Photographing Your Artwork

General GuidelinesIt is not difficult to photograph your artwork, if you follow a few simple guidelines. You do not need a fancy camera or tripod - a cell phone can do a decent job. Here are some things to keep in mind when photographing artwork:

  • Your art needs to be lit well. If there is not adequate light, it takes a camera some time (not much, but enough) to take the photograph. Any movement of the camera/phone in this case will result in a blurry image. (You could use the flash, but that may result in glare.)

  • Your artwork needs to be lit properly. Avoid single points of light, like light bulbs. A tubular florescent light will work, because the light from it doesn't come from a single point, but the whole length of the bulb. Light from window that lets in a lot of indirect light (the sun isn't shining directly through it) works quite well.

  • If the artwork is flat, your camera needs to be pointed as directly at the artwork as possible. If you are using a cell phone, keeping the phone parallel to the artwork will accomplish this.

  • If possible, photograph your artwork BEFORE you put it behind glass! Glass causes reflections that are very hard to avoid, and pretty much impossible to eliminate after creating the photograph.

A Simple Process for Getting Good Photographs of ArtworkHere is one way to get fairly good photographs of your artwork.

  1. Find a room in your house with light from a window that is not currently letting direct sunlight in.

  2. Prop the artwork on a chair, leaning against the back of the chair. You may need to attach the artwork to some sort of backing board so that the bottom of it does not rest directly on the chair.

  3. If you know how, set your cell phone to 1x or 2x (do not use 0.5x!). Hold it parallel to the artwork and move in or out until the artwork fills the frame as much as possible, but still leaving the edges of the artwork in the frame! It can be cropped later to show only the artwork itself.

  4. Make the photograph. Check it to see how it looks, and see if it has any problems. If it does, try something different. If not, you've got it!

Hold your phone parallel to the artwork! The third photo below shows the result of not doing so, called "keystoning." In this case, the first setup resulted in glare on the artwork, the second setup did not. You may have to try several things to get a decent image.

The first photo below shows bright light coming in a window - one would not want to photograph artwork in the bright, direct light. The second photo shows the illumination on the other side of the same room, much better not in the direct light! The third photo shows a different room, with light reflecting off a fence outside. Using the reflected light to illuminate the artwork being photographed is a good strategy.

The photos below show artwork to be photographed. The first picture shows the artwork leaned on the back of the sofa in the second photo above. The artwork alone is too flimsy, causing it to not lie flat. In the second photo, a piece of backing board provides some support, but the artwork does not lie flat against it. The third photo shows some blue painter's tape used to hold the artwork fairly flat, the preferred choice!

When photographing the artwork above from about 5 feet away with the phone set for 2x, there was glare on the art, as shown in the first photo below. Moving closer, the photographer's shadow eliminated the glare. The phone had to be set for 1x to get the entire painting in the photo. The third photo below shows the result of illuminating the artwork with a point light source, like a single ordinary lightbulb. The result is clearly undesirable!

Editing Photographs Taken With Your PhoneAny photograph you get will likely have some flaws, many of which can be corrected by editing with your phone. You may submit photos to the gallery without doing this, but for those interested, here is a start to editing on your phone.To begin with, find the photo on your phone. If you have an Android phone you should see a pencil symbol above or below the photo. Tap it to begin editing. If you have an I-phone, look for three horizontal lines with small circles, to the left of the trash can. Tap it.

  1. Find find two sort of overlapping opposite corners of a square, with a curved arrow around it. If it is not already highlighted, tap it to activate it. You can then move any of the edges in by "grabbing" them and moving them. You can also rotate the image with the scale.

  2. Tap the thing that looks like a sun (circle with small dots around it). You will see a bunch of circles appear above a slider. Find the one that says "Brightness," and move the slider until you see what you like.

  3. Repeat for the circle that says "Contrast."

  4. Find the symbol of a thermometer ("Temperature"), and adjust until you like the colors. If you cant get the colors to look right, try the one that says "Tint." (Temperature adjusts the "blue-ness to yellow-ness" of the image, tint adjusts the "green-ness to purple-ness" of the image.)

  5. You can try some of the other adjustments, but those few will generally get something close to the artwork itself. When you are all done editing, find something like "Done," or "Save," to save the edited photo.