Monday, November 24, 2014

Reproducing original artworks for Nicky Kane


This year at Carterworks we have had the privilege of producing a range of giclee prints for local Wellington artists. Giclee prints are high resolution archival prints. Nicky Kane is an established Wellington based multi-media artist. Nicky asked me to reproduce one of her paintings as well as a pen and ink work of a native bird that she will be offering for sale.  As an artist I understand how important it is to reproduce colours accurately as close as possible to the original artwork. I was able to work with Nicky to achieve a print result that captured her stunning original. 

Diamond by Nicky Kane
Giclee Print on Epson Hot Press Bright Paper 
You can find out more about Nicky's work for Brave Art here :
http://www.braveartnz.com/nicky-kane--bette-cosgrove.html

You can contact her and see more of her inspirations and art work on her facebook page, Taking Issue, here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Taking-ISSUE/676687949073090?ref=profile






Monday, August 18, 2014

Photo preservation and digital restoration references


On the 18th of August I gave a talk to the Wellington Southern Bays Historical Society in Island Bay about Photo preservation and digital restoration.  I thought it might be useful if  I put all the references I gave out in the talk in one place:

Where to get archival storage boxes and enclosures in NZ

Port Nicholson Packaging in Petone:

http://www.pnp.co.nz/

Conservation supplies in Havelock North

http://www.conservationsupplies.co.nz/

General archiving information

The practical archivist blog has useful information about archiving and sorting your family photos and heritage items

http://practicalarchivist.com/

Both archives NZ and TePapa have information on their sites about sorting and looking after photographs


Useful references for dating photographs

For photographic processes  http://www.graphicsatlas.org/

Also Gawain Weavers' site contains a very useful chart which you can use to help identify the photographic processes employed in 19th Century Photographic prints

http://gawainweaver.com/processID

For NZ photographers since 1840 - the photographic database link is:
RogerVaughan  updated reference to this site 
http://www.cartes.freeuk.com/dec/dated.htm
Some links on clothing styles and fashions
http://www.fashion-era.com/Dating_Costume_History_Pictures/how_to_date_photographs_top.htm

Friday, June 13, 2014

Kelburn Normal School Centenary digitisation and display project

Visitors to this blog will have noticed it has not been updated recently. As well as client projects, I have been digitising of Kelburn Normal School's photographic collection in time for the school centenary which was held in May this year. The Centenary turned out to be a great event with 300 attending on the first night and many more on the Saturday for official opening, viewing of displays, and entertainment.  On the Sunday some returned to take a more leisurely look at the photos.

Kelburn School has an impressive photo collection ranging from formal class and sport photos, to music and drama, events and happenings over the years, plus images of the school and teachers.  To date Carterworks has scanned over 1300 images and that is only to 1998! (It excludes documents and photo key notes).

Over 30 people sent in photos many using the Carterworks file uploader to load images from around New Zealand, Australia and England....so even those who could not make it on the day could contribute. 

From past experience with reunions I knew that having original photos on display was not a good idea, partly because many of the photos were small and secondly photos are fragile and can get damaged. As all the images had been archived scanned to international standards it was easy to convert and enlarge them on to A4 sheets for display.  Admittedly the schools printer was kept busy for 3 to 4 days!  The prints filled over 40 square metres of display area.  The boards were placed in 6 classrooms around the school for the main open day and in the hall on the Sunday. There were so many images table tops and walls were also used..  

Below are some shots of people enjoying the photo displays on Saturday.





The photos were enjoyed by all ages.







The larger prints allowed people to identify themselves in the photos and this started many discussions....


Photo Boards in the hall on Sunday - which gives some idea of the extent of the collection.


The work continues....
From 1998 onwards the school had class photos on display in the school hallways and stairwells.  Those photos not in a digital format (from the late 1990s to 2008) will be digitised over the coming months to complete the project.....

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