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Print Aesthetics

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What do people look for in fine art photographic prints?
One of the most important things we look for is …
Detail.
What kind of detail?
At least five kinds.
Detail – Focus
Detail – Dynamic Range
Detail – Gradation
Detail – Low Signal to Noise Ratio
Detail – Flawless Surfaces
There’s are many exceptions to this rule of thumb but they are exceptions.
The best exceptions depart from the standards meaningfully.
It helps to know what to look for in fine art photographs.
Find out more in my free downloadable Lessons.
Find out more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.
Stay tuned for the announcement of my Fine Art Digital Printing DVD.

Prints Survive Floods – Tina Freeman

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Inkjet prints survived floods where silver gelatin prints didn’t.
It’s one of the worst situations. Your life’s work is immersed under water. Tina Freeman found herself in that situation. She was amazed to find that many inkjet prints had survived where many silver gelatin prints had not.
“This is the print and where it was found after Katrina. I also found another print three months after finding this one, it was in the same shape. You’ll see a scan of the Piezotone print that survived 20 feet of salt water and three months in the blazing southern sun. This print was framed and you can see the mark that the mat made but the print area is pristine and exactly matches the image before the storm. In the other image you will see the site of the house where the image was found – the house that the print was in was completely demolished, this house was next door. These prints, two of about fifteen found, showed no evidence of fading! These prints are tough- no silver print would have survived this trial in tact, we didn’t find any more but they may have been buried beneath the rubble of the house which was about 150 yards northeast of the original site. The print was printed on Hanemühle Photo Rag the Piezotone pigment was Museum Black.”
Don’t try this at home – except under the most controlled situations.
Do rest assured, your pigmented inkjet prints are more durable than you think.
Find out more about Tina Freeman here.
Find out more about digital printing and my digital printing workshops here.

FADP Highlight – Print Presentation

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Print presentation is the final aspect of fine art printing. Mounting, mats, framing, portfolios, bodies of work, environment, light. All of these things affect the way a work of art is perceived by viewers. They might seem like incidental after thoughts but they’re actually integral components of making artistic statement – and it often provides necessary protection ensuring a work of art endures. The most beautiful prints in the world will become more beautiful with appropriate presentation – or fade away without it.
Check out my series of articles on print presentation in Photoshop User and on my website.
Learn more at Brooks here.
Be the first to hear about the next FADP workshop.
Stay tuned to Insights for the upcoming release of our Fine Art Workflow DVD.
Check out Mac Holbert’s website.
Find out more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

FADP Highlight – Special Guest – Chris Orwig

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Chris Orwig shared many insights in an inspiring lecture during our FADP workshop at Brooks. Chris collects great stories from photographers and shares them in his new book Visual Poetry.
In one story, a man has written a novel and decides it’s no good so he throws it out. As she’s taking out the trash, his wife discovers the manuscript and reads it. She goes to him and says he needs to finish it – it’s good. He does. It becomes a best seller.
Chris thinks we all need ‘trash can buddies’. I agree.
Find out more about Chris Orwig here.
Learn more at Brooks here.
Be the first to hear about the next FADP workshop.
Stay tuned to Insights for the upcoming release of our Fine Art Workflow DVD.
Check out Mac Holbert’s website.
Find out more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

FADP Highlight – Svetlanda Tepavcevic – It's Printmaking Not Just Photography

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Svetlana Tepavcevic makes abstract black and white images of waves that look like ink paintings.
We discussed the importance of scale and presentation agreeing that classic photographic small scale matted approaches reduced the impact of the images. A larger scale with a different presentation format will highlight the more painterly concerns of these images. So will appropriate materials – something matte and fibrous.
The source files aren’t super high resolution, but that’s a non-issue because the treatment of the subject supports substantial upsampling. It’s another case of how the “rules” are only useful guidelines that identify significant considerations and raise important questions but there are always exceptions. They say “Exceptions prove the rule.” And, there’s an art to knowing when to make them.

See more of Svjetlana Tepavcevic’s work here.

Learn more at Brooks here.
Be the first to hear about the next FADP workshop.
Stay tuned to Insights for the upcoming release of our Fine Art Workflow DVD.
Check out Mac Holbert’s website.
Find out more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.
Read more

FADP Highlight – A Sense of Destination

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One of the key concepts Mac Holbert and I emphasize in our digital printing workshops is developing a clear sense of destination before you start editing a file. Once you have a sense of destination what you need to do to an image becomes much clearer. Without a sense of destination you may end up wandering aimlessly. Your personal style may influence the route you take but you’ll know what steps you need to take to get where you want to go. First you have to know where you want to go. Your artistic intention determines objectives, outcomes, and procedures. There may be many ways to get there – different tools to choose from and ways to apply them during your workflow – but with a clear sense of destination you’ll be able to more easily make meaningful choices that fulfill your vision.
Learn more at Brooks here.
Be the first to hear about the next FADP workshop.
Stay tuned to Insights for the upcoming release of our Fine Art Workflow DVD.
Check out Mac Holbert’s website.
Find out more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.
Read More

Nocturne IV

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I’ve always been fascinated by photographs of the night sky. Telescopes are able to bring back details I could never have seen with the naked eye. Film exaggerates the colors of the stars, which are faint to the human eye. The lens often eliminates the tiny flares we see. When we draw stars, we don’t use circles, we usually use pentagrams. There’s a reason. I can understand that the twinkle and shimmer of the tapestries above would disappear in a photograph. Time is frozen in photographs. But that the photograph would be significantly different than what the human eye sees is fascinating to me. We’re taught to think that the camera records things as we see them. It does to a degree. But there are many points of divergence. It’s almost standard for us to defer to the photograph over our own experience. That’s something I’m wary of — or let’s say instead, acutely aware of …
Read more here.

Adobe's Lightroom 3 Public Beta Is Now Available.

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Adobe’s Lightroom 3 Public Beta is now available.
Download it now.
Highlights include …
1 Importing has been redesigned
2 Collections panel in the Develop Module
3 Better Noise Reduction
4 Grain feature
5 Improved vignetting controls
6 Drag and Drop Publishing to the Web
7 Watermarking
8 Export Slideshows with music
9 Custom Print Package for creating print layouts
10 Change the background color of prints
Find over 12 useful video tutorials on the new features at NAPP’s Lightroom 3 Learning center here.
Find Seth Resnick and Jamie Spritzer’s D-65 free PDF here.