pretty decay
Thursday, March 5, 2009 at 11:14AM 
Decay still life ~ scanner photography • click to embiggenA few years back I started a decay project that I let slide. It involved finding dead/decaying things from the world of nature, bringing them into the house, and scanning them on my scanner.
As you may be able to discern from these scanner pictures, I did not rely solely upon the scanner for light. The things were given a bit of accent lighting from my studio strobe modeling lights. The black background was, in fact, a large piece of black foamcore mount board that was suspended above the scanner.
Decay still life ~ scanner photography • click to embiggenThe thing about scanner pictures is the stunning amount of detail that can be had. And, if you scan at 2400dpi, the amount of enlargement that is possible is also rather stunning.
The biggest PITA though is dust - every single speck on the scanning surface is recorded in faithful detail. The only thing that saved me from going nuts with all the dust removal was the black background - I was able to select all the black with the Magic Wand and use the Despeckle function to deal with it rather easily.
In any event, once the snow is gone, I'm out the door scavenging for more scanner photography subject matter.
Have any of you every played with scanner photography?
decay
Reader Comments (8)
Wow. Those are great. The black background really makes all the difference - it makes the flowers really pop. Very, very cool. I'll have to remember this!
The digital equivalent of a photogram?
Not something I'd thought about, really, but quite easy to do.
I have been real busy lately and have not posted or commented but these are great images.
The only time I did this was years ago when I was selling some items on Ebay, it really paid off.
I played around with a scanner at one point. I never thought of additional light, a good idea. I scanned a few things for photographs for some design projects. I also scanned a few flowers a dead bird and some bugs. You can see some of the bugs at: www.billgotz.com/bugscansite.html
That didn't work. Just copy and paste: www.billgotz.com/bugscansite.html
I fly out of Albany a lot for work...as far as sitting around waiting for your flight to get canceled, this little airport is the best...art exhibits constantly throughout.
Last April '08 in the "Concourse A Gallery", which basically amounts to your typical airport concourse other than the fact that this one is lined with art, there was an artist's work on display...her medium was scanner photography. You can get a tiny glimpse of her work here:
http://www.albanyairport.com/concourse_a.php
I still have a cell-pic stored in my phone from this one (have a master gardner for a wife)...but I can't for the life of me remember/find this artist's name now.
What was most interesting to me was how she embraced the pollen that fell on the scanner (which of course you can't begin to see in the lame link I provided). As mark describes regarding dust, she would experience a similar situation with specks of fallen pollen littering the scene (arrangements were created with fresh cut flowers taken directly from her garden to the scanner)...amidst these perfect arrangements (just a bit too perfect for me) the detail and color and "imperfection" of the pollen's presence was what moved me.
I played around a bit with it too, but my scanner hasn't been able to hook up to any of my computers since 2000, since it has a SCSI connection. I hate the thought of a then, $1,200.00 scanner collecting dust in the basement.
neat stuff...
this guy shoots with a 4x5 camera that has a scanner for a back...
http://golembewski.awardspace.com/cameras/current/index.html