richard_wotton

<p>Hi Luis. Try this company, if you want a field camera: https://intrepidcamera.co.uk/about<br>

They say they will launch an 8 x 10 early this year.<br>

Good luck and good shooting.<br>

Richard</p>

<p>Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to the forum on this. With some problems I was having with other matters at the same time as the printer I sort of completely lost track of the photo.net correspondence.<br>

After the repairs detailed in the November entry above, all was well - until February this year, when banding reared its ugly head again. It was very light and difficult to see unless the print was inspected in bright sunlight but it was there all the same.<br>

The result was that Epson have again replaced the print head. Fortunately for me they did this free of charge, even though the printer was well out of warranty. I should get it delivered by courier tomorrow, hopefully along with a bit of free ink that I suggested they include. I didn't think to do a screen shot of the ink levels before I sent it off so it's anyone's guess as to how much they've used in testing!<br>

So, I now have my fingers crossed and hope I get more than six months' use out of the latest head. BTW, I don't make a large number of prints so it hasn't been over-use causing the problems.<br>

Thanks again to those who responded to my original query.</p>

<p>This printer problem of mine has been a very drawn-out process, but if there's anyone out there still awake, you may be interested to know the sequel. The Epson service agent replaced the print heads but the problem persisted. Eventually they got the Epson Australia crew involved and they recommended replacing the ink supply system. End of problem!<br>

Thanks to those who contributed a response to my original post.</p>

<p>Richard</p>

 

<p>A couple of days after doing my multiple head clean (which made no improvement to my problem) I did another group of three head cleans and the black was clearly lacking very badly. Tomorrow I'll be taking the printer to an Epson service center in the hope that they can fix it. I'll let you know how that works out.</p>

<p>Thanks Hooman. I thought I'd posted a reply to your response last night but must have done something wrong, so will try again.<br>

The on-line manual, pages 90 and 91, gives the procedures for nozzle check and head cleaning.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

<p>I've finally been able to run a nozzle check on my printer. The matte black was clogged to the point where there was only one bit of line about 4mm printed on the check pattern! Three head cleans later I had a perfect pattern. Unfortunately, the solarised effect was still there when I did another print from my file.<br>

Now I'm working through the Epson manual says about colour management etc but it seems they're talking about CS4. <br>

When I'm done with that, if the problem's still there, I'll have to go back and take another look at Photoshop.<br>

BTW, how do I turn off "Photoshop Manages Colours"? <br>

More suggestions would be greatly appreciated.</p>

 

<p>Good question Ted. The first couple of bad prints had some banding in them but subsequent prints had none, so I guess I sort of lost sight of that aspect of the problem. A nozzle check should have been the first thing I tried. I'll do one as soon as I get some more A3 paper and get an "awesome" print made for the skater!<br>

Thanks for your response.<br>

Richard</p>

<p>Thanks David and Charles.<br>

I've been wrestling with this issue, but no joy. In the printer driver, if I select "printer manages colours" the printer profile says SPR3000 Epson Archival Matte. this is greyed out (inactive) and I can't select anything else. If I select "Photoshop manages Colours" I can have my pick of paper types but unfortunately the result is still the same: the printed image still looks solarised. I can't see where else I can turn off "Pshop manages colors".<br>

Any further suggestions would be most welcome.<br>

The only positive thing at the moment is that Sarjeant Spanky, the subject in my photo, thinks the effect is "awesome" and would love an A3 print!<br>

Thanks in advance for any more suggestions.</p>

<p>Hi all<br>

Epson R3000, Windows 7 OS, printing via Photoshop CC, ABW mode, set at "printer manages colors".<br>

Suddenly I've started getting an effect on my b & w prints that resembles solarisation from the wet darkroom era.<br>

I've checked through the "Devices & Printers" path in Windows, I've printed the file in Publisher and I've also printed a different file from the same shoot. Comes out the same each time.<br>

Any assistance with this would be much appreciated.<br>

Many thanks in advance.</p><div></div>

<p>Richard Wotton<br>

John Williamson, the $64,000 is yours! You were right on the money with your response. The chief suspect in the investigation is a resident two-year-old who will probably be punished by typing "I must not fiddle with the keyboard" a couple of hundred times.</p>

<p>Thanks to all for your willingness to help, and especially to John. Photo.net does it again!</p>

<p>Best<br>

Richard</p>

 

<p>My somewhat elderly G5 displays a black background on all applications and screens instead of white. Other colours on screen are also displaying incorrectly and the screen has a psychedelic look.<br>

Help please!<br>

Thanks in advance.<br>

Richard</p>

<p><strong>Richard Wotton</strong><br>

<strong>THINK I'LL GIVE UP AGAIN</strong><br>

After a 22-year break from personal photography, for which I used 4 x 5 and 6 x 7 Mamiya and b & w film, I got started again in 2009 with a Canon 5D II. Now I find out from this poster that it's a substandard camera and I was wrong in thinking my A3 b & w prints are really sharp with excellent tonal range etc. Still, I managed to fool a few people into buying them, because they thought the same things I did about the image quality. Guess I'll have to hunt them down and refund their money :-( then dump that lousy camera in the river.</p>

<p>Hi Daniel<br />My feeling about the image on your post is that it's suffering from a serious lack of Vitamin D - i.e., sunlight :-). Bright sunlight raking across all those surfaces, along with all the resulting shadow areas, would transform the image. It looks like it was shot on a very dull day. While sunlight isn't the be-all and end-all, I feel that any sort of exterior architectural shot isn't very likely to suffer as a result of it.<br>

<br />I was recently reading about using 16-bit for b & w on this site: <a href="http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/digital_black_and_white_printing.html">http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/digital_black_and_white_printing.html</a><br>

I'd been printing 8-bit b & w files on an Epson 3880 with excellent results. Then, a few days ago, in what I thought were very good-quality image files there was a touch of posterisation visible in the clear sky area on my A3 prints. I'd only made very minor tweaks to lighten the skies a little, but in both cases it looked a bit like a rainbow, so I went right back to the original raw files and started again and the skies then printed exactly as they should have been. The use of 8-bit files in the first place was due to my ignorance when using ACR in Photoshop CS5 during conversion. I'm shooting with a Canon 5D MkII set at large raw, so there's no shortage of pixels to begin with, but it's definitely 16-bit for me from now on. Best of luck with your photography.<br>

<br />Richard Wotton</p>

Humble apologies! At the beginning of my 7th decade I should know not to trust my memory too much!

 

The author of the two books I mentioned was, in fact, Michael Harris.

Hi Jo

As another newbie to architectural photography, I bought two books by Michael Freeman: "Professional Architectural Photography" and "Professional Interior Photography", both in their third edition.

 

To me, Freeman's advice about equipment and how to use it looks very sensible and it is presented in a straight-forward way. It's a quick way to learn quite a few things that could have you tearing your hair out if you didn't have this book! I think they're both excellent value.

 

Best of luck to both of us!

Hi Michael

 

I realise your original question was posted quite some time ago, but this response may be helpful to someone else even if you've already ironed out the bugs.

 

I use strobe lights at 45 degrees, and I work in a studio that's painted a fairly light neutral grey.

 

You'll almost certainly need a polarising gel over each light, plus a good quality glass polariser on the lens. Rotate the lens filter slowly until any glare/reflections disappear from the painting.

 

If there is any silver or gold paint, it will very likely appear black if the full polarising effect is used. You will need to carefully observe the paint as you rotate the filter and judge when the best compromise is reached between having the silver/gold retain its proper color and possibly a little glare somewhere else on the painting. However, I've found that glare generally isn't a problem while doing this.

 

If you have to photograph a painting that's framed and glazed, set up the shot and wrap your tripod in a black or very dark cloth, so it's not relected in the glass. Next, take a sheet of lightweight black cardboard and cut a hole in the centre of it for your lens to poke through. Make a grip of some kind on the back, near the top edge of the card. If you hold it by the top edge, your hand may be reflected in the glass. When you take the shot, keep behind the tripod and card, and dark clothing will also be useful - and keep your head down, too! Leave the room lights off while checking the polarising effect and shooting.

 

I strongly recommend the book "How to Photograph Works of Art" by Sheldan Collins, a former staff photographer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York. It's available through Amazon. (Am I allowed to say that?) This guy has done it all.

 

Good luck! Richard

Hi Norman

 

Take a look at the message I left on this thread in the Lighting forum:

 

artwork photography by hala muflehj (2006-11-12)

Hi Hala

 

I'll agree with Bob and Albert: lights at 45 degrees. You'll almost certainly need a polarising gel over each light, plus a good quality glass polariser on the lens. Rotate the lens filter slowly until any glare/reflections disappear from the painting.

 

If there is any silver or gold paint, it will very likely appear black if the full polarising effect is used. You will need to carefully observe the paint as you rotate the filter and judge when the best compromise is reached between having the silver/gold retain its proper color and possibly a little glare somewhere else on the painting. However, I've found that glare generally isn't a problem while doing this.

 

If you have to photograph a painting that's framed and glazed, set up the shot and wrap your tripod in a black or very dark cloth, so it's not relected in the glass. Next, take a sheet of lightweight black cardboard and cut a hole in the centre of it for your lens to poke through. Make a grip of some kind on the back, near the top edge of the card. If you hold it by the top edge, your hand may be reflected in the glass. When you take the shot, keep behind the tripod and card, and dark clothing will also be useful - and keep your head down, too! Leave the room lights off while checking the polarising effect and shooting.

 

I strongly recommend the book "How to Photograph Works of Art" by Sheldan Collins, a former staff photographer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York. It's available through Amazon. (Am I allowed to say that?) This guy has done it all.

 

Good luck!

Richard

Thanks again Helen for your comments. I guess if I stick to daylight film, it would remove the need for whole sets of the 80s and 85s.

 

I've taken Sergio's advice and will have a shipment of books here in time for some serious Christmas reading, so that should help me to firm up on what's needed most for my purposes.

 

Christmas isn't far off now, so I hope all you Photo.netters have a great one. I guess a lot of you are in the Northern Hemisphere, where it's getting chilly. I'm Down Under, where we might get a summer soon if we're lucky!

Thanks Helen and Sergio for taking the time to respond. It's very much appreciated.

 

Helen: I plan to buy a new Gossen 3F, which is the only one I'm aware of on the market. After reading your reply I re-read (carefully) the technical data I'd printed out from Gossen's website and I saw that magenta and green are indeed the only colours mentioned - apart from the color temperature reading.

 

Re the green filter on the camera: I'd assumed that the meter was going to tell me when to use that, and because Ellis had recommended a set of green filters I'd assumed that experience and/or a color meter had showed him it was a useful color correction set to have. Having said that, I guess we all know what assumption is . . .

 

Sergio: Yes, I'm very serious about wanting to do high quality architectural and interior work, and from all my recent reading it's obvious that a color temp meter is pretty much an essential piece of gear.

 

I already have the Lee Frost book and I'll order the Stroebel and Eggers books. Hopefully, this will clear the clouds of confusion!

 

Once again, thank you both for your assistance.

Sorry, I should have said that I have 4 x 5 and med format cameras, but was asking the question re digital for those "other" jobs.

 

Thanks very much for the answers so far.

Hi all.

 

I'm moving into architectural photography, and will inevitably be required to

produce some digital camera images at times. I currently own a D70 with the 18-

70mm kit lens.

 

I've thought about moving up to the D200 or D80, but would first like to have

opinions on whether it would be possible to significantly improve print

quality with my D70 with a top quality Nikon lens such as the 17-35 or 12-24

zooms, and also the 18-200 VR.

 

Many thanks in advance.

Hi all. I posted a question some weeks ago re choice of a "starter kit" of

color correcting filters for architectural photography ( to be used in

conjunction with a color meter). I've just stumbled on a reply from Ellis

Vener to another poster back in 2003.

 

Ellis said:

 

The complete filter set you need is: the 81 series (81, 81A, 81B, 81C, 81D,

81EF) the 85 series, the 82 series, the 80 series and Green and Magenta CC

filters in different strengths from CC05 to CC30.

 

At the risk of revealing a lack of understanding of color, if my color meter

indicates I need a red, yellow, cyan or blue filter, is it possible to

substitute a filter or filters from Ellis's list and still achieve a good

result?

 

Ellis, are you reading this??!

 

Many thanks in advance.

Hi again all. Many thanks for the time you've taken to provide me with this very useful information. It's greatly appreciated. I've checked out the Lee website and I think their filters will definitely be the way to go. Richard Wotton

Hi everyone.

I'm moving into architectural photography with transparency film and need to

equip myself with CC filters. (I intend buying a Minolta IIIf color meter.)

Can someone tell me if it's possible to begin with a limited number of filters

which will pretty much cover the most common lighting found in interiors, or

do I have to bite the bullet and buy a complete set? Many thanks.

 

Richard Wotton