Photography and Art

[Jocelyn Walker]

Initially when I bought a digital camera, it was to take photos of subjects I wished to paint on canvas. It helps when returning to the studio, having a reference to work with in most cases. Painting 'plein air' has its advantages, but sometimes finishing a painting needs something to refer to back home, ie light.
Then came the need to photograph the end product to enter an art exhibition! This is constantly a headache for me as trying to eliminate distortions & reflections are problematic. If someone has some advice on how to go about getting around these problems would be greatly appreciated. I must say, lately photography seems to have replaced painting for the timebeing.:D
I will post an example of the process, from buying some lillies, arranging them with greenery from garden to photograph & the end product of painting.

[Pops]

Is there no limit to your talents Jocelyn. The painting is wonderful.
I am a bit mystified on one point. The arrangement of the real thing is different to your painted arrangement. Do you use the real thing just for guidelines of shapes etc and then make up your own composition.

Oh and about your question on photographing a painting...I'll give that a miss and wait for a voice of experience to come up with advice.

[lumix]

Hi Jocelyn, photographing paintings is not easy at the best of times. It's also hard to advise as we don't have all the info necessary regarding you particular set up. I gather from the images in your gallery that you use a nikon point & shot camera so will try to help bearing that in mind. First you need to chose an overcast day and set you painting up on a plain background. Use a tripod if you have one or some other support to steady the camera. Place a white card over your painting and take a white balance reading from it. Then replace the white card with a grey card to get an exposure reading. Once you have set your camera accordingly, remove card and check camera is parallel to the painting. Use the grid function in your viewfinder to help line things up. Now set the self-timer on your camera and fire away. Take several shots adjusting exposure slightly over and under to be sure you get at least one perfect. You could also do this indoors but lighting is harder to get right without good equipment. Hope that has given you some idea. I'm sure there are others here who can further advise on there own methods.

[bigbob]

This might help

http://artlinkswap.org/photographing_art.shtml

B..

[Archangel]

Initially when I bought a digital camera, it was to take photos of subjects I wished to paint on canvas. It helps when returning to the studio, having a reference to work with in most cases. Painting 'plein air' has its advantages, but sometimes finishing a painting needs something to refer to back home, ie light.
Then came the need to photograph the end product to enter an art exhibition! This is constantly a headache for me as trying to eliminate distortions & reflections are problematic. If someone has some advice on how to go about getting around these problems would be greatly appreciated. I must say, lately photography seems to have replaced painting for the timebeing.:D
I will post an example of the process, from buying some lillies, arranging them with greenery from garden to photograph & the end product of painting.


Hi Jocelyn,

Lumix and bigbob with the comments and information provided, covered almost the entire technique of taken photos of paintings.
I only have to say further to these, that lighting falling on a painting and camera positioning are for me the 2 most important factors of taking very good photos of paintings as correct lighting reveals painting details and camera positioning records different detail when positioned different.
A zoom factor more than 2X is nice to consider too in order to avoid object's shape distortions.


Regards


George

[Jocelyn Walker]

Is there no limit to your talents Jocelyn. The painting is wonderful.
I am a bit mystified on one point. The arrangement of the real thing is different to your painted arrangement. Do you use the real thing just for guidelines of shapes etc and then make up your own composition.

Oh and about your question on photographing a painting...I'll give that a miss and wait for a voice of experience to come up with advice.
I use the photos mainly as a point of reference for when I'm painting as copying from a photo stunts free expression & energy in my opinion! Paintings can lose their vitality & become stiff when copying exactness. Mind you, I take a number of photos of the subject from all angles & use bits from a number of them. I use the subject matter itself up to a stage where I feel I have all the details & then use pics where necessary! Especially with flowers that wilt so quickly! I work shifts, so my painting is only done in my spare time (& photography for that matter, spare time is scarce - usually after midnight except on my day off!)

[Jocelyn Walker]

Hi Jocelyn, photographing paintings is not easy at the best of times. It's also hard to advise as we don't have all the info necessary regarding you particular set up. I gather from the images in your gallery that you use a nikon point & shot camera so will try to help bearing that in mind. First you need to chose an overcast day and set you painting up on a plain background. Use a tripod if you have one or some other support to steady the camera. Place a white card over your painting and take a white balance reading from it. Then replace the white card with a grey card to get an exposure reading. Once you have set your camera accordingly, remove card and check camera is parallel to the painting. Use the grid function in your viewfinder to help line things up. Now set the self-timer on your camera and fire away. Take several shots adjusting exposure slightly over and under to be sure you get at least one perfect. You could also do this indoors but lighting is harder to get right without good equipment. Hope that has given you some idea. I'm sure there are others here who can further advise on there own methods.
Thanx, I didn't think about using a grey card after the white card. I will try that next time! I do have a tripod & normally photograph the paintings in my hallway as it has the biggest amount of space to enable me getting the whole painting fitted in. Trying to photograph them outside just didn't work at all for me! I do take a number of shots using the bracketing white balance!

[Jocelyn Walker]

This might help

http://artlinkswap.org/photographing_art.shtml

B..
That was a very interesting link! Thank you! Particulary about size of photos for web!

[Tinka]

Hi Jocelyn,
Not having copied a lot I think that most points have been covered, but was once told that to avoid reflections from the lightsource and shadows from the photographer, place a black card between the camera and the painting/subject and poke the camera lens through a hole in the black card. this did work when I copied some old glossy photographs once useing an 35mm film camera.

[Jocelyn Walker]

Hi Jocelyn,
Not having copied a lot I think that most points have been covered, but was once told that to avoid reflections from the lightsource and shadows from the photographer, place a black card between the camera and the painting/subject and poke the camera lens through a hole in the black card. this did work when I copied some old glossy photographs once useing an 35mm film camera.
Thanx Tinka,
Next time I'll try all the suggestions & something good should happen huh!