posted on January 29, 2006 02:35:30 PM
Someone, ebayvet? is an expert on taking pictures of posters with a digital camera. I have some items that are much too large for a scanner.
What is the name of the item you use to back light the poster? Light box? I've googled and it doesn't look right.
Any help would be appreciated. Thank you.
Beth
www.vintageads4u.com
posted on January 29, 2006 03:15:27 PM
What do you mean by back light?
Generally posters are photographed with the lights at 45 degrees (off parallel with the poster) on the left and right; it minimizes glare. A polarizing filter can also sometimes be handy for this, depending.
posted on January 29, 2006 03:41:44 PM
One more thought, if your poster is framed and under glass: My son-in-law, the professional photographer, told me how to photograph a poster or picture under glass without getting the glare. He said do it in a room that's dark, and use a flash. This worked well for me a few months ago. The tricky part is focusing on the picture in a dark room! By trial and error, I got it.
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posted on January 29, 2006 04:28:52 PM
Thank you for these great responses. There was someone talking about some type of box or board that they laid their paper items on and photographed them instead of scanning. I believe there was some type of light involved but maybe I am wrong.
Thanks again. This is a great help.
Beth
www.vintageads4u.com
You really don't want to back light posters or any flat art work except when you want to show a watermark in the paper. Maybe you confused backboard with back light?
Photographing posters is actually pretty simple. Mount poster on large flat backboard. Move backboard into position where lighting is uniform across the poster - avoid any "hot spots". Position digital camera mounted on tripod slightly off-axis from perpendicular to the poster, set the camera's ISO speed to 50 or 100, set the self-timer and take your photo. FYI the self-timer helps minimize "camera shake" at slow ISO speed necessary for optimal image quality. A linear or circular polarizer can be used to reduce or eliminate reflections from glass.
Don't use a built-in flash as this often causes reflected "hot spots". If you place a white piece of paper next to the poster (you crop it out of the final image) you can use that to adjust the white levels in your favourite image software (almost always necessary unless you know how to set custom white levels in your digital camera.)
See the recent thread where FlufF asked about different layouts for her handcrafted jewelry for more tips.
