Almost everyone has what they ordered, but I'm still missing addresses on some folks, which I may very well have lost in the tsunami of suck that was the last year.

If you don't have what you ordered, please please email me - spingo at gmail - and let me get you your picture! Include your shipping address and what you're waiting on.

Thank you!

I have the prints in hand, and tubes to send 'em out.

Please send me a message here or email to spingo at gmail.com with your address and which print you wanted.

$10 watercolor people will be getting acrylics or oils, as I've found out I suck at watercolors. Really, they're bad.

Please accept 100 apologies.
Jamie

Thank you all!

If you haven't already posted in the comments to let me know which print you want, please do so and/or email me at the address on my website: jamesbarnett.net.

I'll put together my list and will get in touch for shipping addresses and such.

Thanks so much!
Jamie

Almost 400%? What are you people, nuts? Thank you all so much.

I got the first batch of test prints back from the printer today (using an older low-res image file). You can tell the resolution is too low - pixels are visible - but it's getting pretty close.

I like 100# uncoated best. How about you?

Did you know that Photoshop, from CS3 on, has had a Photomerge function? You can take four 7-megapixel photos of a painting, say, and it'll combine them into one gigantic 25MP file.
http://www.zoom-in.com/blog/photography/sophia-betz/adobephoto/CS4-crib-photomerge-photoshop

Why do I want such a huge file? So I can print it out huge, and not have it be all pixelly. I know that I don't need the printing-industry-standard 300dpi, necessarily, but I don't think 7MP photos blown up to 16 x 20 or larger would look quite as good as denser photos.

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/mpmyth.htm
http://www.design215.com/toolbox/megapixels.php

Getting a giant, good-looking digital version of each of these paintings has been the very crux of all the research and testing I've been doing. And I may have cracked it. With SCIENCE!

Also, Google.

I called a recommended pro photo guy, who wanted $500 just to come to the house and set up, not including the price of any actual pictures taken. As much as he deserves his fee, I couldn't abide paying that.

I learn about different models of 35mm SLR cameras, which I haven't used in 15-20 years. Apparently, they have autofocus now! I also read up on how to light and shoot photos of artworkm which I've done before, but wanted to refresh on.

Found a Nikon N55 on Craigslist with a good-rated lens, drive to meet dude, buy camera, buy 4 x 100-watt-equivalent daylight compact fluorescents, buy 2 more clip-on lights. ($80-90)

Set up indoor setup ($10 tripod at pawn shop, lights clipped to a lamp and an outdoor umbrella, closed). Shoot 4 rolls of film - 10 or 11 paintings, each shot bracketed by a stop (.5 for the slide film). One set taken inside, one set outside in open shade, the paintings as squared-up as I can get.

In between all this, read exhaustively, relearning photography basics and lighting and learning about medium-format camera models, figuring a bigger negative/transparency, the more detail and the bigger print I can make. Like, two weeks of near-constant reading online and in books from the library.

Finally get over to get the film developed, and get 3K x 2K scans on CD ($20). The indoor shots are OVERexposed. The outdoor ones are a little less so, and usable and not as blue-shifted as I expected. Apparently my Nikon meter is a little off, especially under 4 x 100W CFLs, and Kodak Gold 200 (the slowest film available at the Walgreen's next to where my car overheated on the way to the camera store) doesn't mind shade as much as my digital camera.

Poking at one film-negative scan of Megaton, I get curious and open the quickie digital picture I took of the same painting last week. There's more detail in it, rendering a lot of the 35mm-specific research pretty much beside the point.

I still convinced I want to have some non-digital record of the paintings, though I'm tempted to get a 10 or 12MP SLR with the Kickstarter proceeds, which should cover larger prints for sale. Maybe that along with an intro medium-format camera to take film for future use (Yashica Mat 124, Bronica ETRSi, maybe even go nuts and get a $250 lead-breadbox Mamiya 6x7 from KEH).

So yeah, lots of fiddling and runaround and pain in the tuchus -- but I know more things than I used to, which is good.

Nothing like having your assumptions shattered right after you finally figure it all out.

I took photos of Megaton with my 35mm Nikon and my 7.2 MP Sony and did print tests of both of 'em. My Sony won this round.

Slightly bigger version:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elreyart/3729219656/sizes/o/

I've done 9 million pounds of research and it seems the way to go is to take photos of the paintings with a medium format film camera (no, not a Holga, though now I want one of those, too).

I'm thinking MF camera -> Epson V500 transparency scanner and then send the scan off to a printer. I'm thankful the process is firming up. So many choices!

So if any of you have a medium-format camera you're selling (or willing to trade), please get in touch!

PS Three weeks left and we're almost at 300%. You people are bonkers.

Mr. Warren Bullock asked to see my studio, so I threw this together.

It is untidy.

Massive version, with legible notes:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elreyart/3722282156/sizes/o/

This just came up in a private message, so I thought I'd mention it here: hell yes, I can ship elsewhere! You'll have to kick in extra for shipping, though.

... sparked in part by the fact that I seem to be kicking around LiveJournal CoH communities due to the kind fnordx (http://fnordx.livejournal.com/). Welcome and thank you, LJ people! Reading some of your posts and email suggestions of other scenes to capture has me thinking it might be a good time to turn my subscription back on for a bit, esp. heroside.

AND since this is a pretty much done deal, looks like, if you've dibbed one of the commission pledge levels, send a message here or to the email on my website and we can start talking about what you want. That goes for the watercolor/audio file people, too! May as well get started. Brownie points to neuroshred, who's already sent his audio files, and they didn't even suck.

AND some folks are leaving comments in the comments area here with what prints they want. I think that's a good a place as any and certainly the least cumbersome.

I'm feeling a little shamed by the official Kickstarter blog's Best Updates Ever post (http://blog.kickstarter.com/) but I dunno what I could offer. A 5-second video tour of my 7' x 4' "studio"? A little song, a little dance, a little seltzer down the pants? If there's any aspect of what I do that you're especially curious about, send a message or leave a comment and maybe that could be a future update. I've been making pictures a while and I'm not sure what aspects would be interesting, if any.

"And he goes for the NAPLES YELLOW, bypassing the cadmium yellow ENTIRELY! A bold move, Bill."
"It sure seems that like he said before the painting, he's here to give 110%."

You all rock 100x,
Jamie

Jeez, that was quick. THANK YOU, everyone!

Now that the basics are covered, I think we're moving into deluxe territory, and I'm thinking that means one of them newfangled digital cameras with the big ol' glass tube on front. This'll save about 10 steps in the middle of the process, and I can even use it towards future non-vidya-game paintings.

Again: THANK YOU, everyone!

You all are swell.