Need advice

[Marty Frasca]

I'm taking photos of artwork, mostly oil paintings, to sell on an internet
auction site, using an Olympus D340R. This is my first experience with
digital photography.

If I use a flash, the picture seems washed out.

Without a flash & with a halogen spotlight, the picture is either too dark
or has a glare where the spotlight is focused.

In addition, the true colors of the artwork do not come out. i.e., in one
photo, the black frame looks dark brown.

How do I handle this problem? What are the optimal conditions to shoot
under?

I thank you in advance for your help.

Sincerely,
Marty

[Tony Collins]

To avoid reflections, you need a diffused light.

The best bet would be to direct your light source (flash, or incandescent)
through a large area of incandescent material, or to reflect it off a large
white surface, or brolly, or to use a large softbox.

Make sure camera white balance is set correctly for the light source - use
daylight setting for flash.

--
Tony Collins
to...@collinet.freeserve.co.uk

Digital Photo website :
http://tonycollins.members.beeb.net

Marty Frasca <mb...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:cldy4.3779$lA4.2...@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...

[Stanton]

Marty,

There is a rule in photography that you should become intimate with if
you're going to do any copy work: "The angle of incidence equals the angle
of reflectance". In plain English, this means that the angle of the light
coming off a subject is equal to the angle going in. So, if your light is
eminating from the flash on your camera, the light will reflect directly off
the subject, back into your lens. Hence reflections and washout.

The way to combat this is to find a flash or hot light that is not on the
camera, that you can put off to the side, say about 45°. This way, the
light will bounce off the artwork PAST your lens (not into it like on-camera
flash) and the artwork will be fully saturated. TWO lights at equal 45°
angles will work best. This is how most copy work is done. If you want to
get *really* fancy, put polarizers on the lights. This is optimal for fine
art copying.

Hope this helps you.
Stanton
http://stantondesign.com

"Marty Frasca" <mb...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

>I'm taking photos of artwork, mostly oil paintings, to sell on an internet
>auction site, using an Olympus D340R. This is my first experience with
>digital photography.
>
>If I use a flash, the picture seems washed out.
>