Monday, May 13, 2013

Photographing Watercolors

If you ever want to try an exercise in frustration, try photographing watercolors.  The frustration level ramps up if you are stacking the colors in the painting (ie, transparent layers) or using intense colors that are close in value.  Take for example the following painting I tried, which has the following Daniel Smith colors: phthalo Blue, phthalo green, quinacrodone violet, carbazole violet, and permanent yellow deep.  The emphasis was on shape and hue (or color), so I tried to de-emphasize value. 



















The picture on the right shows how close the values in the painting are.  There is some variation, but there it is small across the painting.  The picture on the right shows an attempt at getting the color correct.  I really like the painting to look at, but the photograph of the painting?  Not so much.  It should be much more uniformly--teal?  I'll keep trying to work out how to get an image that accurately represents the painting.


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