The difference between a paid claim and a denied supplement usually isn't the damage. It's the documentation. Adjusters aren't your enemy — they're overworked people looking for a reason to close a file. Your job is to hand them a file so complete that approving it is the easy path.
Here's the documentation standard that holds up.
Shoot the context before the damage
Wide shots first: the full slope, the elevation, the address visible in at least one frame. A close-up of a hail bruise means nothing if you can't prove which roof it's on. Every photo should answer three questions on its own: where, when, and what.
Timestamp and location aren't optional
An undated photo is an argument waiting to happen. Your documentation needs capture time and GPS location embedded — not typed into a caption later, embedded at capture. If your current process is "camera roll, then sort it out at the office," you already know how that ends: three phones, four jobs, and a photo of somebody's lunch in the middle of the claim file.
Document the test squares like a pro
Mark your test squares, photograph each hit inside them, and shoot the chalk circles wide and close. Adjusters see hundreds of files; the ones with clean, methodical test-square documentation get treated like they came from a professional — because they did.
Concealed damage: photograph BEFORE you proceed
The change-order graveyard is full of rotted decking that got replaced before anyone photographed it. If you open up a roof and find damage that wasn't in the original scope, stop, shoot it, and get it into a photo-backed change order before the work continues. The photo taken five minutes before the new decking goes down is worth exactly nothing.
One file, one timeline, sharable in one link
The end state you want: every photo from the claim — inspection, test squares, tear-off, concealed damage, completion — in one organized timeline you can hand the adjuster as a single link or PDF. Not an email thread with 40 attachments named IMG_4471.
That last part is what Fieldshot was built for. Photos file themselves to the right job with time and GPS embedded, checklists make sure the crew shoots the test squares and the decking without being reminded, and any inspection becomes an adjuster-ready report in one tap — with view tracking, so you know the moment the file gets opened.