Photographing red guitars

Reinhard

How do you guys get an accurate representation of the actual colour? With red guitars I can never get it right on camera, even if it is a sunburst guitar with red in the burst pattern.
The first pic is how the guitar came out, the 2nd is after I adjusted the photo in Photoshop, which seems to be a more accurate.

Bob-Dubery

You're not going to crack this one until you get your PC monitor calibrated so that what it shows you is the true colour (assuming your camera got it right).

I've seen this done with a piece of software that "paints" patches of a specific, known colour on the screen and then has a device kind of like a web cam that reads back what the screen actually shows. The software can then say (effectively) "I told the monitor to display C1D2E3 (or whatver the coding for that colour is) and it actually displayed C1D1E4" and then make the adjustments (assuming the monitor drivers allow it to).

This may be more hassle and cost than you want to go to.

Reinhard

Yeh that seems like a lot of work/cost Bob.
I adjusted the hue in the 2nd pic and I feel that got it pretty close to the red colour, rather than the orange vibe of the first one.

guitarboy2828

Well, it could be your monitor settings, or it could just be the lighting. Looks like you were just using natural sunlight in that photo? If that's the case, it's probably why it's a little washed out and orange. If you had studio lighting, it would've come out right.

HOWEVER, photoshop was invented and that is why photographers spend hours on it getting their photo's right ?

AlanRatcliffe

The first thing I make sure that I shoot in RAW - JPEG always does funny things to reds. So I wait until the very last step before converting to JPEG, which helps.

Otherwise, it is important to calibrate your monitor - you can't judge things properly unless you're seeing them represented properly on screen.

singemonkey

I don't know if it's something you can correct in camera man. I checked it out. You need to add magenta and warm the thing up both. I'm not sure that you can adjust the camera to do this - and if you can - everything else will look a bit weird. I suspect it has to do with the colour balance that's set on the camera. You could try shoot RAW - but that doesn't exactly help you avoid doing a lot of work afterwards.

I think the camera's just set up to warm up reds. That probably usually works for what people want. It just doesn't help you here.

dee

What Bob is referring to is called a colorimeter. I have one I use to calibrate my monitors, made by this company:

http://www.datacolor.eu/en/products/monitor-calibration/spyder3pro/index.html

Still, you are most likely to end up doing colour matching in photoshop in any case. I have yet to come across an example where the photo's or scans come out with exact colours as intended. Also, some cameras do saturate the colours more. Do check your camera's white balancing as well, and ensure it is set to to appropriate setting to match the environment.

I'm sure someone like Aubs can give better input regarding the photography side and how you can match it closer.

But yeah, your bound to end up fiddling in photoshop.

DaFiz

For many years I resisted digital photography for that very reason.
A red rose was just a blob whereas with analogue photography there was so much detail to work with.
Still my little digital camera fails to capture the detail in the reds.
Probly need to spend megabucks on an expensive camera to obtain the required result or be content with photoshop manipulation. :-\

singemonkey

If you use Lightroom - and I assume Aperture is similar - you could set up a preset. Then photograph, hit the preset, et voila. You're done. What DaFiz is saying is that digital sensors are balanced in a particular way. As Alan says, shooting jpeg makes it even worse. But film or sensor is set up with a relative colour balance that isn't neutral. Even a neutral set up can be thrown off by the sensor/film's sensitivity to invisible parts of the spectrum.

My guess is that you won't find a better solution than setting up a "quick fix" in post-production.

BTW, that guitar still looks like the dogs' bollocks in close-up. You need to be reminded of just how big you scored with this one ?

Reinhard

singemonkey wrote If you use Lightroom - and I assume Aperture is similar - you could set up a preset. Then photograph, hit the preset, et voila. You're done. What DaFiz is saying is that digital sensors are balanced in a particular way. As Alan says, shooting jpeg makes it even worse. But film or sensor is set up with a relative colour balance that isn't neutral. Even a neutral set up can be thrown off by the sensor/film's sensitivity to invisible parts of the spectrum.

My guess is that you won't find a better solution than setting up a "quick fix" in post-production.

BTW, that guitar still looks like the dogs' bollocks in close-up. You need to be reminded of just how big you scored with this one ?

With my new cam I can shoot in RAW+Fine Jpg, but I have to become familiar with the RAW format.
Thanks man, this guitar and the 330 are both exceptional, definitely lucked out with them.

Wizard

singemonkey wrote BTW, that guitar still looks like the dogs' bollocks in close-up. You need to be reminded of just how big you scored with this one ?

She is nice. Very nice.