Re: More on fine art reproduction
Re: More on fine art reproduction
- Subject: Re: More on fine art reproduction
- From: John Castronovo <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 18 Sep 2015 01:24:43 -0400
- Importance: Normal
I remember the good old days too. Of course now I do that with multiple
Betterlight scans which are then layered in Photoshop. For a single painting
it's sometimes necessary for there to be many scans in perfect register, all
using different lighting techniques, which then wind up getting layered or
used with apply image in various ways to make the final copy. For example,
sometimes we get originals that have bad reflections requiring polarizers,
but the originals might have gold leaf too, and then we might also need to
pick up the texture of the paint and that means at least three scans and
twice that if we need to even out the light perfectly which I always do. Add
another three scans if there isn't enough light to compensate for the
polarizers on a very large piece and noise thus becomes a factor. Then
double everything if the original is very large and several scans need to
get blended together.
Human vision is a mentally produced composite image of multiple experiences
as seen from many viewpoints and everything the mind knows about the
painting goes into what we "see, but in copy photography we're forced to
capture just one rendition, so I think it's fair to interpret the original
to recreate the feel of it rather than just to release the shutter and
accept what the lens captures. Of course we don't always have the budget to
do it right, but it's helpful to know what it takes to do a perfect job
because then we can explain to the customer why anything less must wind up
with compromises.
Every original is different too. Something so seemingly simple as making a
copy is one of the most demanding things a person can do with photography
and there is zero room for error if it's going to look just like the
original when they're side by side.
john castronovo
techphoto
-----Original Message-----
From: Jon Meyer
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2015 8:50 PM
To: Ethan Hansen
Cc: email@hidden ; Brian Lawler
Subject: Re: More on fine art reproduction
In addition to the previously stated, my 4x5 fine art repro days included a
blend of specular directional (1/5 exposure) and cross polarized (4/5). This
captured better brush stroke textures.
Jon
Sent from my iPhone
On Sep 17, 2015, at 8:11 PM, Ethan Hansen <email@hidden> wrote:
From: Brian Lawler
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2015 16:11
To: email@hidden
Subject: More on fine art reproduction
Hi everyone,
Regarding Louis Dina’s post about reproducing the oil paintings…
I have tried to do this using Alien Bees strobes, and eventually gave up
in frustration.
I tried the same set-up with my four Paul C. Buff Einstein lamps, and
that
did the trick, mostly. These strobes are much better for fine art, and
they got me very, very close. There were still some colors that did not
capture correctly.
In a conversation I had with our friend Don Hutcheson, he suggested that
I
could solve the few small color problems I still have by using
incandescent lamps.
These incandescent lamps use tungsten filaments, and they have a
continuous CRI, where almost any strobe lamp, even the Einsteins, will
likely have small gaps in the CRI “curve” of the lamp’s output.
Brian beat me to it. I've run into the same problems in the past with
strobes. Elinchrome's worked well, AB's not so much. I found the best
results using large soft boxes and tungsten lights. We did projects for
two museums this way. Two Chimera mediums with hot lights. Shooting needed
to be quick as the artwork couldn't withstand a hot room.
If you go this route a trick with smaller artwork is to only use a single
soft box for the lighting. Position at an angle and use a flag between the
light and artwork to feather the light so it is even across the field. If
you are shooting tethered, move a white (or gray card) around the frame
and adjust the light and flag until everything reads within 1 L*.
That said, Lou isn't seeing wildly inaccurate colors - contrast being the
problem at hand. Light quality is likely a secondary issue. Ben's
suggestions of eliminating reflected glare and checking with a mirror are
right on. I suspect a shot of the mirror will show much unwanted light.
As one of the constraints was using equipment at hand, we're working with
the AB strobes. If you have softboxes or diffusers, I'd try them.
Otherwise, see if mounting the lights at opposing 45 degree angles to the
vertical and cross polarizing may help.
Best of luck,
Ethan
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