Now that my photography exhibition has finished, I thought I’d put up the answers to a few frequently asked questions. Which paper do you use for prints? I use paper by Hahnemühle  a very old German company that produces some of the best fine art papers in the world. The particular paper I use for my Limited Edition Prints and for the prints on display at exhibitions is the Photo Rag Peari 320 from their Digital FineArt Collection. The paper is actually 100% cotton rather than cellulose, with a pearl coating that give the prints a luminous quality. Of particular importance is that the paper is certified as archival grade. Some examples of archival testing done on Hahnemühle papers with Epson’s UltraChrome K3 pigment inks can be seen here. Here are the results of another study by Wilhelm Research that tested Hahnemühle papers with Canon’s Lucia pigment inks.   I use Canon’s Lucia inks for their longevity, but also because their professional printers use 12 ink cartridges. This means they produce a wide color gamut that allows me to …

A year and a half ago I needed to get a new computer having caused the PC I was using (Seiko’s) to go into thermal shutdown so many times it had fried various essential components.  The problem was one of multiplication.   Most people print small (around A4) and the file sizes you are dealing with aren’t huge.  The amount of data I was dealing with was larger for several reasons. A2 sized prints – files 4 times the size of A4 Printing at 600 dpi   – files double the size of 300 dpi  Printing in RGB16  – files double the size of RGB8  What this meant was that the computer files coming from the scanner were around 750mb. If I started to use the cloning tool to remove dust specks, or even worse used layers, there was the distinct possibility of spontaneous computer combustion.  I wanted a computer powerful enough to run Photoshop and handle large data files without breaking a sweat, and to be able to do this while I am working …

I scan all my transparencies with an Epson Perfection V750-M scanner. It produces fine results, and is reasonably fast and reasonably priced for what it does. In Japan is has a different name the GT-X970, but much to my delight you could still select English rather than Japanese when installing the software. In the past when clients have requested, images have also been sent out for drum scanning. This has however was infrequent, and tended to be only when they wanted very large files. Also essential to scanning is an air duster, to keep the scanner surface and transparency free of all the dust you can see, and then plenty of time, patience and the spot healing brush tool in Photoshop to remove all the tiny specks of dust which appear once you have enlarged the file. Of course if money were not an issue I would run out and get an Imacon Flextight X5. It would do the job faster and produce better results if I was scanning images to very large sizes and needed …

Short answer: Yes, most of the time. Longer answer: As mentioned before the Pentax 67II is a big heavy camera. You can use it handheld, but it is both tiring and you don’t get the same level of sharpness you would with a steady base. I don’t use a tripod when I am moving around at festivals, as I am usually shooting portraits with a fast shutter speed. 90% of the time, however, when I fire the shutter I have the camera firmly mounted on the tripod. This is essential when you are taking night scenes, you are working in low light, or when you are shooting a landscape and want both the foreground and background in focus. Even longer answer: There are several factors that determine what is a good tripod, but the importance of these individual factors will depend on the needs of the photographer so there is no one perfect tripod for all photographers, you have to find which works best for you. There are several factors you should consider. Weight: A …