Paintings photography????!!! any tips???

[amironsi]

A friend of mine that has an art exhibition asked me to shoot her paintings.
i thought of it as a product photography normaly, i will need a lightbox and lighting...
Do i need anything more, any special tips for the photography it self???
she wants the high res pictures for later on mass production of the same artwork if required....

Would appreciate any info
thanks a lot

[john-in-japan]

I think that with good lighting from above downward, like you see in galleries should be fine as long as no glare when looking straight on at the painting. On tripod with photo plane parallel to the painting, and a relatively low number f/stop like f/2.8, and lens centered in the painting. Center point or evaluative should work - experiment. Manual focus can work as well. I would not use flash. If you have borders outside the painting, straighten and crop, but try to fill as much of the frame as possible to keep clarity if enlarged. To get true color might be most difficult, so watch white balance and custom function settings. Fortunately, your subject is still and you can try many things to get it right. I shot this, available light spur of the moment, hand held. I think these are not so difficult. Good luck.

[BrianN324]

If I might suggest: this sounds pretty much like copy work. Two lights, 45 degrees from the subject the same as you would for any flat copy work. You can work vertically or horizontally depending on your preference and equipment setup, (also dictated by the sizes of the originals) use a prime lens probably in a longer focal length rather than shorter if it's not an actual flat field lens. If you are going for quality image captures for reproduction, you need to light the subject evenly (meter around four corners and the center to match exposure) and eliminate shadows. You didn't actually say you were going to shoot this at the exhibition, but it would of course give you better results in a studio type environment with controlled lighting. Hope this is of some help.

[BrianN324]

Also: align your camera to the center of the artwork, keeping the sensor (film) plane in alignment with the subject as close as possible. Once you have the camera leveled its usually easier to have someone move the artwork to frame the image. For this, vertical might be easier working from a tall tripod with a ladder if necessary as you can use a bubble level to help align the camera to the floor or table top. Gravity is your friend in this case, as long as you are careful on the ladder. :-)

[amironsi]

If I might suggest: this sounds pretty much like copy work. Two lights, 45 degrees from the subject the same as you would for any flat copy work. You can work vertically or horizontally depending on your preference and equipment setup, (also dictated by the sizes of the originals) use a prime lens probably in a longer focal length rather than shorter if it's not an actual flat field lens. If you are going for quality image captures for reproduction, you need to light the subject evenly (meter around four corners and the center to match exposure) and eliminate shadows. You didn't actually say you were going to shoot this at the exhibition, but it would of course give you better results in a studio type environment with controlled lighting. Hope this is of some help.

Also: align your camera to the center of the artwork, keeping the sensor (film) plane in alignment with the subject as close as possible. Once you have the camera leveled its usually easier to have someone move the artwork to frame the image. For this, vertical might be easier working from a tall tripod with a ladder if necessary as you can use a bubble level to help align the camera to the floor or table top. Gravity is your friend in this case, as long as you are careful on the ladder. :-)


WOW that's really gr8 information. Thanks a lot
After all this info i am thinking this way, please correct me if i am wrong.
i can level... and i am thinking of using a light box of course and i will have even light from both sides.
I think with the light box i won't have to worry a lot about the direction of light as it will be diffused anyway.
I will be using the 17-55, at 55mm and F around 8 with iso as low as i can go.

I thought of attaching the flash to my camera and have it direct to the painting to have no shadows but i thought that will make me loose the details of the pattern of the painting.