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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

From the sketchbook... (1 Viewer)

Hmmmm? Decisions, decisions. Really like the new ones, now what is my favorite, can't decide between the original heron or the goldfinches. All are excellent.
 
Ink Brushed Black Throated Divers

Not normally a method I use, but did this with black indian ink and water. There was no preliminary sketch either and the whole thing took me just over an hour. It is fairly large for a black and white, is on A2 size card.
Came out a little stylized, with a lot of pronouced curves, but quite like it anyway I think...

Question for anybody out there who regularily puts artwork online... What is the best way to scan images, especially the larger pieces??
I am currently just taking photos with a Canon A95 digi camera. Have my own artwork website under constuction at the moment and am wondering how best to go about it...
 

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I really, really like this. Very loose, I love the water. I hope to see you try this method again some time -- great success!
 
Question for anybody out there who regularily puts artwork online... What is the best way to scan images, especially the larger pieces??
I am currently just taking photos with a Canon A95 digi camera. Have my own artwork website under constuction at the moment and am wondering how best to go about it...[/QUOTE]
Hiya Buzzard, Images for your website are probably best done the way you already do them - the optimum for viewing is 72 dpi. I set up a rostrum - tripod directly over flat artwork (beware of cast shadows from tripod legs, cameras - your own legs!) in natural light (strip lighting makes images incredibly yellow) and take a few shots of each piece in quick succession - one or two will be fine. If you were to need to send images to repro, then a scanner is extremely useful. For larger images you will need to scan in sections - always make sure you are working 'square' - ie that the edges of your artwork are parallel. You'll also need some nice image manipulation software - Adobe Photoshop is the best, but there's other stuff out there. Interestingly, the very best repro. of large images also use camera-work, but I'm sure there are many brilliant photographers reading this who could comment far better than I.
When all said and done - the most important thing for your website is wonderful imagery - and there, Buzzard, you win hands down!
Let me know when your site is up and running, please.
 
timwootton said:
Question for anybody out there who regularily puts artwork online... What is the best way to scan images, especially the larger pieces??
I am currently just taking photos with a Canon A95 digi camera. Have my own artwork website under constuction at the moment and am wondering how best to go about it...
Hiya Buzzard, Images for your website are probably best done the way you already do them - the optimum for viewing is 72 dpi. I set up a rostrum - tripod directly over flat artwork (beware of cast shadows from tripod legs, cameras - your own legs!) in natural light (strip lighting makes images incredibly yellow) and take a few shots of each piece in quick succession - one or two will be fine. If you were to need to send images to repro, then a scanner is extremely useful. For larger images you will need to scan in sections - always make sure you are working 'square' - ie that the edges of your artwork are parallel. You'll also need some nice image manipulation software - Adobe Photoshop is the best, but there's other stuff out there. Interestingly, the very best repro. of large images also use camera-work, but I'm sure there are many brilliant photographers reading this who could comment far better than I.
When all said and done - the most important thing for your website is wonderful imagery - and there, Buzzard, you win hands down!
Let me know when your site is up and running, please.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for the advice Tim.Glad to hear I don't need to run off and buy an expensive scanner or such like! Site will hopefully be up in about 6-8 weeks, will post on the forum when i eventually get it sorted out.
 
Here are two more. Perigrine from last week out on the archipelago, a most cooperative subject, sat for almost an hour! Male, adult bird.

The other is a colour field sketch of one of my favourite passerines, Wood Warbler, from earlier in the summer. Again, a great subject to draw, staying on the same perch singing its guts out as I sketched....
 

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beautiful work, i like the last posted the best but all of the work is gorgeous..

i use a canon A95 as well...i have two scanners and i dont like using either one..i much prefer taking digi shots...but as i work with a variety of mediums...cp,acrylics,graphite and oils, each tends to demand using the camera a bit differently....

i do take shots straight on....i never take a shot tilted or laying flat...distortion with a camera is notorious so i always try to take shots with them set verticle..not tilted...if something has a glass on it? i remove the glass from the frame, rather than try to deal with the reflections...works fine and dandy...
and i have an easel that can double as a tripod and that works great, if i take the time to swap over the attachements on it...
i also try out different settings on the camera too...
the motion one is great on taking photos of our fish...most of those photos i have taken are at:
tomsfish.com


i have to illuminate the graphite and cp one way, to keep the paper white,if white....and i have to take care shooting the oils because i use a medium that causes a lot of glare when wet..acrylics i use for fabric painting so thats really not a problem...but when they are on black shirts you have to take shots in a way that the black looks black..and not a brown...

my website is in my siggy...and all the shots are digi shots...but the older paintings are from a different camera...i love the canon....i have had it for two years now..

you dont seem to be having any problem taking good clear shots...only one of the above i noticed a tiny movement in...and it was more pronounced in the siggy...
 
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Lovely (as usual) Buzzard - the peregrine has a dynamism due to the hatching background fading away from the subject - ace. I haven't heard the Fffrrrrrrr of a wood warbler since I left Yorkshire (3 years ago) - and I never got such fabulous views of one, even then. Fast eye, great hand - totally topping.
 
Sketching like crazy at the moment. Freezing here last week, but has now turned rather mild, prompting me to get out before the big freeze comes.
Birding has been superb, which can only help. Was delighted to see my first Pine Grosbeaks today, worth the wait, bulldozer finches, two of the four were adult males and stunning birds. Will post a colour sketch tomorrow when I have natural light to photograph it..
Got some useful goosander sketches done before the snow melted, posted below, graphite and coloured pencil, will become a painting eventually, it was the snow cover buoy thay caught my eye at initially, liked the contrast of the orange against the snow.

Hawk Owl done from photo, in watercolour, still dreaming about getting decent views of one, maybe this winter...
 

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Hi Alan, really nice images, these. The female goosander is absolutely beautiful. To make such a controlled and detailed observation under tricky conditions (Shows how good the drawings are - I can feel the wind) takes great skill and knowledge - well done. The owl is just super. I particularly like the understated conifers in the distance (the owl, obviously, is beautifully rendered).

Just been on your blog-spot (anyone else reading this, I recommend to do so!).
Cheers, Tim
 
From the last two days...

Pine Grosbeaks, a lifer for me from a couple of days ago and and unforgetable bird. Bit of an influx here at the moment...
Females, head studies in pencil. Male bird in watercolour and black biro.

Smew, female and male, in black biro.

Siskin, imm. male, pencil.
 

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Another consistently brilliant group of drawings, Alan. Particularly like the hunched habit and scowly expression you've caught in the coloured Pine Grosbeak piece. However my favourite (If I have one) is the redhead smew - it's an excellent pose and really well observed - just enough texture in the drawing to bring it alive! I love your drawing of the male smew, too (the comment about how white the bird is, is spot on - I find that when the shelduck return from moult-migration, it's an almost impossible white, impossible to render truthfully in paint.)
Great stuff (you'll need to be buying those bargain bags of 20 biros from Woolies if you carry on working at this rate) - seriously, get the drawings made whilst the drive is there as, I think you work like me, frenetically for a period then drought whilst I'm distracted doing something else - kids, construction or whatever. The drawings are also what you'll need once the 'real' winter sets in up your end - I guess much of your output will then be studio-based.
 
just beautiful!.., i have always loved field sketches, and yours are superb...visually defines what field sketching is all about...
 
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