Tutorials

Photographing your Artwork
If you are serious about your artwork you really need to consider getting a professional to photograph your work. We can’t emphasize this enough. It’s the key to getting the very best art reproduction possible. Once you have that high quality digital file in your possession you have preserved the work for the future. You will no longer be kicking yourself once the original is gone. Think about the hours or even months of work you have put in to a piece. It is a worthwhile investment.

Digital cameras have come a long way and will continue to improve but they will not give you the accuracy that a professional can. 'Giclee' Art Reproduction requires the best possible digital file to give you the best result. We recommend you contact Mike Woods Photography. One of his specialities is photographing artwork.
Phone: 09 444 0930.
photomike@xtra.co.nz



We offer this information as a guideline, and hope it may be of use. There are limitations, and these guidelines will not give you the same results as a professional but may help improve your own attempts.

The main objective you are trying to achieve is detail and colour accuracy. Our recommendations for a non-professional photographer are given step by step below. We welcome feedback from anyone who has techniques they would like to share. The technique offered below proved to be most useful when copying old photographs.

If possible take the artwork outside into natural light. If the day is bright and sunny you want to position the art where you do not get sun flaring directly onto the surface. Grey days are great as the light is more neutral.

If it is not possible to take the art outdoors, have the art facing a window or natural light source. You will need to have your back to the light so be careful where you position yourself so as not to block light to the art when you take the photographs. You want the light to be evenly lighting the whole work. Check the height, maybe a higher or lower position will allow the available light to hit evenly on the work.

Try to position the art so it is not leaning, you want it to be as straignt up and down as possible so you don’t get too much distortion.

Turn off your camera flash, you don’t want flash flares distorting any part of the final image. Try using both automatic and manual settings on your camera. The manual that comes with your camera will tell you how to set manual functions. Take a range of shots changing the aperture and shutter speed settings. Digital cameras have very low apertures which is why they are so good at picking up shadow detail in certain situations, so take some with the aperture set to 1.8 or 2.6 along with the corresponding shutter speed your light meter is recommending for this aperture speed.

The final quality of your photographs will depend on your digital camera quality. Take the pictures on the highest possible resolution your camera can produce. If you are using a film camera pick a 100ASA film for fine grain, and follow the same process, try automatic and manual settings with changes in aperture. You only need a shallow depth of field and a wide aperture should produce the result you are looking for.

Film can now be easily scanned to a digital file at a good photo lab.  Once you have a digital file make sure you save it on a DVD or CD, and make regular copies.  If it is saved in more than one location ie: on your computer, as well as DVD or CD, there is less chance of losing the file.

Giclee – (Gee-clay) what does it mean?

Giclee is French for little squirt. Art reproduction using 'Giclee' printing gives real benefits in reproducing Limited Edition prints.  

We use piazzo print head printers which have pivoting crystal heads firing a fine spray, so we are ‘Giclee’ printing on all our media.  Inks are also important and we use only genuine pigment-based inks to guarantee your images will give you many years of enjoyment.