I’ve had some great successes photographing my paintings and drawings, but those are mixed among tales of woe. There are challenges. I need to create digital images of the highest quality for prints and reproductions.

The distortion problem was partially cured by photographing with a 50-60 mm lens. If I use my 18-200 zoom lens, that gives the least distortion at 50mm. The rest of the distortion is managed by getting the camera angled just right to the painting. For that, I use a ball head on the tripod and I turn on the grid in the camera viewfinder. Then I can move things around until the edges of the paper conform to the grid.

I shoot in raw format. It gives the best chance possible for the picture to be improved by software tools. Some of the pictures exceed 75 megs, so I had to get a more robust computer than my aging vista box. Raw just means no compression is applied to the digital image. That means that with proper software vast restorative capability is available to get the photo just right.

One of the biggest challenges to photographing the paintings has been the awful interaction with the cameral ccd. Light that works to the eye washes out the image to the camera. I used to build boxes of barriers around the art to end stray light across the surface. In the summer I use a covered patio, primative diffusers, a tripod, and a shutter delay.

Actually, I always use the shutter delay. Two seconds.

And I got a full frame digital single lens reflex (hereafter) camera for this work. It’s not essential, but every advantage helps.

The most difficult paintings are the dark ones with  some shiny paint and some flat paint. The trick is to get enough light for the shot without letting the light source wash out the image.

I’ve tried full spectrum bulbs and shop lights. The each have their place. I actually prefer the shop lights in most cases. They’re the ones with the orange or yellow light. The daylight bulbs are 6500. The warm lights are closer to 3200 and I much prefer them for portrait shots.

Any other corrections happen in software. So I use Adobe light room for adjustments to the color, temperature, and other characteristics of the shot. When I’ve gone as far as Lightroom will take me, I export to a jpg and take over from there in Adobe CS6 photoshop. This is handy for detail work, squaring it up with a matt-like border, and various visual refinements. Software tools can make the digital version of the art even better, but except for cartoon and illustration there is still good reason to paint and draw the old fashioned way, pencil on paper or paint on surface.

Lightroom is a spectacular tool. And photoshop is indespensible.

Both of them drove me batty until I figured out how they work.

For the record, I was bothered because my printer put out a darker image than what I see on the screen so I got an xbrite tool to calibrate the monitor and printer. For me it was an agonizing waste of time and money that reduced my lifespan from the tension it created. I don’t know what I did with it. I should sell it.

Uneven lighting is another problem I have to watch out for particularly on the larger pieces. So I’ve begun building a photo studio. I still have the problem at times, but I think unless it causes a washout situation in the dark paintings pencil sketches, that will improve the chance of success.

Always trying, always experimenting. Sometimes it works!