Art in Wilderness

Making Photographs

Here is a brief overview of my image capture to print process.

I use 35mm Canon EOS 1Ds professional DSLR camera body along with combination of Canon "L" zoom lenses as well as prime and tilt/shift lenses. All my landscape images are being taken while camera mounted on a very sturdy tripod. I capture both wide angel, as well as close up of nature. In order to create panorama or high megapixel images, often I take multiple images and I stitch those together in my digital darkroom using specialized stitching software.

After working several years with 35mm format, very recently I got interested to switch to medium format. Recently I purchased a Mamiya 645 AFD II camera body. I will rent digital back for this camera body, as and when my wallet permits,. I expect eventually price of digital back will drop (current price is $30,000 USD for a 39 MP digital back) and one day I will own it. Recently Mamiya has introduced ZD digital back in US market (22 MP) for street price $7,000 USD. Meanwhile, I have option to shoot film with this camera.

As I shoot digital, obviously I process my images in my own digital dark room. I use Adobe Ligtroom to organize my digital images, global corrections and RAW conversion. I use Adobe Photoshop CS3 to make local correction and prepare images for print.

My digital processes for image control is limited to traditional dark room process such as color and contrast adjustments.

Once an image is optimized in digital darkroom, it is ready for printing as well as available for other output devices such as digital projection / web / DVD etc. For the time being, my color prints are made on Epson Premium Luster (250) paper from professional quality in-house EPSON Stylus Pro 4800 printer with Ultrachrome K3 ink set. B+W images are made on Hahnemuhle Fine Art Pearl paper. For image size more than 16" wider, I get those printed from a renowned professional lab, West Coast Imaging (See http://www.westcoastimaging.com).

According to Wilhelm Imaging Research (www.wilhelm-research.com), when displayed indoor, Premium Luster paper with Ultrachrome K3 ink set will have 165 year display permanence rating. This is entirely dependent on the display conditions, of course, and long life requires that these prints be framed for protection from air pollution, especially ozone. Full sunlight is roughly one hundred times brighter than daytime indoor display conditions. Indoor lighting levels vary dramatically, so it is possible a print near a bright window might begin to be noticeably off in color balance in as little as a few decades.