More challenging then it should be . . .

I am still struggling to get some of my original works ready to upload to Fine Art America. It should be much easier than this! I just can't seem to get a clear, high definition image of them. Unfortunately, the bed on my scanner, which does nice work, is too small to accommodate the paper sizes. So, I am tying to get some good digital pictures. This is harder than it sounds.

I have an 8 mega pixel camera, so there should be plenty of resolution. In the past, I have taken pictures in the late afternoon in indirect light, and they came out pretty well. At least, they were good enough for display on the web. However, there were always some issues with them. First, clarity, second, avoiding the "graphite glare", and third, edge curving. Since now my goal is to have a perfectly clear high res image to be available for reproduction prints, this creates problems.

First, the depth of field on the camera seems to never be quite wide enough. I always wind up getting some blurring on the images where the focus faded away. So, I need to take the picture centered, without filling up the entire frame. This of course cuts down on the resolution. Not an issue for web display, but since I want these to be available for print, I would like to squeeze out as much resolution as possible. Also, the focus needs to be right on, and crystal clear.

The second issue really involves the type of lighting. Graphite has reflective properties, so the lighting must be indirect, but bright enough to avoid needing the flash. That is a hard line to walk. Using the flash will just "white out" portions of the image. Direct sunlight creates the same issue, as well as the heat from the sun seems to love curling up the edges of my paper.

Third, is the edge curving in the final image. I am not sure if this is the nature of camera lenses, or user error. I will take an picture of a drawing laying perfectly flat, and holding the camera as steady and level as possible. However, when I load it onto the computer to crop it, the edges are never square. Sometimes it is worse then others, but it is frustrating. I wind having to crop off some edges of the image in order to get it "squared." I have had this issue with a couple different digital cameras, so it may be I just am not holding the camera as level as I think.

I guess I will experiment with some different lighting inside and see what happens. Although, in the end I may wind up having to get professional scans. If anybody has some suggestions, I will look foreword to hearing them.

Well, back to the drawing board. Literally, actually, I have a few projects I am working on. :)