A Matterport camera captures a full 360° panorama from each tripod position, so anything moving within line of sight during those 20–40 seconds gets distorted, duplicated, or smeared. People, pets, and vehicles are all welcome to remain at the location — they simply need to stay out of the room or sightline being captured at that moment.
Invision Studio scans homes and commercial spaces with occupants present on a regular basis, and the workflow is straightforward once everyone understands the sequencing.
Table of Contents
- Quick Answer
- Why Movement Ruins a Scan Position
- People: Where to Be and When
- Pets: The Number One Cause of Retakes
- Vehicles: Interior, Garage, and Exterior Rules
- Commercial Spaces With Staff and Customers
- What Happens if Someone Walks Into a Scan
- Sightlines: The Detail Most People Miss
- Reflections, Mirrors, and Glass
- Room-by-Room Sequencing Plan
- Frequently Asked Questions
Key Takeaways
- On-site: yes. In-frame: no. Occupants, pets, and vehicles can be present at the property but must be clear of the active capture area.
- Each scan takes 20–40 seconds. That’s the only window where stillness is required.
- Sightlines matter as much as rooms. An open floor plan means one scan position can see four rooms at once — clearing only the immediate room isn’t enough.
- Pets cause more retakes than people. Crating, walking, or relocating during capture is strongly advised.
- Vehicles should be moved off driveways and away from the curb for exterior scans; garage scans are cleaner with vehicles removed, though they can be captured in place.
- A person caught mid-scan cannot be edited out — the position must be re-captured, which costs time.
- Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend a five-minute walkthrough before capture begins to establish the room order so nobody has to be redirected repeatedly.
Quick Answer
| Who / What | Can be on property? | Can be in capture area? | Best practice |
|---|---|---|---|
| Homeowners / occupants | Yes | No | Stay one room ahead or in a staging room |
| Children | Yes | No | Supervised in a designated holding room |
| Pets | Yes | No | Crated, leashed, walked, or off-site |
| Real estate agent | Yes | No | Useful on-site for access and decisions |
| Cleaners / stagers | Yes, if finished | No | Complete work before arrival |
| Contractors | Discouraged | No | Reschedule around active work |
| Cars in driveway | Yes | No (exterior scans) | Move to street corner or neighbor’s drive |
| Cars in garage | Yes | Optional | Remove for a cleaner, larger-looking garage |
| Delivery trucks / trailers | Yes | No | Relocate before exterior capture |
Why Movement Ruins a Scan Position
Understanding the mechanics explains every rule that follows.The Matterport camera sits on a tripod and rotates, capturing overlapping images and depth data as it spins. Software then stitches those captures into a single seamless panorama and builds a 3D mesh from the depth readings.That stitching process assumes the scene is static. When something moves mid-rotation:
- The image stitch breaks. A person appears twice, or half a body appears with no legs.
- The depth mesh corrupts. A moving object registers as a warped blob in the 3D model, visible in dollhouse and floor plan views.
- Alignment can fail. In extreme cases, the scan position won’t register to neighboring positions at all, forcing a re-capture.
There’s no filter or retouch that undoes this. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend treating each capture like a long-exposure photograph: for those 20–40 seconds, the space needs to hold still.
People: Where to Be and When
Occupants, agents, and property managers are frequently present during Invision Studio shoots. Three approaches work:
1. Leave the property (fastest). The photographer works without interruption. A 2,500 sq ft home typically finishes 20–30 minutes sooner with nobody on-site.
2. Use a staging room. Designate one space — garage, basement, screened porch, or a spare bedroom — as the holding area. Everyone and everything that needs to be out of frame goes there. That room is captured first, captured last, or excluded from the tour.
3. Rotate ahead of the camera. Practical in smaller properties. Occupants move to the next area as each room finishes. Requires attention but works well when the sequence is established up front.
Agents and property managers: Being on-site is genuinely useful. You can answer questions about which rooms to include, confirm Mattertag placement, and make judgment calls on staging. Just plan to step out of each room as capture begins.Our Matterform 3D Tour Photographers recommend against “I’ll just stand in the corner.” Corners are still in frame — a 360° camera has no blind spot behind it.
Pets: The Number One Cause of Retakes
Across Invision Studio shoots, pets generate more re-captures than any other factor. The reason is behavioral: dogs follow the photographer, and cats are drawn to tripods.
What works:
- Crate the pet in a room scanned first or excluded from the tour
- Schedule a walk timed to the shoot window
- Book daycare or a neighbor’s yard for larger properties
- Leash and hold in the staging room with a family member
- Close interior doors to prevent wandering between cleared rooms
Also remove from view:Food and water bowls, litter boxes, pet beds, crates, toys, scratching posts, leashes on hooks, and gates. These read as clutter and, for some buyers, as a negative signal.
Fish tanks and caged animals are fine — they’re stationary from the camera’s perspective, and slight fish movement in a tank is rarely noticeable.Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend against leaving a pet loose “because they’re well-behaved.” Well-behaved pets still walk into frame, and every instance costs a re-capture.
Vehicles: Interior, Garage, and Exterior Rules
Vehicles come up in three contexts.Driveways and curbside (exterior scans) If your package includes exterior capture or aerial imagery, vehicles should be moved. A clear driveway makes the home look larger and better maintained. Move cars to the street corner, around the block, or a neighbor’s driveway with permission. Also relocate boats, trailers, RVs, work vans, and motorcycles.Garages Garages can be scanned with or without vehicles. Removing them is generally better:
- The space reads significantly larger
- Floor condition and storage capacity are visible
- Buyers can assess whether their own vehicles fit
- No chance of a running engine or reflective surface complicating capture
If a vehicle must stay, park it fully and centered, doors closed, and don’t move it mid-scan.
Moving vehicles near the property Street traffic passing during an exterior scan is usually a non-issue at distance. But a car pulling into the driveway or a delivery truck stopping curbside during capture will register. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend timing exterior scans to avoid predictable traffic — school pickup, trash collection, and lunch-hour deliveries in commercial districts.
Commercial parking lots For retail, office, and industrial scans, a partially filled lot can actually help — it signals activity. A lot full of employee cars blocking the building facade does not. Coordinate with facilities to clear the primary frontage.
Commercial Spaces With Staff and Customers
Restaurants, gyms, offices, medical suites, and retail stores all present the same core challenge with higher stakes: you may not be able to close.Strategies that work:
- Scan before opening or after closing. The cleanest option, and what Invision Studio recommends for most retail and hospitality clients.
- Zone the capture. Close one section at a time with temporary signage while the rest of the space operates normally.
- Scan during the slowest window. Mid-afternoon on a weekday for restaurants; mid-morning for gyms.
- Brief the staff. A short pre-shift note explaining the process prevents employees from walking through capture areas out of habit.
Privacy and consent: Customers and patients have reasonable expectations of privacy. Invision Studio does not knowingly capture identifiable individuals. In healthcare settings, HIPAA considerations make after-hours capture effectively mandatory. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend posting notice at entrances during any scan in a publicly accessible space.
What Happens if Someone Walks Into a Scan
Here’s the honest sequence:
- The photographer notices the distortion — usually immediately on the tablet preview.
- That scan position is deleted.
- The tripod is repositioned and the capture repeated.
- Total cost: roughly one to three minutes per incident.
One or two incidents are unremarkable. Fifteen incidents across a large home add 30–45 minutes and can push a shoot past its scheduled window.If a distortion is missed on-site and discovered in processing, options are limited: delete the position (leaving a navigation gap), accept the flaw, or return for a re-shoot. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend erring toward caution during capture — it’s far cheaper than any fix afterward.
Sightlines: The Detail Most People Miss
This trips up almost every first-time client with an open floor plan.The camera doesn’t capture a room. It captures everything visible from that point. In an open-concept home, a single scan position in the living area may see:
- The kitchen
- The dining area
- A hallway
- Up the staircase
- Through sliding doors to the patio
- Into a powder room if the door is open
Clearing only the living room is insufficient. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend a simple test: stand where the tripod will go, turn a full circle, and note every space you can see. All of it must be clear.Practical measures:
- Close doors to rooms not being captured
- Clear the full visual corridor, not just the immediate room
- Keep people off staircases visible from open areas
- Check the backyard — someone on the patio is visible through glass doors
Reflections, Mirrors, and Glass
A 360° camera sees itself in every mirror, and it sees you too.
- Mirrors will show whatever is reflected, including people standing outside the room’s direct line of sight
- Glass shower doors, glossy tile, stainless appliances, and dark TV screens all produce partial reflections
- Windows at night become mirrors
The photographer manages self-reflection through tripod placement and post-processing. But a person reflected in a bathroom mirror while standing in the hallway is an avoidable problem. Our Matterport 3D Tour Photographers recommend clearing hallways and adjacent spaces whenever a mirrored room is being captured.
Room-by-Room Sequencing Plan
A typical Invision Studio approach for an occupied two-story home:
| Order | Area | Occupant location |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Upper bedrooms and baths | Main floor |
| 2 | Upper hallway and stairs | Main floor, clear of stairwell |
| 3 | Main living, kitchen, dining | Upper floor |
| 4 | Main-floor bedrooms, baths, office | Upper floor |
| 5 | Basement or lower level | Upper floor or outside |
| 6 | Garage | Outside |
| 7 | Exterior and aerial | Inside, vehicles relocated |
Export as CSVClearing upstairs first means occupants move up while the main level is captured — reducing crossings on stairs, which are among the hardest areas to capture cleanly.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I stay in my home during the scan? Yes. Stay in a staging room or move ahead of the camera. You just can’t be in the active capture area.
Will I show up in the finished tour? Not if rooms and sightlines are cleared during capture. Any accidental appearance is corrected by re-capturing that position.
Can my dog stay in the backyard? Usually yes, but not if the yard is visible through glass doors being captured, and not during exterior or aerial capture.Do I need to move my car? For exterior or aerial capture, yes. For interior-only scans, only if the driveway is visible through windows. Garage vehicles are best removed.
Can you just edit people out later? No. Movement corrupts both the image stitch and the 3D mesh. Re-capturing the position is the only remedy.What about a running business — can you scan without closing? Often yes, using zoned capture during slow hours. After-hours is cleaner and faster, and mandatory in healthcare settings.
Are birds, fish, or reptiles a problem? No. Caged and tanked animals are effectively stationary and cause no capture issues.
Can children be present? Yes, with supervision in a designated room. Unsupervised children are the second-most-common source of retakes after pets.
The Bottom Line
People, pets, and vehicles don’t prevent a Matterport scan — they just need a plan. Everyone can remain on the property; nothing can be in the frame during the 20–40 seconds each position takes to capture. Establish the room order up front, use a staging room, contain pets, clear the driveway, and pay attention to sightlines in open floor plans.Ready to book? Contact Invision Studio, and we’ll include the capture-day preparation guide with your booking confirmation so everyone at the property knows exactly where to be.
