I read your article with great interest on how to illuminate artwork. I have the task of photographing several hundred of my mom’s works done over a period of 60 years. I have everything down except the lighting. I have done a lot of reading and product reviews. In your article, you mention not to use fluorescents because it lacks some of the visual spectrum and the UV will damage the artwork. I have been specifically looking at this kit from Westcott with a CRI of 93. I know you say ignore CRI, but do you think that these bulbs, though fluorescent would be do a reasonably good job for art copywork? Or do I need to go with halogen only and a custom white balance? What do you use in a studio where you can completely control the lighting? I have everything from small (12″x24″ to 4’x8′ works) to include oils. Thanks for your time, Frank
English
David,
I read your article with great interest on how to illuminate artwork. I have the task of photographing several hundred of my mom’s works done over a period of 60 years. I have everything down except the lighting. I have done a lot of reading and product reviews. In your article, you mention not to use fluorescents because it lacks some of the visual spectrum and the UV will damage the artwork. I have been specifically looking at this kit from Westcott with a CRI of 93. I know you say ignore CRI, but do you think that these bulbs, though fluorescent would be do a reasonably good job for art copywork? Or do I need to go with halogen only and a custom white balance? What do you use in a studio where you can completely control the lighting? I have everything from small (12″x24″ to 4’x8′ works) to include oils. Thanks for your time, Frank
Because of your need to uniformly illuminate large works (8 feet) you do need more light than most jobs.
Why use halogen? Because when a color is missing (holes in the light spectrum that fluorescents have) it can’t be added later.
Compare sunlight at our earth’s surface with the spectrum your proposed system delivers. Here’s a couple to get you started —
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_spectrum_en.svg
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/~mpeterso/classes/phys301/projects2001/awgachor/awgachor.htm
Best wishes.