Color Accurate Photography
Source: www.betterlight.com
Topic: Digital Photography
Sort Desciption: 1 Color Accurate Digital Photography of Artworks Robin D. Myers Better Light, Inc. 31 October 2000 ©2000 Better Light, Inc., all rights reserved. Introduction In the world of photography, some colors ...
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Color Accurate Digital Photography of Artworks
Robin D. Myers
Better Light, Inc.
31 October 2000
©2000 Better Light, Inc., all rights reserved.
Introduction
In the world of photography, some colors are not reproduced accurately by either film or digital
photography. Colors can change hue, lose or gain saturation, lighten or darken in appearance. For
example, some blues turn purple on film or in a digital file and some greens become gray. This article
will explain why this problem occurs in the field of digital photography of artworks and propose a
solution. While film photography is still a large business, for reasons that will become apparent, digital
photography offers better a solution for reproduction photography. The techniques developed here for
color accurate artwork photography are also applicable to many other situations where color accuracy
is a prime requirement.
The Problem
To understand the issues involved in artwork photography, an especially problematic watercolor
painting, Summer Breeze by Ann Langston, was borrowed from the artist. This painting contains large
amounts of cobalt blue in a wide variety of tints. Cobalt blue is one of the colors that is extremely
difficult to reproduce accurately. Ann Langston had this painting photographed with film and then
printed on offset presses with varying results.
Figure 1. Different renditions of the watercolor "Summer Breeze" by Ann Langston using traditional photographic
reproduction methods.
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None of these reproductions is close to the original. When an exposure is made to reproduce cobalt
blue correctly, the image becomes too dark or the other colors are incorrectly reproduced (Figure 1,
upper-left). An exposure that renders the paintings tonal range correctly results in the cobalt blue
turning purple (Figure 1, upper-right and bottom). The problem with correctly imaging this painting is
metamerism of the cobalt blue pigment.
Metamerism
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