How to Photograph Your Artwork

Tips and tricks you can use to help improve the quality of your photographic reproductions. A professional photographer offers a few simple techniques you can follow to copy your artwork

using camera equipment you probably already have.

by Carol Schiraldi

How to Photograph Your Artwork

IntroductionThe Basics

The CameraCamera Settings

The LensA Note About Focus

The TripodThe BackdropThe LightingThe SoftwarePutting It All TogetherWhat About My iPhone, Droid, Digital Pet, etc.?Summary

About the Author

IntroductionSo you’ve been busy pumping out pastels, advancing your acrylics, exciting over encaustics, or maybe you just want everybody to ogle your oils. As an artist, at some point you will be asked to reproduce your work, either to submit it for gallery review or to share it with your friends on the Internet. That’s where your camera and I come in to help. This eBook will provide you with some tips and pointers to get you started on the path to photograph your artwork better and more efficiently. Armed with a bit of knowledge and with a little bit of effort, you can have great looking shots without having to spend a lot of money on new camera equipment or hiring a fleet of photographers for help.

The Basics This eBook is divided into several sections in order to help you understand how best to photograph your artwork. Topics include: The camera, the lens, the tripod or support, the lighting, the backdrop, the software, and what about my iphone? While this material is intended to be a basic guide which will help you get started along the road to taking better pictures of your artwork and being able to better reproduce your work, there’s no substitute for practice. Every situation is unique so there will be some trial and error but the tips provided here should get you off to an easier start and help you move along to results that highlight and showcase your work.

The Camera Many artists feel that they do not have a “good enough” camera to be able to reproduce their artwork on their own. Maybe they lack the money to go out and purchase a high-end camera, so the notion of photographing their artwork is slightly out of reach. Unfortunately, this is a very common myth which, conveniently enough, is encouraged by camera manufacturers, who want to in turn encourage us to go out and spend a lot of money on cameras. Most modern cameras, especially somewhat up-to-date digital cameras are more than sufficient for you to use in reproducing your artwork. While it’s nice to have tens of thousands of dollars of photographic equipment at your disposal, the photographer with a keen eye and a dedication to craft will almost always trump the one with expensive equipment who does not pay attention to the details that go into making a great image. When it comes to the camera that you should use, I am a big fan of the “use what you have” school of photography. There’s usually no need to go out and buy expensive equipment to do this although, if you have the budget and inclination to do so, by all means, go out and get yourself a wonderful camera that will also allow you to reproduce your artwork easily. I also don’t recommend specific brands--there are plenty of websites and conversations about this on the web already--instead, I opt to focus here on the steps you can take with your current camera setup to make better reproductions of your artwork. When talking about cameras, the question of DSLR vs. point-and-shoot will invariably come up. Again, here, I’m going to suggest that you use what you have. While a DSLR is a great investment and it will probably result in better images, this is not always the case and you can still take great shots with a point-and-shoot camera. For reproducing your artwork on the web, you will probably find it easiest to get a digital camera. You can get a reasonable point-and-shoot digital camera for about $100-$200. You do not need to have maximum megapixels, in fact, even something like a 4 or 5 megapixel camera or the camera found on an iPhone will do. If you do have a DSLR, use that. It will offer you a wider selection of lenses and (usually) the camera’s sensor will be larger, offering up better image quality. As a photographer, a lot of people come up to me and ask, “what kind of camera should I get?” or, “what kind of camera should I use for...?” These are important questions but, the one question I have never been asked is, “what kind of camera should I avoid?” If you were to ask a photographer that question, the answer would almost always be the same, “there really aren’t bad cameras out there!” There are plenty of bad pictures, yes, even bad photographers, maybe but bad cameras? Not so much. Usually, if it’s not broken and it works, it works good enough to take some kind of picture with it. To photograph your artwork, it’s probably good enough so go ahead and try it out. If you find that it’s really faulty, you can always upgrade later. If you need to make a lot of slides of your work, it’s best to use a film camera and buy slide film. Unless you really need slides, however, I would recommend that you go with a digital camera.

Any camera is only as good as the person taking the picture so it’s best to familiarize yourself with the camera’s controls before you try to reproduce your artwork. You probably don’t need to read the entire manual but you might want to first learn where some of the basic settings are and get generally comfortable with the controls before you start adding the complexity of reproducing your artwork into the mix.

Camera Settings The choice of camera is an important one but the settings on the camera can be equally important. When copying your work, you want to use your camera’s native ISO. For most camera’s this will be 100 but some cameras manufacturers such as Nikon use 200. In general, the lower ISO setting is better so, if you are unsure, use 100. As for the f/stop, you will want to avoid the wide open f/stop if you can, such as 1.4 or the like. If you are working without a tripod, you can probably get away with a medium setting, such as f/8. If you are using a tripod, you can safely go up to f/16. Stopping down your lens (moving it more to the f/16 range) will provide you with a deeper plane of focus, allowing you a bit more slack when focusing. You don’t want to go too far down though, since most lenses drop off in sharpness at the smallest apertures. Usually one or two stops away from the extremes of the given lens will give you the best results.

The Lens Probably the best lens I’ve used for copy work (or reproducing artwork of any kind) is the 50mm macro lens. This lens offers you a natural view of the artwork and is free from distortion. It’s also a very sharp lens and these lenses tend to be very bright and easier to focus. If you have a DSLR and want to get or use a lens to reproduce your artwork, I would recommend a 50mm macro lens. They are not cheap, however, and so you might be faced with some decisions and some choices. Here are a few options:

● Use a 50mm macro lens for best results.● Use a 50mm lens that is not a macro lens--offers most of the benefits of the macro lens

but does not focus quite as closely to the artwork as you might like. If this is really an issue, you can purchase macro filters which will allow you to get closer into the subject without having to purchase a “true” macro lens. The cost of a 50mm lens plus the addition of the macro filters will be less than the 50mm macro lens. This will be a little clumsier to use but it works just as well for less money.

● Use a zoom lens that includes 50mm somewhere in the middle of the mix--this solution will work, and can work quite well, but there are a few considerations. For starters, zoom lenses tend to be not as fast as fixed lenses, so the viewfinder of your camera will be slightly darker. Also, most modern zoom lenses have an autofocus mechanism that makes manual focusing somewhat difficult because the scale of the focus ring is very tight, and some of these lenses allow you to focus past infinity. Without getting too technical, basically, these lenses can be harder to focus in a manual focusing situation.

To workaround this, focus carefully and take many pictures, each time adjusting the focus slightly.

● Use something other than a 50mm lens--this can work too, but there are some “gotchas.” For starters, ultra wide-angle lenses will usually distort the image. Distortion shows up on the edges of the picture so, if you have to use a wide angle lens, avoid filling the frame with the art--leave a little room around the edges and cut this out later in processing. Extreme telephoto lenses will “flatten” the image, compressing the 3D space even more than our eyes do normally, which might impact your results, especially if your work is textural or has any 3D elements, even slight build-ups in the paint surface (for example.)

The best focal length for shooting artwork is between 50-100mm (35mm equivalent) so it’s best to stay in that range if you can. Try to avoid using a digital zoom which magnifies the pixels in the image, use an optical zoom, which magnifies the image instead.

A Note About FocusI’ve mentioned manual and autofocus and you might be wondering which is best. I’ve found that, when copying artwork, sometimes the autofocus mechanism on my camera can get confused and select the wrong focal point or plan of focus. I tend to be a manual focus shooter anyway, since I learned using older/used equipment, most of which had little in the way of autofocus (if it was there, it was probably broken) so this is not a big deal for me. If you absolutely must use autofocus, you can do so when copying artwork, just make sure the camera is making the “correct” choices, and double-check your focus, either by looking at the images on your computer or carefully checking the viewfinder as you work. Many of the 50mm macro lenses have a focal scale offered on the side of the camera, which tells you, in feet, meters, or both, where you are focusing the camera. Check your lens to see if it does have such a scale (many do) and use it if it is available, even if it’s just to sort of “spot check” your focus. I’ve found that it’s much easier for people to guess at distances, like say 3 feet, than it is to guess at focal points in the frame. You can even use this scale in conjunction with a tape measure to get a really accurate focus (even without looking through the camera although, obviously, that’s not recommended.)

The Tripod Everybody hates tripods. They are heavy three legged beasts! But, alas, they can be an invaluable tool in copying your artwork. It’s best to have some kind of a camera support when photographing your artwork, since it will allow you to provide longer exposures and will help avoid camera shake considerably. For starters, you do not need to run out and buy an expensive tripod. You can go to a local electronics store (like Best Buy) and get a tripod for about $20. Especially if you are using a light camera and working inside your studio (and not facing the brutal winds of the Shara with a giant view camera) you do not need a heavy, expensive tripod. You can also borrow a tripod from a friend.

If you are working in your home or a small studio and space is tight, you might feel that you do not have enough room to maneuver with a regular sized tripod. In this case, you might want to invest in something called a Gorillapod or get a tabletop tripod. A Gorillapod is a device made by Joby--it’s a small, flexible legged tripod you can bend onto things like chair legs, to stabilize your camera. While this sounds like it might be expensive, the Gorillapod is actually quite cheap and can come in very handy. A tabletop tripod can be purchased for under $20 as well and it’s another option for these situations, though it is not as flexible as the Gorillapod. If you do decide to purchase a Gorillapod, be sure to get one that will support the weight of your camera with the lens attached. Read the product specifications carefully to make sure you are getting the correct Gorillapod. When shooting, here are a few tips. The purpose of the tripod is to hold the camera steady but it can also hold the camera in the same place. This is helpful when shooting more than one piece that’s the same size. Organize your work by size, either starting from largest and working to smallest or going the other way and then move your work around your camera, not the other way around. This will speed things up for you considerably. Your camera may have come with a remote. If it did, use it. If you do not have a remote, use the camera’s self-timer if it has one. Try to avoid touching the camera while the picture is taking. Don’t walk around if your floors shake and try to avoid having objects or things like pets, children, etc. running around while you are working. If your floors do shake and you want to stabilize your setting some, trying hanging something off the center column of the tripod to weigh it down a bit.

The Backdrop One of the biggest mistakes artists make when photographing their artwork is to have something unattractive in the background. You don’t want to send a reputable gallery pictures of your beautiful paintings with trees, old easels, or studio clutter poking out from around the edges of your work. Fortunately, this is also one of the easiest things to remedy. I use black velvet fabric, unbounded at the edge, for most of my copy work and it works wonderfully. You can get velvet fabric at a fabric store and, if you go when velvet is out of season you can even find it on sale. I recommend about 3 yards of fabric to start, which is good for most smaller sized paintings. If you do especially large work or very small pieces you might want to adjust this to your needs. Velvet fabric comes in two varieties: crinkled and smooth. I prefer the smooth but you might want to get the crinkled if you have a cat/dog/hairy pet or are worried about the fabric itself getting dusty or picking up things (lint.) When I work, I frequently shake out my velvet and I find it to be tolerable but everybody has their personal limits on patience and I too have been annoyed by the stray dog hair floating into my frame just as I’m ready to snap off a picture. If you do not want to go the fabric route, you can use foam core, available at most art supply stores or even fun foam, which is used for kids arts and craft projects. These are both

inexpensive alternatives to using velvet. If you routinely do smaller work, you might want to purchase a photographic dome that is basically a white tent which allows you to put objects into it and photograph them without borders. These can run anywhere from $90-$200 though, and they will only work best for smaller items. Many people use them for photographing items for EBay type online auctions and they are frequently used in food photography or small product photography. Some of them even come with small lighting kits so be sure to read the specifications carefully to make sure you know what you are getting. For the shoot itself, if the artwork is small enough, I tend to place the fabric on the floor or ground and then put the artwork face up, flat and in the middle of the fabric. If your artwork is larger, you will want to tape the fabric up, onto the wall and then prop your artwork against it. You can also use an easel and drape the fabric over the easel. Sometimes, I use the combination of foam core and fabric. By getting a large sheet of foam core or two smaller ones and draping the velvet over it, I can then lean the artwork against it and it stays rigid and gives the fabric a less distracting drape. If you are doing very large paintings, it might be easiest to hang them on the wall and shoot them in that spot, passing on the fabric and just trying to get a plain white walled background. Experiment to see what works best for you. As far as the white vs. black argument, I prefer the black background because it tends to make the background disappear. A white background works equally well. Any single color is better than a collage of unwanted “foof” behind your artwork but I find that, generally speaking, I can get either a good black or white background in most cases.

The Lighting Perhaps the trickiest aspect of photographing artwork is getting the lighting correct. Even many professional photographers have a difficult time getting the lighting just right. In the past, for my high-end clients (when I was paid for copying artwork) I would setup my studio with four hot lights and spend a great deal of time getting the light soft and even on the artwork. This can be especially tricky with artwork that has a natural sheen to it--things like oil paintings and encaustic pieces, because the glare coming off the piece will be essentially magnified and highlighted by the camera. Any small glare that you see when looking at the piece will surely show up in the resulting picture and you might even find the nasty surprise of some additional ones you could not spot with your eyes. My advice here is to pay careful attention to the lighting--is it smooth and even? Where are the shadows? Double check your answers to get your lighting just right on the artwork. Pay close attention to any highlights or bright spots that you see, as these will almost always show up in your results. Even if you were to create a perfect world without shadows and with wonderfully even bright light, there is still another factor to be addressed with regards to lighting and that’s color. Lights have different color temperatures. Sunlight is actually blue, for example, while fluorescent lighting is mostly green, and, while our eyes adjust for these color shifts, sadly our cameras do not always do this for us.

Digital photographers often use the term “white balance” when talking about the color temperature of light, because the basic problem is that, the way the camera defines what objects are “white” depends upon the color temperature of the lighting used to illuminate the object. White balance (WB) is the process of removing unrealistic color casts, so that objects which appear white in person are rendered white in your photo. Many photographers shoot using RAW format, so that they can make decisions about white balance in processing and others use a custom white balance, by doing something like shooting a white or grey card in the given lighting situation they have, in order to properly determine the color temperature of the specific lighting situation they are shooting in--to get it exact. The basic idea behind the white balance setting on your camera though is to remove color casts and to allow your image to have a truer more “natural looking” color palette. Here are some common temperatures of light:

Color Temperature Light Source

1000-2000 K Candlelight

2500-3500 K Tungsten Bulb (household variety)

3000-4000 K Sunrise/Sunset (clear sky)

4000-5000 K Fluorescent Lamps

5000-5500 K Electronic Flash

5000-6500 K Daylight with Clear Sky (sun overhead)

6500-8000 K Moderately Overcast Sky

9000-10000 K Shade or Heavily Overcast Sky

If you are shooting with a DSLR or a camera that allows shooting in RAW format, you might want to try setting the color balance in camera and then adjusting it in processing to see if this can give you truer color. If you do not have a DSLR, you might still find that your camera allows you to set the white balance. Check your manual to see if it is a setting that is provided and experiment to see what white balance works best for you. Note that most camera manufacturers don’t specify the white balance in temperatures, like “5500 degrees Kelvin” but rather use the more “human friendly” names, like “Daylight.” You might have to check your camera’s settings against the chart to see which settings might work best in your processing software. When photographing artwork, I find it best to avoid what photographers call a “mixed lighting” situation. This is where you have part sunlight and part tungsten lighting, for example, or, more specifically, any two or more light sources from the chart. I prefer to work with one type of light source, even if it means that I have to shut off the lights in the room and use only available

lighting or if I have to darken the windows and use artificial lighting. This is where using a tripod will really help, since you’ll be able to do long exposures with one type of light source, rather than having to use two in order to hand hold your shots. If you are very confused about lighting and want to start simply, I would recommend that you work in a shaded area, such as under a tree in the middle of the day, or an area with soft shadows. Going outside and working under a tree or even just outside when the sun is not glaring down on you is a good place to start. Try to get the lighting even on your pieces, with few shadows and work with natural lighting for starters, so that you can leave your camera set on the common “Daylight” setting. This will get the colors, while not exact, close to where you want them to be. As you get comfortable in your environment, experiment with your white balance settings to see what works best for you and to see if you can get the colors closer to the actual pieces. You might also want to introduce using some foam core or a reflector to bounce some of the light to fill in some shadows and make things more even. Try experimenting with a few different options to see what works best in your surroundings.

The SoftwareMany people are scared away from digital photography because of the cost of software. Adobe Photoshop is an expensive program. While, quite frankly, I personally feel it is worth its weight in myrrh, I can also understand why many digital camera enthusiasts are reluctant to purchase it. Fortunately, there are options to consider which cut down the software costs. For starters, Photoshop does not have to be expensive. Adobe makes a program called “Photoshop Elements” that is a reasonably priced alternative to the more fully-featured Photoshop CS variant. This usually retails for about $100 and has many of the features of its higher priced counterpart. Also, Elements can often be acquired for free, sometimes being supplied along with the purchase of other electronic devices, such as scanners, printers, cameras, or even TV sets. You know those CD’s and reading materials you sort of pushed aside when excitedly opening that new TV, scanner, printer, copier, fax or camera? Yes, there just might be a stripped down version of Photoshop lurking in there, so go ahead and check to make sure you don’t already have a copy. If the $700 price tag of Photoshop CS is too hefty and even the $100 Elements is out of reach, do not despair, there is still hope. There are now freeware versions of photo processing software available. You might want to download something like The Gimp, which is free and almost as fully featured as Adobe’s expensive version. If you shoot in RAW format, you might want to download a RAW processor from your camera manufacturer or you may also opt to use the one that comes with Adobe’s Photoshop program, but don’t forget that you will need to format your RAW files in some way before processing them in the traditional editing software.

Putting It All Together Ok, so now that we’ve discussed the basics, it’s time to give you a run down of an actual photo shoot. Here’s where I recommend you start.

1. Pick a place where you have enough room to work and set aside about an hour (for starters) to give yourself some time to work. Don’t pressure yourself, relax.

2. Remove any unneeded items from the area and gather the pieces you want to photograph in one spot to make things easier. Decide upon a location for the shoot that has an even lighting situation and try to avoid things like passing clouds or mixed lighting situations. Organize the paintings to be photographed based upon size, either starting with the largest and working down or starting with the smallest and working up.

3. If you are going to work on the ground, place the velvet on the ground and spread it out. Likewise, if you are working on a wall, tape the velvet up to the wall, making sure you tape it high up enough to provide a surround for the pieces you are going to photograph. You can also use an easel and drape the fabric over the easel or use a combination of these to get the best results.

4. Put one of the pieces in place, either placing it in the center of the fabric or propping it/hanging it against the wall. Take the artwork out from under any glass and remove it from any matting now as well. Set this aside and restore it as soon as you are done photographing the piece.

5. Once the artwork is in place, inspect it very carefully for shadows and shifts in light or contrast. Walk around it several times and really hunt shadows and light sifts, as these will be pumped up once you photograph the work. If you are using artificial lighting, like hot lights or a lighting kit, move the lighting around until you are happy with it. If you are working on the ground, work out where you are going to stand so that you do not cast a shadow on the work and you can easily move above the artwork to frame your shots.

6. When you are happy with your lighting setup your camera on the tripod. You will want your camera to be directly in front of the artwork and your lens to be perpendicular to the front plane of the artwork. If that sounds complicated, think of something like this: -- | where the -- is your camera and the | is your artwork. You want to try to avoid this: -- / since that will render a “shift” in the resulting images. Basically, the rule here is, try not to tilt, keep everything straight, level, and plumb.

7. When you are happy with the camera position and lighting, you are ready to make your first shots.

8. I usually fire off a few test shots and upload them to my computer for inspection. You can double check your white balance here and look to see the general quality of the results you are getting.

9. Once you are happy with the test shots, fire away at your finished shots. 10. Carefully align each image in the camera so that the sides of the artwork are straight

and the tops and bottoms are level. Try to square and plumb all of the lines and outside edges of the artwork. If you cannot square all of the lines, make sure the piece is in sharp focus so that it can be squared in editing later.

11. Take several shots of the same piece, adjusting the exposure and slightly tweaking the focus each time. Remember, your camera’s viewer is not always accurate and it does not always show us 100% of the frame so shoot carefully.

12. As you move to the next sized piece, be sure to check your frame in camera and make sure your are getting the right frame. With every shot, you want to fill the frame as best you can but also not cut anything out.

13. As you work, separate your paintings into two piles: those you have shot already and those you need to shoot. I tend to work from left to right and start with one pile, moving everything into the next as I’m finished with the piece.

14. When you are finished, you can tear down everything in reverse. Move the camera away, tear the fabric down, put the artwork away, etc.

15. Remove the flash memory card and upload the images into your processing software for editing.

16. Set the white balance, exposure, color saturation and then crop the image if you need them. You can also produce JPEGs for the web now and sharpen the images for printing if you need to do this now.

17. Organize your work on your hard drive! Create a separate folder for your images and upload them into it. Use dates and names that make sense to you so that you can easily find work. Be prepared to rename JPEGs for gallery submissions, since some galleries are specific and want names like 1-CSchiraldiTitleHere.jpg.

What About My iPhone, Droid, Digital Pet, etc.? Mobile phone cameras are getting more advanced and now produce images that are good enough for most presentations. The same rules and tips as working with other cameras pretty much apply to mobile phones as well with a couple of exceptions and notes. If you have one of the newer iPhones or mobile phones that has both a front and back camera, use the back camera because it has the highest resolution. The mobile phone is easy to move around but be careful to align each image carefully, paying close attention to the angle of the camera lens in relation to the artwork. It’s very easy to create skewed images with an iPhone. When uploading, you can use a website such as Flickr to upload directly onto the web and then download onto your computer later on, to adjust things before you send them out to a gallery. The iPhone and other mobile phone type cameras do not work well in low lighting situations so make sure there is enough light. Also, be careful to pay attention to the color of the light source--avoid mixed lighting situations with the iPhone if it’s at all possible.

Summary By following a few simple steps you can create better images of your artwork without having to spend a lot of money on camera gear. Making the most of the camera gear you already have, but paying careful attention and using your current equipment wisely can go a long way to improving your artistic presence, both on the web and in the gallery setting. With a little practice and some simple tips, you can be making high quality copies of your artwork using only the equipment you probably already have on hand.

About the Author Carol Schiraldi is an exhibiting fine art photographer currently living outside of Austin, Texas. Since her first art show in a local ice cream parlor in Austin, her photographic work has gone on to be exhibited in galleries and museums around the world as well as included in publications and many sites on the web. She has participated in over 50 international juried shows and her award winning photography is highlighted on her blog Carol’s Little World. Carol was first interviewed by the Austin Visual Arts Association on the subject of photographing artwork in an interview that appeared in their journal Aavanti in 1994. Later she assisted the organization by providing copy work for many of the artists in the group, resulting in an increased gallery presence and recognition for the Austin area artists.