fetzler Loc: North West PA

Yesterday there was a discussion of color reproduction of art work. In particular the poster was having trouble with the color purple (violet?).

https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-615253-1.html

There is a good book (available on Amazon) on the necessary set up. This is also well discussed in the original post. The book is:

How to Photograph Works of Art Paperback – April 1, 1992
by Sheldan Collins.

There are a couple of excellent videos on youTube that address the importance of light sources in color reproduction.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HauiF_AQUIY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U-F7EhLp7g

The gist of the discussion is that the behavior of your camera sensor and the spectral quality of the light that you use can affect color reproduction. The color violet is difficult for an RGB sensor has violet light is outside the RGB space. Different cameras may be have differently with regard to violet light. RGB lights are particularly poor for color reproduction.

The best light sources would be incandescent and natural light as they give the full spectrum of a black body radiator. Yes I know that incandescent bulbs are old fashioned and super hot. Indeed, I recall a few burns.

LED (white) and Fluorescent bulbs (Photo quality) may fail noticeably as the two do not give a complete spectrum. Fluorescent are the worse of the two.

Incidentally, the original poster was using a D40. I don't know how violet reproduction has progressed in Nikon Cameras. I have a rainbow picture with my D7200. Violet is present in the rainbow. The color is a bit like magenta but that is not unusual for cameras.