Digital Prints

BetterLight Scan Backs
One way to get a handle on digital drawing and painting work is to look at the software
used to create it. I’ll give a short summary of some of the major program players to give
you a feel for them. And again, keep in mind that my category dividing lines are not impermeable.
Many programs can both help create and edit images, and many artists own several
types of software and use them all, even in a single image. (See Table 3.2 for an overview
of the major image-editing software applications, including drawing/painting programs.)
Chapter 3 ■ Creating and Processing the Image 97
BetterLight scan backs provide large, high-resolution files with extraordinary detail and sharp focus, wide dynamic range (BetterLight claims 11+
f-stops), great control of color and tones, and adjustment of density (exposure) in less than 1/10th f-stop steps.
The technology that BetterLight uses is completely different than the other single-shot backs with area-array sensors. Working like a flatbed scanner
turned up on its side, the BetterLight gathers the information for the image in one continuous scan as the light is collected by three, individually
filtered rows of pixels (tri-linear scanning array or CCD).
Because the CCD sensor slowly moves across the image plane, scans can take minutes. This results in two limiting issues: (1) the subject cannot
move, and (2) continuous lights rather than electronic flash must be used.
However, if you’re willing to live with those two conditions, then you will be amazed at the quality of the resulting captures. For example, the
top-end model of BetterLight at this writing was the expected Super 10K-2, which features a native maximum resolution of 10200×13800×3
pixels (422 MP)! (BetterLight gets to multiply the pixel dimensions by 3 since they have “real” pixels for each of the three colors throughout the
image.) If I were to plug those numbers into Table 3.1, the resulting print sizes would be 51×69 inches (@200ppi) and 34×46 inches (@300ppi)!
The primary users of BetterLights are professional photographers involved with advertising, catalog, commercial/industrial, art reproduction, and
museum/archiving applications. One is Benjamin Blackwell who creates digital archives of artwork for the UC Berkeley (California) Art
Museum, as well as other museums and clients. Figure 3.14 shows his setup using a BetterLight scanning back on a 4×5 camera. He uses
4200ºK HID (ceramic metal halide High Intensity Discharge) lights, which produce much less heat and more light per watt than tungsten.
Blackwell’s image files for museums, artists, and printers can range from 300—549 MB in size!
Figure 3.14 A BetterLight scanningback
system is used by photographer
Ben Blackwell to digitally capture
artwork at the UC Berkeley Art
Museum. Inset shows two of the
BetterLight inserts with a CCD sensor
that moves across image plane.
© Ben Blackwell
www.benblackwell.com;
inset: Courtesy of BetterLight, Inc.