It's hard not to be charmed by an Australian accent. I wonder if the opposite is true?

I received a phone call from Tim Healy that his delightful wife, the painter Annie Fraser, needed a bit of photography right away. I'd like to think I'm not frightening to call directly so I'm guessing Tim just wanted to make himself useful after being out of commission with the flu for most of the week. Plans were made and the day arrived (this past Friday) lickity split.

I've not actually shot a painting before so it was back to the fundamentals. Some basic considerations -

- is the painting flush when mounted on the wall
- what kind of lighting is in the room
- what kind of lighting was the painting created in (in other words did the artist paint outdoors or with artificial light thus modifying the color spectrum)
- what lens produces minimal distortion
- how important is texture to the painting

Depending on the answers the lighting scenario would change, but certain things would remain the same. We used the new xrite color checker passport to get our colors in sync. One thing to be aware of in color sensitive situations is that varying the power of your lights will generally produce different color temperatures. So, it is best to measure twice and shoot twice.

In the end I took advantage of a makeup mirror (kindly provided by Annie) to just confirm that I was looking dead-on with the image (f you can see the lens in the mirror, through the camera, you're good).

If you get a chance visit her studio down at Shady Lea Mills in North Kingstown and see some more of her work here: Annie Fraser Art

My thanks to the lovely Amie for being my assistant.