Many artists are intimidated to get professional photos of their art because they feel it is either too expensive or too confusing. In either setting you'll want to position yourself in a way that you face the drawing head-on (or use a stand, as explained below) but you are not right between the sun and the artwork, thus casting a shadow. It can be helpful to have one person stand at the camera and another move the lights until its perfect. I wasn't shocked. It really sounds like a lot of work for a single photo, but it doesnt really take that long and you are left with a high quality image that can be used for prints, blogging, products, etc.. All of the hassle of a few minutes is worth having really high quality photos of artwork that can be sold. This article has a good selection of cameras touted as better than a smartphone. Considering how the human mind works, the viewer is likely going to want to see the whole piece, so theyll click into your profile or go to your website. Get an SLR camera. The first problem with scanning your artwork is some paintings are too large to scan. CANVAS GICLEE PRINTING1328 N Lake Park BlvdSuite 110Carolina Beach, NC 28428, Toll-Free: 844-678-5707Local: 910-458-4229Fax: 910-458-4204, Take a look at our gallery of How To Photograph Your Artwork (A 7 Steps Beginner's Guide) Last Updated on 2 April 2023 by Proactive Creative You could be the most talented artist around. We want to fill as much of the frame of the camera with the subject as possible. 7. Its as simple as that for really sharp photos (assuming you arent also using my iPhone). And that's just one of the reasons to choose canvas prints. Its also visually stimulating if you use topic-related props, such as flower petals for a drawing of your garden in spring. If you do decide on using artificial light, diffuse it using tissue paper or make your own softbox. Just go with whatever window you have available and perhaps test it out at different times of day to see when the conditions are best. Plus, it is much easier to get your camera in the right spot, square, level, and straight on, when you use a tripod. Without this, your prints will get distorted if you want to adjust the print size. There are more options than ever before, let's explore a few to find what suits you best! If you have a cable release, using it will reduce vibration and create a sharper image. The third slider lies under the center of the histogram and adjusts the overall brightness of the image. I recommend using a zoom lens if available because it allows you to get a nice close crop in camera leaving you with a larger file size after the final crop in computer. While this method is very effective, it still doesnt do justice to the actual paintings. It builds character and creates a narrative. Its not just fruit and wine, there are still life subjects out there for all of us. Im using soft boxes with daylight bulbs. Step-by-step videos for all levels. Discover how to thrive as an artist, and find your voice! Obviously you'll need to light your painting well, to avoid shadows and glares from the often glossy paint. There is a lot of computational photography going on behind the scenes with an iPhone, and not all of it is helpful if you are trying to get a really accurate color reproduction. It shoots high-quality imagery even in low light, thanks to the generous 24.2 MP sensor. Finally, if your lens has a stabilizer function, turn it off. If you do not make sure your camera is parallel to your photograph will turn out distorted. I usually make a folder of Master Images, and save it on multiple hard drives, as well as in the cloud. Ive started cleaning my paintings when theyre dry to the touch with a sticky roller or tape right before photographing to minimize any debris that would have to be edited out later. If you use a standard household lamp, the colour of your drawing might be a bit off, especially if it's not just graphite or charcoal. Those irregular shapes can be a real pain, it's true. This ensures that stray light bounces back from all sides, thus illuminating your artwork more and filling in some harsher shadows. In live view mode, zoom in closely on a detailed area of the painting and turn the focus ring until it looks perfectly sharp. But, with a little work, a high quality camera phone image can be used for all your social media, online advertising, and website images, and reproduction of small sizes only, maybe up to 8x10, or coasters, etc. Or should you neutralize any color casts and make the whites white? For DSLR users, this is an ideal situation to use the Mirror Lock Up function on your camera if it has it. How to photograph your artwork - Artists & Illustrators The wonkiness can be corrected to a certain degree in Lightroom, but it is better to just get it right in camera. As artists learning artwork photography will empower you to create prints of your artwork. Light Kits: Use a lighting kit which consists of light stands, strobe heads and soft boxes or umbrellas. The reasoning is that the slight vibrations from the mirror moving can cause your photo to blur. Cloudy days are your best friend. Lighting. When you are needing to photograph your artwork for prints, you will need a higher quality DSLR camera. Paintings on a flat wall. With your cameras built in light meter, you can achieve your desired exposures. Make sure that youre using the 10 second timer (10 seconds gives the camera time to stop shaking) or a remote to actually take the picture or it may be ever so slightly blurry. All of that gloss is hard to photograph, especially when the artwork in question is also very dark. Zoom. All Rights Reserved. It's OK if you don't see all of it, just a piece of neutral grey in the frame will allow you to color correct later. Stabilizing your tripod is recommended. Schedule a 10-minute intro call with the form belowand well give you a quick overview, show you how our augmented reality tool works, and fill you in on how we can help you get more traffic from collectors. It records how much light is falling on the subject, unlike the meter in a camera which records the light reflected from the subject. Try to hang it at ~48" high so as to avoid any color casts from the floor or ceiling. That's why every artist needs to know how to take photos of their artwork. You can also think of creative ways to keep the camera still, but the tripod would be the best option. You may not be a photographer but you surely have the capability of photographing your art with a little direction and advice. Over the next two decades, his work appeared in Forbes, US News & World Report, The New York Times, and other publications. Im glad you found my article useful! I borrowed my moms point and shoot for this tutorial. The McGimp version of Gimp by Partha is a closer approximation to Photoshop if you are already familiar and comfortable with Photoshop. Full disclosure, I take all of my photos with a DSLR and I highly recommend using one for the highest quality photos suitable for prints. If your photo is nicely exposed and tack sharp, there is very little editing you need to do. Make sure the angel of camera is perpendicular to the painting to negate distortion. Good composition is one of the elements of a great photograph. Jun 23, 2023Art Copy Service, Giclee Printing. #case study How To Photograph High Gloss Artwork | Burnt Umber Arts Ideally the back of the camera will be parallel with the ground. First we will go head and measure out equal distances with a tape measure: The lights should be positioned down at 45 degree angles toward the subject. They cover topics such as portraiture, landscape, abstract and surreal fine art areas. The point and shoot I was using indicated I was shooting off the charts underexposed when in reality the image was perfectly exposed. Or stage the artwork in a way that helps viewers imagine where and how it could be exhibited. Old photograph of one of my paintings, before I knew about lens distortion. How to Photograph Artwork (8 Essential Tips) - Digital Photography School It's important to remember that you do not alter your artwork too much in editing. Change what you can and forget the rest. Very nice post quite often for social media) to simply using a high-quality scanner. Drawing skills are handy for so much more than just sketching pictures to hang on your wall. A road map to drawing interesting portraits. How to photograph artwork with your iPhone. These are the steps we learned from trying multiple photography setups to find the best, most cost effective, and easy ways to get high quality photos of your artwork. It has 10 megapixels and a manual mode but didnt allow me to change the image quality or ISO and only a limited ability to change the aperture. For more information on this method, check out this informative tutorial about using a gray card to set exposure and colour balance. Remotes. Level. Howard Sherman shows how he documents his work on his Instagram account. Some slightly more advanced adjustment tools were buried in the adjustment tab that allowed for white balance correction and levels. Amber Honour, a Moab, Utah native, is a lifelong artist who grew up inspired by the landscape around her, the vibrant local community of artists, and a household that encouraged and valued art. Block out any light from all sources other than your lamps. Some shadows can make a photograph more interesting even. Here is a list of 21 photographs for you to use for inspiration. If your art is very neat and refined, choose a layout that plays into that, and the other way around. The goal with with this adjustment is to enhance some of the detail such as the brush strokes in this painting. Also make sure that your camera is actually parallel to your artwork. Additionally you can use continuous light from assorted brands of hot lights. In the next section, we will share our experience with various ways we tried to capture high-quality images of paintings. Home So I improvisedand started shooting indoors in very dim lighting using long exposures. I use this as my folder of images to upload to my warehouse at Art Storefronts for print reproduction. Truth be told, I dont recommend this particular camera at all. Its sharp, the colors are accurate, and you can see tons of subtle variations in color. Learn how to take great pictures of your artwork for Instagram, Pinterest or even your portfolio. Photograph your artwork in batches! 1 Answer Sorted by: 9 To photograph artwork, you'll need as flat and uniform a lighting setup as possible. A small level laid on the back of the camera will help. If your painting doesnt contain any pure white (highlights) include a piece of white paper or a photographers grey card in your photo to use as your white balance reference. Any way you spin it, buy the best you can afford. More information here. However, most artwork does not conform to the standard aspect ratio of a camera. For this set up, we will use a pair of lights positioned at equal distances from the subject. It shows the viewers everything with one look. It worked out well, but I couldnt replicate the results in different rooms so I kept searching for another way. The camera we use for prints is a Nikon D750. Buying good lighting has been one the best investments Ive made towards my art. Tripod: Use a tripod to make things level and square in the view finder and to eliminate shake or vibration. If your light source does not contain all of the visible colors (also known as full-spectrum), you will not get an image that fully represents your painting. If there is no daylight available (Scotland in winter, anyone?) The advancement in technology allowed the world to share the visions of artists. I love, love, love the look of glossy, varnished paintings. You want your camera to be at the same height, and exactly parallel to the artwork to avoid distortion. I live in a very dusty, dry area and my pets love to hang out in my studio so it cant be helped. But there is a way. Carefully adjust the focus using manual focus and check with LCD screen on your camera until you can see that the smallest detail is in focus. Print on demand supported by online marketplaces like. Also, they are a bit more fragile, and the bulbs will eventually need replacement. Investing in a camera for your art business is essential for the growth of your business. 6. Step 2: Hang your artwork flat on the wall. Especially with mobile phones it's very easy to have the angle off by a few degrees. The levels adjustment shows a histogram that has three sliders under it. This is done by simply lighting the artwork unevenly, i.e. This kind of photograph is extra compelling when it covers part of the artwork, showing only a fraction of it. I strongly suggest using a DSLR camera of at least 24MP, and a good lens, if you want to shoot your original artwork, and use these images for reproduction as prints. Drawing great landscapes will be super easy if you follow these simple tips. Naturally these are just a few ideas, there are many other possibilities out there and Im sure you could come up with a million more if you put your mind to it. Great article! If you live in the city with no garden and maybe a handful of days a year where it's not chucking it down or wizard-of-oz windy, taking pictures outside just isnt practical. Draw Mix Paint. Although it is not the optimal way of photographing your painting, art copy work can be achieved without lights in natural outside lighting in the shade where the area is evenly lit. To set exposure for the camera, again use the manual mode (M) and light meter reading. You don't want to steer away from the masterpiece your artwork already is. Place your art on the wall and set up your two lights at 45 degree angles from it on either side. Every lens lets in a specific amount of light. requires more than just copy lighting to look good. He currently lives and works in the Portland, Oregon area. If there's a little room on one edge of your frame, add the grey card there. Place your artwork near a window. Soft boxes are really easy to make and there are tons of tutorials available. We hate SPAM and promise to keep your email address safe. Art in itself is inspiring, but how the artists present their pieces is even more so. Focus. ), How to Draw Rocks and Mountains in a quick Landscape Sketch, 5 easy Drawing Exercises for Beginners and Pros, Composition in the Arts: How to plan a Drawing or Painting, The foolproof way to a beautiful Portrait Sketch (in 8 simple Steps), 5 great Exercises to learn Perspective Drawing the easy Way, 100 Drawing Ideas for when You can't Think of Anything, How to learn Drawing in 2023 (it has never been easier), 12 simple Warm-Up Exercises that will Transform your Drawing Practice, Awesome Gifts for People who love Drawing and Painting. More photo oriented smartphones may have a fighting chance to create decent photos and have replaced the market for many point and shoots. If you're planning to take a straight on photograph of just your drawing, move the camera a bit further back, so you've got an inch or so at the edges, then simply crop that out later. 3. Blog You can purchase this kit for under $600.00. There are a million tripods available in almost all price ranges, it is a little bit of 'you get what you pay for', but look for one that goes up to at least 60". Show more. You photos look very good. Delete the blurred images and keep the best ones. Contact us now at (800) 380-6038. This will brighten the light areas of the image. Set up a tripod so that it faces toward the painting and adjust the tripod head to be level using a level. Take that slider and slide it to the left until it meets the histogram graph. With a quality tripod, where you set it, it stays, even with a heavy camera. Your image should be around 20 megabytes. Call me sloppy, but Ive had good luck with just using my highlights or a bit of white painted on my easel for progress shots that may not contain white. Its on closer inspection that you really start to see the differences. If your photo is nicely exposed and tack sharp, there is very little editing you need to do. If you only have regular lamps, it may be beneficial to use cardboard to more precisely direct the light. Whether you're a beginner or simply out of practice, these simple drawing exercises will help you get in shape. Position the tripod directly in front of the art. This is also where you would connect the sections of scans for larger art pieces. The artwork alone can be sufficient, but it's also a good idea to add props in boosting visual appeal. Most newer smartphones have great cameras perfect for posting on social media, but not for prints. It supports RAW files and does very basic editing. My personal favourite option for rolling paper (humidity in Scotland, y'all) is to simply strap it to a piece of cardboard with some elastics bands. I bought a pair myself and tried it out and found that it worked just fine. Get the right exposure. I usually bring down the shadows and highlights, bring up the whites, do any white balance adjustments needed, and crop to the edges. Lightroom for sure does this, but check with your software for compatibility. A style you cant go wrong with is taking pictures of your drawing or painting with your art materials on or next to it. If you don't have Photoshop or Lightroom there are free tools you can use that provide similar functionality. If you don't have a tripod yet, try to be perfectly still or minimize shaking when you take the shot. If you are going to be photographing 2D artwork for the first time, I'd recommend supplementing this guide with a video or two to get a good feel for the overall process. You want match the overall appearanceof the original artwork. On the other hand, if the composition shows more of the drawing's surroundings (see point 8 below), the viewer's brain expects the distortions to be off, so it's usually not a problem in that case. Lets jump right in and deal with the main issue we face when taking photographs of any kind in a home-setup. Frame and position with the tripod to fill the view finder with the painting. Tools. For more composition tips check out, Invest in a good camera that produces sharp images. A photo just doesnt capture the full range of depth you would see when viewing an original painting in person. My preferred method of focusing on art is to do it manually. It can definitely be a challenge. Check the exposure/focus on the screen and re-shoot if necessary. Repeat for each new work you capture. The easiest way to help with this is to use a stand, of course. Sometimes, when the light is just not right, it can be fun to embrace shadows instead, play around with them and use them as a style element. There are many available, but one I like a lot is the Sony A6000 . If you do not make sure your camera is parallel to your photograph will turn out distorted. Fortunately, there are ways to rectify the situation. Quality is everything. Let's take some photos! Even lighting is key to making a well-exposed image that needs little post-production work. It can be a. I dont really recommend a smartphone unless yours is absolutely amaze-balls. This means the colour, brightness, texture and proportions should all look as close to real life as possible. Not everything you paint has to be on a canvas! Make your photos stand out by letting them communicate with your viewers. For the Gallery Award, we ask that you submit 3 photos: 1 of the artwork straight on, 1 side angle and 1 detail close-up. Just change the metering mode of your camera to the spot meter and record the exposure value as you place the gray card in different areas of the work area. The older Shopify API version is retiring and will cease to function from June 21st, 2023. I know it probably goes without saying, but dont use a flash. It only takes a few moments to catch their eyes, and hopefully, close a sale. How To Photograph Your Artwork | Start Getting Prints of Your Art