A heart-warming story from the front lines:
For several years now, I have been shooting 4x5 EPN of art works for the cover of the "Official" Tourist magazine of Puerto Rico. Last year, the production director called me distraught, as she had forgotten to call me to shoot this year's cover until it was "almost" too late, and she needed me to shoot it and deliver the shot the next day! Unfortunately, that's no longer possible, as there is no longer a lab in PR who processes 4x5 film. I would have to send it to the States. She told me she could not wait, and I would have to shoot it on digital.
Sighing long and loud, I agreed to do what I had to do; I shot the painting and took her the files the next day.
The day after that, she called me and said I had to reshoot (what? what about yesterday's deadline?) because the digital file that I had shot "did not look like the painting." I told her that I would be glad to reshoot if it was necessary, but I had shot RAW files, and had bracketed, done a custom white balance, and all that crap, so surely it had to be just a matter of adjusting the image on screen. I took my laptop and headed for their office.
When I got there, she told me that "the orange tones" in the painting had not come through. (Orange tones? What orange tones?) She showed me a desktop printer copy of a file that the artist had sent her, and in it the painting had garish orange tones in some areas. I told her I did not remember the painting looking like that, but I would see what I could do. But no matter what I did to the file, I could not make it look orange without screwing up all the other colors.
So we got on the phone with the Graphic Artist, who lives in Florida. I told him (and the director) that as far as I was concerned, the "gold standard" for art reproduction was a properly lit and exposed 4x5 EPN transparency, just like I had been providing them for years. I would be glad to reshoot the painting if I could shoot it on film. And it would take a week.
They agreed, and I reshot the painting. Sent the film to Duggal, got it back, delivered it to the client, and guess what?
There were no orange tones. Nor were there any orange tones in the original painting. Or to tell the truth, maybe there were, as the artist had spent almost an hour "retouching" the painting before he would let me shoot it! Hmmmm...
So guess what happened?
They had me shoot yet another painting for the cover! On film! The orange tones were what the director had liked about the original painting, but they did not really exist!
And the film did not lie!
