dickwilber wrote:
There is good information above, though I am not in complete agreement with all of it. First, my experience with quilters (I share my bed with one) is that they want it shown in its full glory, the whole thing flat and all at once. That means hanging it. (Laying it on the floor of that garage would make it very hard to photograph straight on, and just suggesting that you might lay them on a garage floor could get you seriously hurt.
You want your camera on a tripod set exactly at the quilt mid height, centered with no offset or skew! This will minimize the post processing adjustments to make it appear square. Lighting is crucial - it must be even over the entire quilt; if you can find an outdoor north facing wall on a windless day, that might be your best bet. (I used that method to photograph some artwork for a client. The other way was in the studio with four strobes with shoot through umbrellas or soft boxes set at 45 degrees from the quilt surface - we used cross polarization for critical artwork. Of course that was back in the film days, so now you could use other light sources if you corrected white balance carefully, and made sure to have even soft lighting over the entire quilt surface.)
You will need the means of hanging the quilts (a quilting club might have that covered, otherwise a background system would work), a good ladder system to get to everything, a tall enough tripod, and some willing labor to help get everything in position.
Indoors you might end up with a moderate wide angle lens, but pushing back and using a short telephoto, if practical, would minimize distortion.
I would certainly take the advice of Bozsik and get pictures of the labels, and the reverse sides whenever appropriate.
There is good information above, though I am not i... (
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Yes, my mother said she would rather they hang. Floor of garage would have carpet rolled out (neighbor is a carpet man).
I think I will hang them at the front of the garage (faces north) and protected from wind by house and neighbor garage.
I will try with natural light, tripod, and test a couple lenses this weekend.