How To Photograph Your Paintings Through Glass

Hi friends of the CAG Blog,

It is a little unusual for me to post a how to article... but I ran across this in my personal blog list and thought it would be of help to a lot of us that struggle with the problem of needing to photograph a piece that is already framed and under glass. The post below has been copied from the Artists Network, written by Maggie Price, Pastel Artist.  I'm including   a link for you to check out the blog site for yourself! I hope you enjoy the read and that it will help us (me included) with this common photography problem!

Gail Watford, CAG Blog Editor

Pastel Q&A | How To Photograph Through Glass Posted on February 16, 2012 by Maggie Price |http://www.artistsnetwork.com/medium/pastel/pastel-qa-photographing-through-glass

Q. Recently I sold a painting, and just before the buyer arrived to pick it up, I realized I’d never photographed it for my records. There was no time to unframe it, so I shot a quick photo through the glass, but there was a bright spot from the flash and the image is nearly unrecognizable. Is there a way to shoot through glass without this problem?

A. Of course the best photo will be one taken before the painting is framed and under glass. But, in the situation you describe, there’s a solution. I learned this method years ago from Deborah Christensen Secor, artist and contributing editor to The Pastel Journal, and have used it a number of times for my own reference photos of small, framed paintings. It doesn’t work for paintings that have more than a 12×16-inch image area, however.

You’ll need an easel to hold the framed painting firmly in a perfectly vertical position, a tripod and camera, a couple of good lights, a full sheet of black Fome-Cor and a friend to help you.

Position the easel and tripod so that you have a perfectly straight view of the painting, and zoom in to eliminate as much of the mat and frame as possible. Make certain everything is squared so there’s no parallax or skewing of the image of the painting. Turn your camera’s flash off. If you’re shooting outdoors, no additional light should be needed. If you must shoot indoors, set up two light stands, one on each side of and a little behind the tripod, and focus the lights onto the painting. Focus the camera, but don’t click the shutter yet.

Take the sheet of black Fome-Cor and cut out a circle in the center that’s just barely big enough to allow the lens of your camera to poke through. Don’t be tempted to use a small piece of Fome-Cor; it needs to be about twice the size of the painting in order to block all the potential reflection. Hold the camera firmly in position, and have your friend hold the Fome-Cor in front of it, positioning it so the lens extends through the hole as shown in the illustration below, left. At this point you won’t be able to see through your viewfinder, so just shoot the image. The large area of black just in front of the painting eliminates the bounce and the reflection of light. The closer the camera is to the painting, the more likely you’ll eliminate glare.

If you’re using a digital camera, you’ll be able to see the results quickly and determine if an additional shot is necessary. If you’re using film, you’ll have to wait until it’s developed to confirm that you have a good shot, so snap a few. I don’t recommend this method for making slides to enter into competitions, as the glass will slightly distort or fuzz the image. For your own record of your work, however, it works well enough.