Photographing Art

OK - I've just been commissioned to photograph about 75 pieces of art for a high enough price to make it worth it to me to buy any sort of lighting that I need.

I'd appreciate if you all could tell me what I need to know - what sort of lighting would be best, what techniques should I use, etc...

Also, they want the photographs turned into slides. To be honest, I don't know what that means. I understand that Cord Camera can do that - is it a good idea to go through them?

I was thinking of buying a black background (paper or muslin), a stand, two storbes, and two softboxes. Is this a good setup for this sort of work? If not, what should I look to purchase?

I'd appreciate any and all help...

I had a friend that dealt with slides for his college architecture class. Ill get with him and see what he did, as far as the other issues, ill let the photo gurus handle them!

I'm going to recommend that you get a copy of the book "How to PHotograph Works of Art" by Sheldan Collins: http://www.amazon.com …3-5028970-5083061?ie=UTF8

Also, if the client wants slides and not digital files, then I would recommend renting a film body and shooting slide film. My experience with getting slides from digital files is that you will have to do some critical color management in order to get accurate color. Whether you do film or digital you will have to experiment ahead of time.

I would recommend against strobe lights. They vary too much in color temp and spectral balance, and definitely no softboxes or umbrellas because they alter color even more. I would use tungsten-halogen, preferably the Lowel Totalight, which has very flat,even light output. An incident light meter is very useful to measure the evenness of the light on the subject, which should be less than a 1/3 stop from center to edges.

Why not rent a medium format and take the shots directly as slides? I have only a little experience in taking pictures of art but I asume its for some form of archiving, if so it depends on the art but if it is two dimensional pictures with no real texture then two strobes with softboxes is great, nice even flat lighting, no fancy edges needed and I am not sure that abackground is needed i would just leave as little space as poss around the picture and crop later(harder if you use slides of course), but hell Im no expert although I have done it a few times.

I don't really want to use a medium format or film camera. I plan to use my 20D. How can I do it using my 20D?

Also, what brand of lights is best to get on a budget (kind of)?

I want to get strobes, and nice ones.

Several questions.

How large are the art works?

Are they flat art or three-dimensional art (like sculpture)?

If you are dealing with flat art, is there glass over it?

If you are dealing with flat art, does the surface of the art have a significant texture (such as many works in oil, or paper ridges in water colors).

Your approach will depend on these factors, and others.

But, it is very likely you will need a lens that is corrected for flat field, such as a macro lens or an enlarging lens fitted to a bellows.

If you need slides, heed the advice of others in this thread, do not produce slides converted from digital images, get a 35mm film body and use that. You may want to use your digital camera for test images.

Unless you are dealing with some sort of kinetic art, I would use continuous lighting, not flash, as long exposures will be easy.

For the slides, be sure to purchase fined grained film that is matched to the color temperature of your light source, or use the appropriate lens filters.

Enjoy! Lon

Usually when they ask for slides, they mean 35mm slides, not medium format transparencies. If the slides are for submission to juried art shows, the judges want to put them into projectors and see them on screen. For archival purposes most collections are set up to store 35mm slides. If they were for prints or reproduction, the medium format or 4x5 would be better.

Using a digital camera file to produce slides is a grand mistake. Unless your client is uninterested in quality.

The least expensive 35mm camera fitted with an approprate lens you can get off of Ebay, will do a better job than digital images from your 20D converted to slides.

Enjoy! Lon

Unwanted reflections will be a key problem, unless you are dealing with just extremely flat art with no surface texture (then it is very easy).

Visualizing reflections with flash gear (so you can eliminate or mitigate them) will be extremely difficult (unless the art is very flat and has no meaningful surface texture). Continuous light is a far better way to go for items that do not move, and for photographers that have little experience in copy work (as definitely seem to be your case).

Enjoy! Lon

you don't need strobes, just a good tripod with a level, a macro lens (macro lenses have a flat plane of focus, rather than a slightly curved one) 2 lights, point them to the center from 45º, then feather them to the sides, check with a light meter to see that the light is even across the entire piece, use a cable release and mirror lockup if possible, use a polarizing filter to reduce glare/flare, and you should be good to go.

slide film comes in very different types. you could get astia to try and have the colors remain as close to normal as possible. almost all slide films are very slow iso, so having a good tripod etc is a must.

slide films like all films have a issue on longer exposurers, called reciporcity, where the film begins to break down over 1 second, and you end up needed more time to expose correctly for. some are better than others, and you should plan accordingly. something like kodak 64t holds up very well, and is color balanced to work with tungsten lighting.

This method will typically work nicely, but if the flat art has a significant surface texture (like some oil paintings); there will be reflections (as the raised surface areas are not at 45 degrees from the lights).

The polarizer may help, but there are times that you still have unwanted reflections.

If there is a lot of large surface texture, it gets a lot more complicated to rid yourself of the reflections (than just employing lights at 45 degrees). Large surface, soft lights may need to be employed.

The OP has not really indicated the nature of what is to be photographed, other than "art".

Enjoy! Lon

I've done artwork slides for juried shows from my 20D. They seem to work OK for me and for the artist. The problem is indeed in light and color management. Oil paintings generally have a glaze on the surface that creates reflections. The different color oils can cause different reflective surfaces on the painting. I shot in subdued ambient light - my wifes studio - north light, tripod, long exposures and trial and error. Results were OK and moved fairly quickly once I got the light and angles set up. I will add that we picked the time of day to shoot based on the light.

We used Slides.com to convert and had quite good color results. They were quick and accurate, but we did spend lots of time with the original making sure the color was OK.

Now if Art is refering to an Arthur you will have much fewer problems...

Can't help you with the slides, but I have photographed many pieces of art for local artists, and various people who just have old photo's in old original frames.

I do it with my 20D/30D, a 580EX, light sphere PJ for diffusion, tripod, off shoe cord, and a circular polarizer.

The camera must be set on a tripod, I typically face it straight down and put the work on the ground. That way, everything is level. That is absolutely key, you can't have the work angled to the lens. A zoom lens is the best way to go, adjust focal length as needed to fit the dimensions of the frame. A circular polarizer should be added to the lens, this will help kill reflections from the glass. The diffused 580ex flash must then be attatched to the camera via the off shoe cord, and held out at a 45 degree angle to the piece of art. Then, fire!!!

Ideally, you need 2 flashes on either side of the piece being fired at 45 degrees so that the entire frame is lit evenly. If you use only one, you could get shadows on the edges, uneven distribution of light, ect. If your working with small pieces, then one flash will be fine, but for larger pieces, two is an absolute must. Otherwise, you will spend hhoouuurrrrsssss trying to get it right, and with 75 pieces to process, you don't want that!

I'm guessing you don't have this kind of cash to blow, but if I did, this is what I'd have:

Two 580EX's with ST-E2
Two cheap light stands
Two cheap umbrellas, softboxes, or LSPJ's. Not sure what would work best, only ever used the LSPJ
And a tripod with the arm thing

That's a lot of money though! I get by with 1 580ex hand held, but for 75 pieces..... eeeehhhhhhhhhh if they're paying you the $$, invest it.

Hope that helps some...

Get this book.