say, "Oh, that looks like a good idea," and then once you get the first job, then the rest is a little bit easier to sell. [00:14:37] Jo Hailey: Yeah, exactly. [00:14:39] Amir Frank: Good. You're basically doing all of this, it's not like you're going in one direction. You're doing Google Street View for businesses, you're doing galleries now it sounds like anything else where you've taken Matterport and said this is good to use, did you use proactively or through the network? [00:15:03] Jo Hailey: I've done schools. That's really good with the third party overlay. It's like a Zoom call within the models. [00:15:13] Amir Frank: Okay, interesting. I didn't realize schools were using that. [00:15:18] Jo Hailey: Nurseries. But because particularly because of the pandemic. [00:15:23] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:15:24] Jo Hailey: They didn't want people coming in, you've still got kids in there, some children in there. But they still need to move forward with recruiting, somehow, so they can do it like that. There's a system that I use where the headteacher can show them through the different models I've created of the key areas; a sample classroom, the gym, the main hall, all the key areas. They've got all of those and then the teacher can actually broadcast out to 15 computings locally, all at one time. As if they were walking around with the teacher. The head teacher says, "Oh no, this is where we do this," and they can ask questions as well. [00:16:10] Amir Frank: They can do guided tours through the campus without actually being on campus. That's very cool, so that when kids do go back, a lot of them, I know my kids are back now in school, they can be more familiar with the space. That's great. That's also a great use case. I think familiarizing yourself with the space that's part of it. That's a huge part of it. That's why it's done so well in real estate. Cool. How long have you been doing galleries in schools? [00:16:48] Jo Hailey: Well, since the pandemic really. [00:16:53] Amir Frank: Schools, yes, your gallery is also basically they did. [00:17:01] Jo Hailey: They couldn't open, could they? [00:17:02] Amir Frank: I see okay. That was the main. [00:17:04] Jo Hailey: They needed to find a way to. [00:17:06] Amir Frank: Initially, it started with the pandemic and being able to bring people in virtually and have the artists still use their space to set up. You're saying now it's morphed into we'll still do it even though we can open our doors. But this allows us to just keep it open forever. The same gallery and the same exhibit I guess. [00:17:34] Jo Hailey: Exactly. Then that makes their website more Google friendly as well, because maybe slightly longer and take more, so win win. [00:17:44] Amir Frank: Exactly. They're replicating their own space many times. Every time it's like a pop-up shop where you can set it up, scan it, and then have it indefinitely after you've torn it down and moved on. That's interesting because that could potentially lead, I would imagine someone's going to do this for a gallery where it's just virtual. Why pay rent or I can just have all my artists present virtually. Do a pop-up shop out of some warehouse, tear it down the next day, and then move on and everything is just virtual? [00:18:30] Jo Hailey: Really move that up, that will be. It's probably good enough for the exhibition. [00:18:40] Amir Frank: Exactly. We did have a couple of questions come in, so I just wanted to take a second and see if we have anything for you here, Jo. By the way, just a reminder, if you can put all the questions in through the Q&A panel and not the chat panel, that'd be very helpful just so we can have everything in one place. Here's a really interesting one. I don't know how into this you've gone into NFTs or anything like that. Is there any link to NFTs from Matterport for artists? Have you heard of the galleries doing anything with NFTs? [00:19:20] Jo Hailey: No, I haven't. [00:19:22] Amir Frank: It looks like traditional galleries are not looking into that. I do know if you're interested in artists called Alexa Mead, we've done some work with her. She's put out some NFTs and it's very interesting. Basically, it's 100 percent virtual art that you can buy. Basically, that's all it is. Just have your little JPEG of this thing and it's worth a lot of money. That's it. You don't actually have what we consider something that you can put on your wall. It's just basically a JPEG. It could be an animated GIF, and in her case so, but Alexa Mead has done a couple of things. She had a gallery, really cool. If you haven't checked it out, it's called something Winter Wonderland, I think? If you do Winter Wonderland Matterport in Google, just search for that, I think that'll get you to the gallery page on her website where you can go through the gallery. Very neat. The entire exhibit is painted; floors, ceiling, all of it, walls. She's a very unique artist. Very cool if anybody's interested in that. I want to, I guess, take a little step back. No, before we do that, let's talk a little bit about your network, something that I think is super important. I don't know how many people are really taking full advantage of building their network and maybe they don't know how to get started with that. How would you recommend? I know you have a really broad and well said network of MSPs, Matterport service partners, and photographers. How did you get to know them or how did you build that? Was it through Moog? For anybody who's not familiar, Moog is the Matterport Official User Group on Facebook; a good place to at least get started with building a network. [00:21:49] Jo Hailey: Various really. Again, I just go out there and I chat lots of people on Moog. The Google Street View Summit actually, like Chris Pinkham , [inaudible 00:22:04] , they're my pals. They actually [inaudible 00:22:07] . It was in London, it was very exciting. Then from there, I met a load of other MSPs, but mostly in the States and other parts of the world. We're not that many of us from the UK, that's too bad. Then yes, on Facebook groups. Then there was one particular company who was looking for lots MSPs locally in UK. They wanted to build a [inaudible 00:22:43] to cover particular jobs that they had going. They called us all in for a meet up in London, so I met [inaudible 00:22:52] then. We sometimes go out on jobs together when there's a large project. We, literally met on Friday, in fact. Then I can listen, but we had a good night out in London. [00:23:07] Amir Frank: It's not all just business. You find time that you guys get together and just hang out and talk about scanning models, I'm guessing. [00:23:19] Jo Hailey: Yeah, talk about some of the issues, share solutions, use cases, and what we've been up to, get ideas and inspiration, have a laugh. [00:23:32] Amir Frank: That's great. I mean, I know you said that through your network, you were able to get the first job scanning the gallery, which led to many more jobs scanning other galleries as well. I'm guessing the same gallery again, it just repeats with every exhibit, with every artist that comes and puts your work-up, they need another scan. That's cool. Basically, bottom line is, get out there, start talking to people, don't be shy. Google Street View has Summits, but other photography niches also do their own summits and things like that. [00:24:14] Jo Hailey: [inaudible 00:24:14] from networking. Whichever town you're in, they'll have networking groups. You just go along with some breakfast networking because you want to get in touch with the local community. Tomorrow night I'm going out to a local awards thing, it's for the [inaudible 00:24:31] . It's a [inaudible 00:24:33] businesses thing, so there'll be, I don't know, a few 100 people there having a dinner, celebrating successes, just talking to people. [00:24:48] Amir Frank: That's great. [00:24:50] Jo Hailey: Once they know you like your [inaudible 00:24:51] , they start giving you work, if you're giving them work. It's funny. [00:24:58] Amir Frank: What goes around comes around, I guess. Basically, is that what you would recommend? Is not only putting yourself out there to get the network, but also pitching yourself to businesses that could potentially be outside your geography or something like that, so you can work with others in those further locations to expand the network? [00:25:24] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:25:24] Amir Frank: Does that make any sense at all or am I just completely out? [00:25:28] Jo Hailey: I mean, my MSP network is really valuable. We have WhatsApp group, we are always chatting on there. We have someone who got stuck on a job, "Oh my God, my account is doing this. Anyone got any idea what I can do it?" We help each other and pass jobs. If I get a job way too far away for me, I'm just going to reach out to someone and say, "Look, can you go and do it for me?" Generally now when travel isn't really the way forward at the moment. [00:25:58] Amir Frank: Yeah, travel is less ideal. How do you find those jobs? Do they just come to you because your name is out there or you've done things like Westminster Abbey? How did those clients that are far away, how did they come to you? How do they find you? [00:26:16] Jo Hailey: Just normally word of mouth. Existing client started a show room for one client. They use marketing agency. I don't just do [inaudible 00:26:31] because I'm a photographer. I have a little studio here where I do head shots for you and I conduct shoots. I go out and do plain photography for websites and team photos etc. That marketing agent provides all these services. When they have another client that they need to get [inaudible 00:26:54] ask me to come do [inaudible 00:26:57] . It varies. I've got a list of where all my referrals come from. I've been in business 10 years in February, so I'm established. It was hard at the beginning. I wouldn't suggest that anybody buys a Matterport and makes a business out of it, because it's normal. [00:27:25] Amir Frank: That brings up a good question. What would your recommendation be? To have Matterport just as another tool in your toolbox? You're basically a photographer, you're doing Google Street View and head shots well before Matterport came along, and this is just another revenue stream. [00:27:42] Jo Hailey: Yeah. But it's going to be hard because if people don't know what it is, they don't know what to do with it even once they got it. Even if they were lit up and they thought, that's not too expensive, I'll have that. Then you go in and you go, three months later, how's that going? Is it embedded on your website? Is it worth? "I don't know who does my website. [00:28:06] Amir Frank: They get excited by it, but then they have a hard time implementing it [inaudible 00:28:10] [00:28:10] Jo Hailey: You can share the link. I've written a nice big blog about what things you can do with your Matterport virtual tool. [00:28:17] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:28:18] Jo Hailey: I send that out to them and I say, look, you should be taking advantage of your investment. That you should be working it. [00:28:28] Amir Frank: Same goes with Google Street View. You were saying it's not just getting those panels and putting them in your Google My Business listing, you have to be a lot more proactive about it. [00:28:41] Jo Hailey: On your Google My Business, you have to use it, yes. That's really important. Then if your location business is definitely have to be cheap inside, a bit more my advice, opposed to every day at Photos. Then Google will love you and show you to more people and you get more customers. [00:28:59] Amir Frank: With that said, what would your recommendation be for someone who's not as familiar with something like Google Street View and wants to take that on as well as Matterport? They've got either Matterport camera or they've got their cell phone. I know somebody who's doing real estate photography with his cell phone, or they have a 360 camera like the Rico Z1 that you have as well. They've got that, they've got the tools to get started, and they're getting into Matterport, but they also want to venture and find other things. You started with Google Street View and found Matterport. Others are finding Matterport, but then they can get into Google Street View and the other way, and do other things. For that person, what would your recommendation be? How should they go and pitch Google Street View to clients, to these businesses? What do they need to know? [00:29:57] Jo Hailey: It depends what the business is. [00:30:02] Amir Frank: Right now with the pandemic, I think a lot of restaurants are struggling. Is that something that can benefit them? A lot of people are now ordering from restaurants online. Does it benefit them to have that Google My Business listing at all? [00:30:21] Jo Hailey: Definitely you have the Google My Business listing. [00:30:23] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:30:23] Jo Hailey: Absolutely. Every business should have a Google My Business listing. In a pandemic when people can't come inside, not necessarily Google Street View, but Google Street View will elevate the listing. Any interaction you might with it. I would have your Google My Business listing. If you have Matterport and you don't know about Google Street View inside, and you don't know about Google My Business, you need to find out about it, because it's all part of the same thing. You really need to have expertise in these things. It's not hard. [00:31:01] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:31:03] Jo Hailey: Google makes it easy for you. There's lots of info online. The more people that know about it, the better, really, because when more people understand that you're going to get your reviews on there, you've got to put your messaging on. If you're a restaurant, people will be messaging you. I've got a couple of businesses and I manage their pages. They're always getting messages. There is a pub, The Holly Bush. They say, "Hi, have you got any availability for Sunday lunch?" He comes straight back and he goes, "Yeah, I've got one at 3:00. I'll book you in. Done." [00:31:43] Amir Frank: It's interesting. I never thought of it myself to go through a Google My Business listing to see if I can make a reservation. [00:31:51] Jo Hailey: It's right up there now. If you go into Google Maps and you click on the business there, straight away it says, do you want to chat with this business? If they've got messaging turned on obviously. You can literally just chat with them. The guy I said eyes in Owens, all the messages come through. They're always chatting people all day making eye appointments. [00:32:14] Amir Frank: If you've got a business that is actually public-facing, not warehouses back in nowhere, but a public-facing business, you need to have Google My Business listing and you need to have messaging turned on? [00:32:28] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:32:28] Amir Frank: That's step 1? [00:32:29] Jo Hailey: At the very least. [00:32:30] Amir Frank: At the very least? [00:32:32] Jo Hailey: Yeah. You need to put your banner up there, your logo, fill out all your information, make sure your information is correct, write something that describes your business perfectly to your perfect customer so that when they get there, they're going to know you're talking to them. I put plenty of pictures up there. Those pictures tell people instantly. Photography is key. [00:32:54] Amir Frank: How would Matterport fit into that? By basically capturing the store itself? [00:33:03] Jo Hailey: Yeah. Basically, to make a 3D model. Then once you're a Google trusted photographer, you attach your account, and you can just literally publish it. Because the Matterport makes it much more simple than the old days when we had to create your individual shots, stitch them together, upload them, plot them, do what we call moderate, put them in the right direction, join them in a sensible order. That's everything we did for Westminster Abbey actually back in 2015, 175 photos. But now, it's as simple as click a button. You do get the blurry hexagons in it, but people doubt they'll put them down. As soon as they can see where they're going, right and left, it's fine. [00:33:54] Amir Frank: Yeah, of course it isn't as important, unless you're in Westminster Abbey, then you want it. [00:33:58] Jo Hailey: Yeah, when you have to have the ipics and the media beautifully stitched in. [00:34:03] Amir Frank: Fantastic. We do have more questions coming in. Let me address some of these, see what we've got here. Oliver wrote, "At the moment, you read a lot about the problems with adding Matterport to Google. Have you heard of the problems? Is it a technical problem or is it a compatibility, or is Google currently having a problem?" Have you heard these problems? [00:34:36] Jo Hailey: I haven't noticed that being an issue. [00:34:43] Amir Frank: I haven't heard of the problems from Matterport uploading to Google Street View. I'm not really sure what you're referring to, Oliver. [00:34:54] Jo Hailey: It was way back when it was in Beta. You thought it'd had done it, and then it didn't turn up. [00:35:05] Amir Frank: Okay. Then you could just do it again and it would show up. That was basically the workaround. [00:35:10] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:35:12] Amir Frank: I think I remember that, but I have not heard of anything right now happening that's causing the problem of uploading. [00:35:20] Jo Hailey: I can't remember the last one I published or how long it was, but I don't recall an issue. [00:35:27] Amir Frank: Okay. Sorry, Oliver. May want to reach out to support team and see if they can help with that if it is a Matterport related issue. Nicholas, will you show us your workflow online? Are you referring to the Google Street View workflow? We can certainly talk about that. When you do a Google Street View with Matterport, what's your process? Are you still knocking on doors or do you get enough incoming work that you don't need to go out practically looking for it? [00:36:06] Jo Hailey: Yeah, I get incoming. [00:36:07] Amir Frank: Okay. At this point you've got a bunch of work coming in. If it is a Google Street View or gallery or something like that, what is your process? You go and you talk with the client, what do you do? How do you work that out? [00:36:24] Jo Hailey: They call me. I look at time, is it right for both of us? I put them in my Google Calendar and they know that I am coming. Then I do a quote actually on the system. I quote first, they approved the quote. When they've approved the quote, I put the time in that we've agreed. I put them in there, they know I'm coming. I really should ring them just a day before, but mostly it's fine. We all know that we're coming. If they're brand new to that, I will send them a prep sheet because they don't often know that it's a full 360. Anyway, I turn it off. I encourage them not to be there and to have that photo ready. [00:37:09] Amir Frank: Everything cleaned up as much as possible. [00:37:11] Jo Hailey: Yeah, and I'm not there to dress it. I'm just a photographer. If you want a set dresser, you can pay for one. I can arrange one but that's not my job. This did happen with one client. She was like it looks awful. I'm like, your place. I thought that we've got a photographer to come in. I encourage them just to leave where I tell them that I'm hiding myself and it will capture you if you were in it, and we joke about perhaps I'll move the bins. I take all the cameras. I upload it as I'm leaving using my phone to tag up. Usually, by the time I get back, it was definitely processing and it may have come out even depending on how busy the servers are. Then once it's come out, I share it with the client. I make sure that they're happy with the imagery. Then I say, "As long as you're happy with the way it looks now, I'm going to upload it to Google." I publish it to Google. Depends on what they have ordered, I might then do a video walk-through in there and I might snapshot a little bit of photos out of it and upload it to my gallery system before I send them the embed code, the link to the virtual tour, the link to the gallery. Usually, we transfer them the gifts, download the gifts. [00:38:53] Amir Frank: You're using Matterport to capture all that at once, basically. You get them photos based off of the Matterport capture and the Google Street View based off the Matterport capture, and the video run-through based off the Matterport capture. Cool. [00:39:11] Jo Hailey: If they want that as a separate MP4 if, for example, I just press play and screen record it and then I download the video that I can share as well, which is separate video. Content is king, isn't it? [00:39:30] Amir Frank: That separate is very important and the more businesses understand that, the better they're off. Cool, I hope that that answers the workflow question, Michael. If you have a follow-up, you definitely let me know. Oliver asks, "Jo, is it easy to win new customers through Matterport or Google these days? What is the percent figure for Matterport and Google of your orders?" How much are you doing Matterport versus just Google? [00:40:02] Jo Hailey: I say don't do very many just Google since it should be hard because it fluctuates. If the automatic buyout is actually American company and if they buy out another dealership, they might have 20, then they just going to want Google. I'll just take that one. The other ones individually, it depends on the person. Some things are related to business, but it depends on the person. How much they understand, how much they want it, the value that they see in it. You have to try and work out what is the value to this person, you can only do that by chatting with them. I can try and influence it by telling them all the great staff, but a lot of people don't even know what SEO means. I think that's the main thing, it's the marketing tool mostly. [00:41:05] Amir Frank: How did you market Google Street View to these businesses before now you said you've got a lot of incoming business. But prior to that, you had to build and work and market. How do you market something like SEO to someone who is selling pastries? [00:41:24] Jo Hailey: We just keep talking about it. I have a client locally. They hire me for photography for their website for their social media. They know that I do Matterport, so they hired me to do a Matterport as well so it's really quite cool. They didn't really know what it was and they still don't really know what it is. But I know me well enough that when I say it's really good for you, they going to believe me. Because it's a local business and I do a lot of networking, so I know that quite well. I haven't been here for 10 years doing this because it doesn't work basically, I suppose. [00:42:15] Amir Frank: You said that you help some of the My Business listings with their online messaging and whatnot. Is that something that you've put out either in some format, whether it's a blog talking about it, or a couple of YouTube videos and how you do it and why it's important? [00:42:38] Jo Hailey: With My Business, yeah, there's blogs on my media. There's at least a couple of them on there. Because it changes so often as well, so it's not long before they've changed the look of it and they've moved features and stuff. I think there was one in, was it 2020? There might have been one that I did. It might have been initially, or 2020, I did have a lot of time on my hands. But yeah, have a look on the news posts on my website basically, and there is stuff about being a Google Trusted Photographer as well, it describes. I've done all things on there, there's something you might find useful. [00:43:16] Amir Frank: If you're going to get into Google Street View photography, you'd definitely want to become a Google Trusted Photographer. [00:43:24] Jo Hailey: Yeah. It's not very hard these days, I think you have to upload 20 panoramas or something, ridiculous. Not that I've not gotten gripes, so I used to get so many turned down by the moderators. "You've missed blurring someone's faint reflection in a car window." [00:43:47] Amir Frank: Was that all done manually in the past? [00:43:49] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:43:50] Amir Frank: Now it's all pretty much automated. [00:43:53] Jo Hailey: Now it recognizes it. Well, there are some of the things that recognizes a place is interesting. [00:43:57] Amir Frank: Yeah. For sure. I've noticed that too. [00:44:00] Jo Hailey: Best I can start with that. Isn't it? [00:44:03] Amir Frank: I suppose. All right. Elizabeth has a great question actually. This is something that I think is very challenging for most. How did you acquire your first client? [00:44:22] Jo Hailey: Gosh, who was my first client? Well, I had to do lots of tests. I had to do sample ones anyway. I went down to my local pub and I asked the landlord if I could do it. They said, "Yeah, that's fine". It wasn't very busy. I think it was a rainy Wednesday afternoon. I did Google sheet you inside the Rose and Crown in Sandridge. I should have a look at that [inaudible 00:44:49] to see how many views its got on it now. I published that. [00:44:58] Amir Frank: Your first and it wasn't. [00:44:59] Jo Hailey: I'm now having an example. [00:45:01] Amir Frank: That wasn't really a paying job, right? Because you just went in there and said, "Hey, can I do this"? [00:45:05] Jo Hailey: Yeah. Then I had an example. [00:45:07] Amir Frank: Is how it gives you an example. It shows other people that experience under your belt. [00:45:12] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:45:14] Amir Frank: Got it. That makes sense. [00:45:15] Jo Hailey: What was my first paying client? Jesus, a long time ago, I'd have to look it up. But then I was quite lucky after that. I worked with some major tire company in the UK. They refurbished hundreds of their centers in research. [inaudible 00:45:35] depends on lots and lots of towns in between, that kept me busy for quite a while. Once you've started working with some big names, big respect. [00:45:51] Amir Frank: Yeah, they talk, they recommend. [00:45:55] Jo Hailey: Yeah. [00:45:55] Amir Frank: I really liked the gallery idea and having that. That just kind of resonates with me. For anybody who's looking into getting into that, would you say approach to gallery with the idea or the artist that's putting up their stuff. [00:46:13] Jo Hailey: Gallery. [00:46:14] Amir Frank: The gallery? [00:46:15] Jo Hailey: I suppose it depends on the set up. But for my purposes, the more gallery sells art on behalf of artists. I'm sorry. For example, what's up at mine is the Royal Society of Oil Painters. Within that, there's lots and lots of different artists. Well, inside of smaller gallery might be selling many different artists so you'd switch the gallery, I reckon. [00:46:55] Amir Frank: Done. [00:46:57] Jo Hailey: Museums as well, I've done some museums. It's a different thing really. [00:47:05] Amir Frank: Entire museums or just exhibits within the museum? [00:47:10] Jo Hailey: Well, the local one was the entire museum, but it's not very big. [00:47:15] Amir Frank: Okay. [00:47:17] Jo Hailey: I wouldn't mind getting into a bigger but I know Charles doing a really big space. Conference center, as conference centers I've done. [00:47:26] Amir Frank: Yeah. How is the museum using the Matterport that you scanned for them? [00:47:32] Jo Hailey: Well, that was very keen to use it in lockdown so people could still learn about that particular town. It's a really good exhibition actually, really fun. Again, looking into some interactivity, [inaudible 00:47:50]. [00:47:52] Amir Frank: Interesting. I guess outside of lockdown lots of places that depend on tourism like the city itself, would benefit from having Matterport models of different parts of the city that make very attractive tourists. [00:48:14] Jo Hailey: Yeah. I think most people come up with a reason for not having it because then people won't come. But actually I think the reverse is true because they didn't know about it. While virtual tour is amazing obviously, [inaudible 00:48:36] amazing, that you can look around. It's not exactly like being there. [00:48:42] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:48:44] Jo Hailey: You'll only get that experience from being in a place, don't you? [00:48:51] Amir Frank: Yeah. It just helps anyone who's excited about seeing Westminster, seeing it. The Google Street View PANOS, as amazing as they are of it, it's not going to make them not want to go visit the real thing. [00:49:06] Jo Hailey: No. [00:49:08] Amir Frank: Just the opposite. [00:49:09] Jo Hailey: The opposite is going to remind them of it so much. Because once you've experienced the virtual tour, that's engrained. [00:49:16] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:49:17] Jo Hailey: You remember you seeing that place, because there's not that many of them. [00:49:21] Amir Frank: Yeah, exactly. That's interesting. I wonder if photographers can approach municipalities and cities that have a lot of tourists come and say, "Hey, we need to make some virtual tours of these locations." [00:49:37] Jo Hailey: Yeah. Make it memorable for people online. [00:49:40] Amir Frank: Make it memorable, yeah. People who have been there can go back and revisit it. What a lot of people don't know is that it doesn't end with just the Matterport model. There's a whole infrastructure of partners who are doing phenomenal things. These SDK partners, they can do a complete audio tour through a Matterport model and it's amazing. [00:50:07] Jo Hailey: Yeah. I love all of that. I love all whistles and bells and the amazing things that you can do. I'm actually quite happy just taking the pictures and delivering that first part because the rest of it is such a steep curve to be exact. If people know what they want, we could pretty much do anything. If they come to us and they want it and they know what it is, that's great. But, once you doing one thing you might think it's better to just keep doing that same thing like delivering the virtual door. [00:50:44] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:50:44] Jo Hailey: It will come, I'm sure. Because here we are, now it's 3D virtual tours which are amazing and easy to use. Where before we were like, "Oh. Yes, it's Google Street View." Which is a little bit stilted in comparison, isn't it? [00:51:02] Amir Frank: We have a couple more questions. I do want to get through these. We have a few minutes left, let's see what we can do here. Can you increase the density of a point cloud capture I think, by the BLK or the Matterport camera? Can you increase the density of a point cloud? As long as you increase the density of the scans, the number of scans that you have, you can increase the density of the point cloud to get the highest density point cloud, Caesar. You can buy a matter pack that has a higher density point clouds than what you just get through showcase. I don't know how available it is, it might still be in beta, but you can definitely reach out to us outside of this. E57 files are the highest density point cloud. If point cloud is what you're looking for, the E57 is the way to go and we should be able to get you that. I'm just not sure how yet, we're still working on it. I think it's in Beta. Do Matterport tours get recognized on street view with blue line? I don't think so. Do you know about that? [00:52:16] Jo Hailey: No. [00:52:16] Amir Frank: No. [00:52:18] Jo Hailey: Blue line is actual Google Street View, and Google Street View inside [inaudible 00:52:24] . The difference ultimately is what is not attached to Google maps is just like one of those. If it's attached to the Google My Business listing, it's Google Street View inside. If you just post it using go through, for example, there's the option to add it as a blue line, that just has a street so that it knows where the above cities starting geographically. Then we collect, I've done my local park clouds. They don't hack in class, isn't a big house down the road from us. What she found out was she was green. They have big grounds obviously. They wanted to extend Google Street View from the gate up to the car pack, round past the old palaces, into the courtyard, round the park into the front of the house and then round into the back again [inaudible 00:53:22] garden. I've created that as Google Street View as a blue line, but it's not attached to Hatfield house in my business listing. [00:53:34] Amir Frank: Got it. Great. The difference between Google My Business Listing, Google Street View, you're not going to get a Matterport model, it's not a 3D. It's just the 360 panels that go out to Google. When you click on that little yellow person in the corner, you can see the circles indicating that there is a photograph here. [00:53:57] Jo Hailey: That's Google Street View inside. [00:54:00] Amir Frank: That's Google Street View inside. [00:54:02] Jo Hailey: They could be linked together or individual, if they're linked together it's Google Street View inside. When you hover Pac-Man over, you see the dots inside a building, on the map? [00:54:16] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:54:17] Jo Hailey: That's inside and the blue line is just Google Street View. [00:54:22] Amir Frank: Got it. Cool. John asks, planning to retire from North Carolina State in January and just purchased my own Pro2 camera. Will be applying to become a capture technician soon. Nervous about a change, but would love to hear from people who have already taken the plunge. That's a really good question. I'm not sure if we're the best to answer that, but I would recommend checking out MOUG, which is MOUG, Matterport Official User Group on Facebook. I'm sure a lot of people on there are probably in the same situation and you can get to know them and their experiences. Let's see what else we have here. Once you do the tour with Matterport Pro2 cameras, some of the objects in the shots turned out to have blurry or erased edges. Have you ever had that problem? [00:55:22] Jo Hailey: Yeah, they look like nipples, don't they? [00:55:25] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:55:25] Jo Hailey: Which is a pain actually, when you do snapshots out of it. Because you'll spent hours in Photoshop fixing this. [00:55:32] Amir Frank: Yeah. Your current workaround is just tiring to touch them up in Photoshop? [00:55:41] Jo Hailey: I can't do anything about the model. [00:55:42] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:55:43] Jo Hailey: [inaudible 00:55:43] is the model. I think generally people don't see it because they're looking for the big picture. You're looking at it and go, wow. [00:55:51] Amir Frank: Looking at it from a distance. [00:55:52] Jo Hailey: But if you've taken a snapshot and you've got a photo and think you are going to be using that, it does. So I just fix it in Photoshop. [00:55:58] Amir Frank: Got it. [00:56:00] Jo Hailey: If it's really bad, then don't use it. [00:56:03] Amir Frank: Yeah, when you extract the photos, the 2D photos to give them as a 2D image, you'll go through and fix them. There's clearly nothing that can be done. [00:56:13] Jo Hailey: Yes Actually, I don't use them straight out of the snapshot either, because they're not really ready for client to use. My workflow there is the Lightroom. I process them in the light room. [00:56:29] Amir Frank: Yeah. [00:56:29] Jo Hailey: I pull them out if they need to for detail that in Photoshop. [00:56:33] Amir Frank: You'll capture all the snapshots in workshop, download everything, bring everything into Lightroom, and then touch everything up as needed. Make sense. Those little jaggy bits on edges and sometimes banisters, it's just an inherent issue with how the camera is built. If you've done Panorama Photography, you know about the nodal point or pupil entry points. That's where you want to be when you're panning. And because of the Matterport Pro2 camera has a lens going straight, one going up, one going down, they don't align on that point. We need to use a lot of depth data in order to properly align. When there isn't as much depth data as there should be or can be, then we might run into problems. That's what's going on there. With that said, unfortunately, didn't get to all of the questions. Thank you very much for everybody who did ask the questions. We'll try and get those answered after the webinar and get them to you via e-mail or something. We'll try and figure it out. But for now, we are at the end of the webinar, Jo. Thank you so much for joining me and spending this hour. [00:58:01] Jo Hailey: Welcome. [00:58:02] Amir Frank: I hope everybody got something out of it. Jo, your experience with Google Street View is insane and I love that you've done so many different things with Matterport. I hope that shows everybody that it's not just real estate. [00:58:19] Jo Hailey: Not by a long chalk. [00:58:21] Amir Frank: Yeah, thanks again. We will see you in the next webinar happening, I believe January 5th, at least next ShopTalk Webinar. Thanks everybody. Take care. [00:58:36] Jo Hailey: Thanks. Bye. [00:58:37] Amir Frank: Bye bye.
	2 years ago	Post 2 • IP flag post

Matterport ShopTalk Webinar: a Photographer's Journey to Success15957