11) Shooting Slides of Sculpture & Crafts

From the book Effortless Mastery, I picked up something that has helped me take better photos of my work. As I set up for the shots and take each one, I think "this is the most beautiful _____________ I’ve ever seen." (Fill in the blank for this specific artwork – bowl, sculpture, medicine bag, painting, etc.) The photographs mysteriously improve.

The most stressful attitude to take is that "I have to make perfect slides because it’s the only way I can get ahead in my art career." The "have to" creates mental and emotional resistance immediately. The "perfect" doesn’t help a thing. And emphasizing the career use of the slides is more stressful than remembering that wonderful slides are a way to share your artwork with people who will love seeing it. It serves your work, getting it out into the world where it can be used and appreciated. And it serves other people, including people who might not be able to afford to buy the work, but can still enjoy the photographs.

Remember to relax and breathe, breathe, breathe.

Take your time. Act as if you have all the time in the world. Act as if you’re making slides for eternity, to be enjoyed for eternity. No deadlines apply. Enjoy the present moment.

Eliminate any thought of "wasting" film. Regard the price of film and processing for practice slides as relatively inexpensive tuition in photography. If you regard each practice roll as "wasted film" it feels expensive. If you regard each roll as a "photography lesson" it looks pretty reasonable. And when you think about it, as an artist you know already that there’s only so much you can learn from books and articles. At some point, practice is required.

My most frequent mistakes with practice rolls involved forgetting to change the lighting. I’d forget to turn the photo lights from low to high. Or I’d forget to turn off the fluorescent light I used at the "staging station" to change lenses or load film. Or both!

The solution was a simple Post-It reminder to check the lights. I’d put this right on the shooting log or view picture where I’d see it before I took the next shot. This solved it.

Don’t hesitate to make any reminders that serve you. The idea is to make the slide shooting effortless and joyful.

With views preplanned, all you need to do with each shot is check the composition and focus. Check to see if the artwork is exactly where you want it in the frame. Is there anything in view that shouldn’t be there? Light, umbrella, background edge, dirt?

I focus by running the focus back and forth from front edge to back edge, front edge to back edge. Then I get a feel for where to focus one third in from the front edge. This gives me maximum depth of field. The depth of field preview on my camera doesn’t help since I’m using such a small aperture. Everything is too dark to really tell what’s sharp and what isn’t. So I do it by feel. This seems to work.

Since I wear glasses, I tried using an eye cup to help me focus. It made the view look too small and far away. It was uncomfortable so I don’t use it.

I did find it necessary to buy new glasses in order to focus well. Also, I found it necessary in order to judge the sharpness of projected slides. With my old glasses I just couldn’t see well enough to do either one.

My backup plan, in case even with my new glasses I had trouble focusing the camera, was to buy a new Canon eos 7e and try its auto focus. Some people find that the camera does follow their eye direction accurately and I thought it worth a try. The camera also has an auto depth of field focus so you can point it at the front edge of a piece, then at the back edge, and have it make both sharp. However, I found that with new glasses, my old manual focus camera works fine for me.

My routine is to focus, set exposure, press the mirror lockup lever, and press the cable release to take the shot. Then I rewind immediately. I make my notes on the shot, and start on the next shot.

The mirror lockup reduces vibration during the shot. Rewinding before I make my notes and start setting up the next shot, lets the camera vibration from rewinding settle down before I take the next shot.

All this facilitates sharply focused shots since the best focus can’t prevent blur from camera vibration.