Taking Site Photos That Hold Up: Before, During and After

A good site photo answers a question nobody has asked yet. Was the damp patch there before you started? Did the customer agree to the second socket? Take three sets of photos on every job, before, during and after, keep them attached to the job record, and most of those questions never become arguments. This guide covers what to shoot, how to light a dark cupboard, how to file and back up the photos, and what the cameras on our devices can and cannot do.

Why Photos Settle Disputes

Memory is a poor witness. Six weeks on, you remember the work and the customer remembers the bill. A dated photo of the room as you found it, the work in progress and the finished result is something you both can look at, and it usually ends the conversation before anyone needs to escalate it. The same photos feed the office side of the trade: snag lists, parts orders from a picture of the data plate, quotes for extra work.

We are not giving legal advice here. If a dispute does go further, a trade body, your insurer or a solicitor can tell you what records carry weight. A photo taken on the day, with the date and time stored in the file, is a better starting point than a description typed up a month later.

Before: The Condition You Found

The before photos are the ones people forget, because you want to get on. They are the set that protects you.

• The whole room or area from the doorway, so the layout and the state of decoration are on record.
• Anything already damaged. Marks on walls, cracked tiles, a scratched worktop, a stained ceiling.
• What you are replacing, including a close-up of the data plate or rating label.
• Access routes. The hallway and stairs you will carry materials through. If a wall gets scuffed, you want to know whether it was already scuffed.
• Meter readings and isolation points where they are relevant to the job.

If the customer is there, show them the photos as you take them and agree what is and is not part of the job.

For decorators, a photo of the client's signed off colour sample belongs in the same set. Our guide for painters and decorators covers keeping colour schedules and snag lists alongside it.

During: The Work You Cannot See Later

Once the plasterboard is on, the floor is down or the trench is backfilled, nobody can check what is behind it. The during set proves the work was done and done properly: pipework, cable routes and fixings before they are covered, the joints and clearances the regulations or the manufacturer care about, test instruments showing a reading where that is part of your sign-off, and anything that changed from the quote, with a photo of why.

After: The Finished Job

Take the after set from the same positions as the before set. A matching pair is the clearest record there is of what changed. Then add close-ups of the finished work, labels and test stickers, and the area left clean. If a signed job sheet is part of the handover, capture the signature in the app and attach the photos to the same record.

How to Frame a Photo That Is Useful Later

The point of a site photo is that someone who was not there can understand it.

1. Wide, then close. A wide shot shows where the detail sits in the room. Without it, a close-up of a pipe joint could be anywhere.
2. Put something for scale in the frame when size matters: a tape measure across a crack, a pencil in a gap.
3. Hold the device square to the subject. Tilted photos make straight runs look crooked.
4. Keep the lens clean. Plaster dust on the glass turns every photo into fog.
5. Tap to focus on the thing that matters and wait a moment before pressing the shutter.
6. Take two, then check. Open the photo and zoom in. If you cannot read the label on the screen, nobody will read it later.

Light Under Sinks, in Lofts and Behind Boilers

Most of the photos that matter in the trades are taken in the dark: a cylinder cupboard, a loft, the void behind a bath panel. A camera that is fine in a kitchen struggles here.

Three things help. First, use a flash if the device has one. The Tuga A6, Tuga A8 and Tuga A10 all list a 13MP rear camera with a flash. The WH6, W8 and W10 do not list a flash, so for dark cupboards on those you will need a separate light. Second, light the subject rather than the camera: a head torch, or a small LED work light propped in the cupboard, beats a hand torch pointed at the lens. Third, hold still. In poor light the camera keeps the shutter open longer, so brace your elbow against the cupboard frame or the loft hatch.

Watch out for glare. A flash straight onto a shiny data plate bounces back as a white patch and hides the numbers you wanted. Move half a step to the side, or turn the flash off and use the torch from an angle.

If you are working in a loft with the device in one hand, the Hand Strap (£24) fits the A8, A10, W8 and W10 and leaves your other hand free for the torch or the ladder. On the A6 the strap in the box does the same job.

What the Megapixels Do and Do Not Buy

Our Android devices list a 13MP rear camera. The WH6 and W8 list 8MP, and the W10 lists 5MP. More megapixels means more detail when you zoom into a photo later. A 13MP shot of a consumer unit lets you read the breaker ratings afterwards. A 5MP shot from the same distance may not, so on the W10 you compensate by getting closer and taking a second, tighter photo of anything with small print. For a record of a room, a wall or a finished installation, 5MP is plenty.

What megapixels do not buy is a better picture in the dark. That comes from the flash, the lighting and a steady hand, which is why the flash on the A6, A8 and A10 matters more for this trade than the megapixel count. Nor do they make a blurred photo sharp. Autofocus, which the A8, WH6 and W10 list on the rear camera, helps with close-ups of labels and joints; on the A6, A10 and W8, which do not list it, keep the subject a little further from the lens and let the camera settle.

Higher resolution photos are bigger files, one reason work devices fill up. Our guide to how much storage a work tablet needs goes into that. The short version: 64GB on the A6 and 128GB on the rest, a microSD slot on every model, and cloud sync so the device is not the only copy.

Naming and Filing So You Can Find Them

A camera roll with two thousand pictures in it is where good evidence goes to die. Treat photos as part of the job record instead. The simplest way is to take the photo from inside your job management app. Most apps have a camera button on the job sheet, and the photo is then stored against that job, timestamped, and often tagged with the location if the device has GPS. If you use a shared folder instead, make a folder per job, named with the date and the address, and move the photos in at the end of the day. Something like 2026-10-24 Smith 14 Elm Road sorts itself into order and reads at a glance. Inside the job, three tags, Before, During and After, are enough. Do not rename individual files; the date and time stored in them is the useful part.

Backing Up: The Device Is Not the Record

A tablet can be lost, stolen or left on a roof. If the only copy of six months of job photos is on it, so is six months of your protection.

Turn on cloud sync for the photo folder or the job app on day one, and check it is actually uploading. Dual SIM 4G on the A6, A8 and A10 means photos can upload from site rather than waiting for the Wi-Fi at home. Our guide to protecting customer data on a work tablet covers the other side of this: a screen lock and remote wipe, so photos of a customer's home are not readable by whoever finds the device. Site photos are personal data about your customers, so keep them in the work account, not the family camera roll, and ask your trade body or accountant how long to keep them.

Which Tuga Camera for the Job

If photos in dark spaces are a daily part of your work, the Android models are the ones to look at, because they are the ones with a flash.

• Tuga A6, £349. 13MP rear with flash, 5MP front. At 277g it goes into a cupboard or across a loft one-handed, and the Belt Holster (£22) keeps it on you between photos. 64GB of storage with microSD up to 256GB, so turn cloud sync on.
• Tuga A8, £379. 13MP autofocus rear with flash, 5MP front. The autofocus helps with close-ups of labels and joints. 128GB storage, a 1000 nit screen for checking the photo in sunlight, and a removable 8000mAh battery.
• Tuga A10, £449. 13MP rear with flash, 5MP front, and a 10.1 inch Full HD screen that makes reviewing and marking up photos on site easier. 128GB storage with microSD up to 2TB, IP68 and MIL-STD-810H.

The Windows models are bought for their software and ports rather than their cameras. The Tuga WH6 (£699) and Tuga W8 (£629) list 8MP rear cameras and the Tuga W10 (£649) a 5MP autofocus rear camera, none with a flash listed. They take a perfectly good record photo in normal light; for dark corners carry a work light, and get closer for small print. If you need Windows for diagnostic software and good photos in cupboards, one answer is a W8 or W10 in the van and an A6 in the pocket; our guide to rugged phone or rugged tablet weighs one device against two.

Every device comes with a 12 month warranty, prices are as listed with no VAT to add, and delivery is free to UK addresses in 7 to 10 working days. If you are not sure which fits, the Which Tuga? picker takes four questions, or ask us.

The Habit That Makes It Work

The hard part is doing it when you are running late and the before photos feel like a delay. Make them the first thing you do when you walk in and the after set the last thing before you leave, every job. The one time it matters, you will not know in advance which job it was.

Compare head to head: A6 vs A8 · A8 vs A10 · A10 vs WH6