Is there a way to take pictures of pictures with a digital camera that will look good ?

Question

I have tried and they all look blurry. The camera is 4.0 mega pixels .

Answer 1

Most digital cameras can't focus close enough to take the full advantage of all the pixels. Keeping it leveled and maintaining proper lighting would be a challenge too, without proper equipment such as a copy stand.

Your best bet is with a flat bed scanner. You can get one relatively inexpensively. You can solve both of the problems by using one.

Answer 2

The best lighting for this is outdoors on an overcast day with the sun high in the sky, but still behind the picture you are photographing. Turn off your flash. You may or may not have to use macro mode, depending on how large the original photo is. With 4 MP to work with, you should try to fill the frame with the picture you are copying. Get pretty close to perpendicular to the original, but not perfectly so. (Or, consider it as having the front of the lens or the imaginary film plane not quite parallel to the original.) The reason for this is to minimize any possible glare that might still exist, even under such diffused lighting conditions.

I shoot pictures or paintings at a local gallery for their promotions and this is how I do it pretty much all the time. Since I do not own the artwork, I can't upload any examples, though.

Answer 3

Indoors or outdoors.

Blurry is either camera shake indoors in low light in which case hold your breath or brace the camera on something.

Soft is out of focus. You aren't set on the little FLOWER are you. Set it for the mountain or on A

You can also try upping your ISO to 200 or 400

Answer 4

Well, if you really have to, there is ways. Try turnign off the flash and going into a well lighted room and take it. Although, if possible, a scanner works excelent for that sort of stuff. If you don't have one, maybe a friend does.