Sepia secrets

[Steven Sweeney]

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[Chris Saper]

Hi Steven,

What an interesting discovery. It may be that the digital photograph escapes the value compression problems of negative (especially) based film, and I would love to know whether this is the case.

However with print film, what the eye may see as a range of 9 values is typically compressed onto the negative by about a third. The darkest four values are the most severely compressed, representing the equivalent of about 1-1/2 visual values. The lightest lights suffer the same fate, but not quite so severely. When the print is made, there is a little bit of relief in the middle value compression, but very little at either end.

So when you work from a conventional film print, your initial source has "clumped" the darks as well as the lights, and gives you a false reading of the distribution of values in the picture. If you then rely on this distortion to paint the values in the painting, and then photograph the portrait with film, you will have compounded this value compression yet again. That is the major problem with "second generation" photos.

I don't know whether the value compression happens with digital images, and plan to do a little research to see what I can find.

I'm not sure whether this explanation is intelligible or not, but I don't have permission to post the chart that shows this so beautifully (Eastman Kodak Company, "Copying and Duplicating: Photographing and Digital Imaging Technique", 1984, page 2). I'll hunt online for it to se if I can reference it here.

I look forward to seeing the revised portrait!

Nice to have you back.

p. s. Harley Brown's mantra (one of many, actually) is this: "You can use any color as long as the value's right, but remember that the color can't be right if its value is wrong."

[Steven Sweeney]

While awaiting the posting of the image, I should add a caveat to my initial post. What I am NOT urging anyone to do is to take interim photos and then blindly adjust their paintings in progress to "agree" with the photos. Down that road there be dragons.

The progress photo would be just a tool, like any other. Used properly, it will at most suggest reexamination of an area of the work, but that reexamination is strictly between the work and the artist. If the information in the photograph doesn't jibe with the artist's perception upon review, and no change is required, great.

Similarly, when I used to use a mirror to "check" life drawings, I would not just turn around and make adjustments according to what I saw in the mirror. I'd have another look at the model and see if indeed my drawing failed in the way suggested by the reflection in the mirror. If so, I'd redraw -- from life, from the subject -- and if not, I'd leave it alone, despite what I saw in the mirror.

What if the "tools" keep telling you that something's "wrong", but it still looks "right" to you? Or if they report accuracy, but you can't get over the sense that there's a problem? Some folks say they go with reproducible measurements, others go with their feeling that something's nonetheless "off" and needs to be worked on. Luke Skywalker was trained to fly with computer guidance, but when push came to shove, he flew by the seat of his pants to get that missile into the Death Star.

Lastly, I would never use an interim photo to judge color. The eye trumps the camera every time on that matter.

[Cynthia Daniel]

Here it is.

[Mike McCarty]

Steven,

I haven't changed my mind on this, I still like it a lot.

[Steven Sweeney]

Thanks, Mike, I'm beginning to make my peace with it too. It was instructive to be away from it a while and then come back to it with "fresh eyes". I had just watched a Gregg Kreutz video in which he spotted a drawing error in his figure, and fearlessly painted over a lot of work to lengthen an upper leg by about 20% -- a big change. I don't know that I would have complained about the original, but it looked SO much better after the revision. That gave me the courage to go after my own creation with "tough love", and I'm happy with the results.

In any case, I'm pretty sure I'm done fiddling with it, for fear of spoiling it. Despite my perhaps neurotically tight style, there are nonetheless some spontaneous, serendipitous "mini-events" happening in there that would be a shame to lose. Now I have to try to get a decent photo of the finished piece.

Cheers,
Steven

[Chris Saper]

Steven.

Leave it. This is a beautiful conclusion. There are many grand works in front of you. Go.

[Steven Sweeney]

I signed it last night, Chris. It's done!

I spent yesterday building custom stretchers for a landscape commission that I'm pretty keen to get stuck into, so off we go. Toning the canvas in a few minutes.

Cheers,
Steven

[Linda Ciallelo]

I agree with Chris, it's beautiful. If there is any imperfection, it only enhances it.

[Margaret Port]

Steven,

It's beautiful!

I'm very critical of paintings of musicians and I think you've captured something really special in this one.

I have a project going at the moment where I am painting different musicians whom I admire (with their chosen instrument and with heavy focus on their hands), using composition and colour to recreate the sounds and tones of the instruments. (in square format) So far I have done the flautist, the cellist and the pianist. I have a way to go yet. Big challenge!!

With regard to your use of your camera as a way to check the image, I will use every trick I can think of to catch out any errors. Camera, mirror, bells, whistles, friends, relatives.

I recently painted a 6m x 3m backdrop of the inside of a cathedral for a photographer. Very proud of it I was until she gave me a proof (fortunately) of a sample photo and guess who had a BIG!!! mistake in the perspective of a little wall off to one side. It went down where it should have gone up but in life, I couldn't get far enough back or hang it high enough to compare it to the other lines. Embarrassing? Fixable!!!!