Everytime I Photograph My Artwork It Appears Washed Out?

What format are you capturing - jpeg, tiff, raw?

Are you post-processing the artwork in Photoshop or Lightroom?

My paintings usually come out a bit flat colorwise if I shoot them in overcast conditions. I just give them a boost in post-production if that happens.

If ISO is set to 100, and if you're allowing the camera to set the shutter and aperture, it's possible the shutter is low, giving a long exposure for the reason of being washed out.

Hi Maxwell .
As best we try when photographing - the colors never seem to come out exactly as painted. You just need to do a bit of tweaking in your photo editor to find what you feel is acceptable portrayal.
As long as you are not using that image to sell an original painting - you can have fun with it.

Scanning is much better if you can for size - but even then the color is a bit of a struggle to match.
It is both a disadvantage - & a perk.

If we could see an example, it would help. Are you shoot on manual? Automatic? Or what? Are ypu getting a good metering? When you say washed out, do you men a little over exposed or horrible and uncorrectably mucked up?

FWIW, every photograph I have taken over the last month or so has been over exposed. I have no idea if it's the camera or the photographer, but so far, they are fixable.

Lighting is the key. If you're shooting outside on a cloudy day you will have to compensate for lack of light by overexposing and/or levels adjustment in post-processing. You have to be careful with latter as you risk bringing out noise.

i would guess that your pointing into the sun, and or the lens is dirty. the camera may be set to over expose.i would have see an image otherwise its guessing. if it's that first picture, the camera is overexposed because the whole thing is black. there is glare on the sky, so that may be sun causing glare making it look washed out. you may have to set the camera to manual to compensate, or diffuse the light better.

---Mike Savad

Are you talking about your images looking different than your computer monitor after they are printed out? If so problem may be your monitor isn't calibrated correctly!

You could try a ColorChecker Passport. It's a card that contains color samples. It also contains a gray card so you can get your own custom white balance.

So you take a shot of the gray card to get a custom white balance. You shoot your painting. Then you take another shot of your painting with the color checker card in front of it.

You then use the photo that has the ColorChecker card in front of it to create a camera profile with the software that comes with it. That profile will show up on your RAW converter and you apply it to the photo of your painting. The colors are completely accurate. It's the only post precessing color work I do.

I looked at this one


The histogram appears to be over-exposed by maybe half a stop or more. If you pull the levels input slider across to the start of the histogram at around 43 the colours become much richer.
Try under-exposing by about half a stop and you may get better results - it will vary from picture to picture, though, depending on what the camera is metering on. Remember that the camera can't see what it is metering, it just assumes that it is of average brightness. If the picture (or metering point) is darker than the average landscape it will try to make it lighter and will over-expose, if the meter sees something brighter than average it will under-expose and make it too dark.

I take pics of my paintings after the sun has gone behind the trees or in the morning before it is too bright in my yard. Also, I have learned that if your paintings have black backgrounds, etc..any little bit of sunlight (even through tree shade) can and will show up and cause color changes. Also, If you spray your paintings with a protective finish like I do, be sure to take pics of your paintings first, before you spray. With trial and error, I have found that taking pics after spraying causes major glare and reflections that are hard to correct by tweeking it out on a photo enhancing program.

If you have your camera set to RAW they will seem a little flat right out of the camera.You have to process them after

I'm having the same problem especially with darker paintings. I have tried so many things and it is always the least favorite part of the work when I have to spend a whole afternoon just to take pictures in different areas of the apartment or balcony depending if there is too much or too little light. Sometimes I use a large blanket or something else that I hold up so that the sunlight does not directly shine onto the painting. I always take pictures before and after I have varnished my paintings but I have found out that for me the paintings photographed after varnishing turn out much better colorwise, however, if there are large areas of darker color I often have the glare I have to deal with. Sometimes I have white spots that I have to correct with the cloning option of the picture processing software on my computer. It can be really time consuming.

I'm grateful that you started this discussion, Maxwell! It is good and interesting to see what kind of experiences and good advices our fellow artists have.

Thank you! :-)

if your shooting outside, if you can expose for the grass, the dark images should shoot better. grass is middle gray, and you can usually get a good exposure using that. better yet, get a gray card or paint on (get a middle gray card from a photo store) and make a larger one to target on.

you can make a light tent from sheets, you want the light to be diffused. the light temp will change depending on the source and i think, time of day. hidden behind a cloud, straight out, at an angle, etc. your better off shooting it with a small gray card, so you can use photoshop (or whatever), and choose that gray card as your white balance (set to gray), and it will usually fix the colors.

other places recommend shooting diffused flashes 90 deg on the sides of the image to highlight paint detail, but that gets harder.

---Mike Savad

Use an 18% grey card to set the exposure. Calibrate your monitor with a Spyder or other device. Contrast will be low on an overcast day so use post processing to bring back some kick.

It sounds like you are overexposing. I use my in camera histogram to get the correct exposure. If doing a painting I will bracket a bit. Setting up an autobracket is helpful or just use the exposure compensation to bracket in half stops or even a third of a stop. There is plenty of light on a cloudy day to get perfectly exposed and sharp images if using a tripod. Using a grey card is another good way to figure the correct exposure. Learn to use levels and curves adjustments with a slight hand. Or use the contrast adjustment. If you can shoot in RAW you can then fine tune the white balance a bit. Also sometimes the tint needs adjusting.

Wow thanks a lot guys very helpful information here. It appears I have lots of research to do before I will be able to capture good photos my self. Thankfully I know a photographer who can help me out with this, it sucks though because I have to pay him. We haven't decided on prices, he's an amateur but last time he took pictures of my stuff it came out good enough and he did it for free. I'd be interested to hear somebody's opinion on this..is this okay? How much should I pay him to capture images of about 10 or so different artworks?
Can't wait to post my latest work, it's so frustrating for me to get a good picture though :/ I will do some research and see what I can find. Thanks again to all this forum's community has proven exceptionally helpful to me!

What is your white balance set at?

I think it's worth your time to learn the basics of photo editing. Even images taken by the best photographer using the best equipment can use a tweak or two. In your situation, minor adjustments to exposure, color balance, white balance, contrast, etc. will make your photo look much more like your original.

In my opinion, the two critical things you absolutely must know are how to adjust LEVELS and WHITE BALANCE. Correct white balance means your whites are white, not yellowish, and your colors will be truer. Cameras have white balance settings, which help, but they don't always get it 100% right. LEVELS help get your exposure just right. When you open the levels window (similar to the histogram in your camera) it should look more or less like a bell curve (depending on the subject, of course). If the edges of the bell curve don't reach either side, slide the pointer in until it's ALMOST BUT NOT QUITE to where the curve starts.

Those two fixes take maybe 20 seconds, but in many cases that's all a photo needs.

Ive had to resort to scanning and stitching.. I cant get my camera to get a decent pic for my artwork to save my life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vpj28da03JQ

How to Photograph Your artwork video

Maxwell,

Scanning your art work will yield far superior results than photographing. Find someone that will scan it for you. Or purchase a good scanner and do it yourself.