Advice on some shots

Eirebear

Hi folks
Im looking for a little advice on some shots ive been asked to take for a local artist.
he basically wants me to catalogue his paintings and sculptures so he can put the pics on disc and send them to prospective clients.

I'm a wee bit worried about taking pictures of the paintings more than the sculpures as im not sure what the best way to go about lighting them and shooting them is in order to preserve as much of the detail (brushstokes, textures etc) as possible.

Has anyone got any hints, tips, advice on the best way to shoot them?

Thanks

DaireQuinlan

Eirebear wrote:

Hi folks
Im looking for a little advice on some shots ive been asked to take for a local artist.
he basically wants me to catalogue his paintings and sculptures so he can put the pics on disc and send them to prospective clients.

I'm a wee bit worried about taking pictures of the paintings more than the sculpures as im not sure what the best way to go about lighting them and shooting them is in order to preserve as much of the detail (brushstokes, textures etc) as possible.

Has anyone got any hints, tips, advice on the best way to shoot them?

Thanks

You'll definately need a poloriser for a start, any direct light on a painting (acrylics or oils in particular) will raise a lot of reflections and glare. Even worse obviously if they're behind glass. I'd shoot them with a big diffuse flash right behind the camera and then maybe another 1 or 2 fill lights off to one side to pick up on the texture or something. I'd say it'd take a bit of experimentation. I'll bet there's a tutorial somewhere on the web :-) Check out the strobist for a start, see if there's anything there specific to paintings or flat texture. It'll certainly give you some great ideas for lighting the sculpture.

Duchovny

Well, you need to be very carefull with light and reflections in the painting, a good idea as well, is take the normal picture, and then take a macro picture and edit in photoshop, put in the corner just to show a bit of the real quality of the drawing

Eirebear

Cheers guys.

daire ill have a look at that later, should be fun trying to figure out what i need to adapt and make-do with!

Duchovny, yeah i had thought of doing something like that already, almost like a magnified section of the photograph.
Cheers

Fajitas!

I'd shoot from above the image (ie haev the painting on the ground)

Make sure you're shooting at your sharpest, and make sure your lens has no distortions.

Following this, I'd nearly advise shooting a couple of photos for each shot, lit differently, and combining them in photoshop.

Eirebear

Fajitas! wrote:

I'd shoot from above the image (ie haev the painting on the ground)

Make sure you're shooting at your sharpest, and make sure your lens has no distortions.

Following this, I'd nearly advise shooting a couple of photos for each shot, lit differently, and combining them in photoshop.

Shooting from above the painting makes sense if i can get the lighting right....i'd be worried about unneccesary shadow problems from that position though.

ThOnda

Off camera flash is a must and also, use colour table at the frame of the picture, to callibrate it 100%.
Personaly, I think that pictures of statues will be bigger problem. Once you set the light for paintings, you can just shoot and shoot and shoot. But to set lighting for a statue, oh my god... I've seen that only once and I would think a lot before doing it on my own.
But good luck and share some experience, please.

Eirebear

ThOnda wrote:

Off camera flash is a must and also, use colour table at the frame of the picture, to callibrate it 100%.
Personaly, I think that pictures of statues will be bigger problem. Once you set the light for paintings, you can just shoot and shoot and shoot. But to set lighting for a statue, oh my god... I've seen that only once and I would think a lot before doing it on my own.
But good luck and share some experience, please.

I've done some statue stuff before and tbh was fairly happy with the results so im not worried too much about that.
paintings are his main thing too, so im a little more tense about getting that spot on.

Should be doing it at some point next week after some research and rounding up a few bits and pieces.
Should be fun! I'll post up the images afterwards so you can all tell me how awesome my work is!

Fajitas!

Eirebear wrote:

i'd be worried about unneccesary shadow problems from that position though.

That's why you'd be shooting mulitple exposures and blending together

Eirebear

Fajitas! wrote:

That's why you'd be shooting mulitple exposures and blending together

Good point....its gonna be an interesting job i think, i should learn a fair bit from it if it works out well.

Fajitas!

Tbh, it's one of those jobs you'll do again at a moments notice, or never again in your life

Eirebear

Fajitas! wrote:

Tbh, it's one of those jobs you'll do again at a moments notice, or never again in your life

haha! yeah that sounds about right...at the moment i'm just a little nervy because i actually really like the guys work and want to do it justice.

and if i screw it up...well im moving out of the country in a couple of weeks anyway

Damned Thing

Shooting multiples and blending together is all well and good if you have the time and inclination, but not really practical if you have more than a few to do. You could spend substantially longer post processing than actually taking the photos, and to be honest I can't imagine ever having to do that for artwork unless the canvas was absolutely monstrous - certainly something bigger than 8x16 feet.

1. use an artists easel to sit paintings on (remove paintings from glass and frame where possible, though it's not really a big issue). If you don't know how to do it don't try, it can be really finicky depending on the framing - you can crack a frame, break the glass or scratch the painting.

2. One light (we use flash) either side of the painting, the further back you can get them the better - more even spread of light, particularly on large paintings (though you're gonna hafta use 4 lights for stupid big ones). If the paintings have frames that stick out makes sure the lights don't cast frame shadows on the artwork. You can buy polarising gels to clip onto the lights, expensive though. Take light readings from the flash at all four corners and through the centre of the painting, make sure there's an even spread of light. If you light the largest painting correctly first it follows all others will be equally evenly lit, if you start with the smallest and work your way up you may find you have to move your lights back and take readings again...no one wants to do that.

3. Standard to medium long lens with polarising filter will do most in most situations, ocassionally you might need a wide for bigger canvases...or move further back Anyway, set camera on tripod, use lens hood to avoid light spill from lights, and level and centre things up. Shoot at f8 or f11, you shouldn't need any more unless someone has been using a shovel to lob paint on, or you have to get in very close.

4. Black velvet hung from two light stands, one on either side of the camera, with a hole cut to fit the lens through is the best way to avoid reflections and shine on glass or paint. We use a 9 foot wide roll clipped to the stands, takes a coupla minutes to set up but it's worth it. If you're going to be doing this sort of thing regularly that's the best bit of advise I can give to save hair-pulling and tears. You don't need it for all paintings, just shiny oils and stuff behind glass.

5. A photographic colour swatch should be taped to the middle of the paintings frame, top or bottom, on all shots.

6. Bracket your shots half a stop and a full stop either side. Maybe another half stop either way if you want to be sure to be sure.

7. If you're shooting digital make sure whoever's going to be printing them knows what they're doing. We've had issues with muppets saying our calibration is wrong and then getting our preferred people to do proofs and everything's hunky dory. Printers, and bad designers, will blame photographers at the drop of a hat so don't take any guff from them and make sure the client knows where to lay the blame by being able to prove it's not you.

As Th0nda said, once you have the first and largest painting set up correctly everything should flow smoothly. Scultures are the same, start with the biggest and work your way down - they do take longer to set up, getting the best angle and lighting.

Be really really careful with unframed pastel work and charcol, the merest touch can wipe them out.

In short: Level everything, light evenly, watch out for reflections and bracket. Take your time and you'll be fine.

Oriel

Tripid, no flash, 100mm+ lens so less distortion, watch for flare, shoot RAW, use f11-f16, good natural daylight.

Fajitas!

Well.

You're not going to get much better than that!

Eirebear

Well damned thing...thats pretty much as comprehensive as it gets, thanks!
Cheers for your help everyone, ill let y'all know how it goes.