Digital Diversity a new approach to botanical illustration Niki Simpson in collaboration with Peter Barnes
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Digital Diversity a new approach to botanical illustration Published for the exhibition of digital botanical illustrations by Niki Simpson in collaboration with Peter Barnes 8th March - 27th May 2007 at the: Botanisches Museum Berlin-Dahlem Freie Universität Berlin KÜnigin-Luise-Str. 6-8 14195 Berlin, Germany
ISBN: 978-0-9554917-0-2 Published by Niki Simpson, Guildford, Surrey, UK www.nikisimpson.co.uk Catalogue design by davidthedesigner@celsius.eu.com Catalogue production by printwise.co.uk Published February 2007 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher. The rights of Niki Simpson to be identified as author of this work have been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998.
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Foreword Professor Dr. H. Walter Lack Director at the Berlin Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum When I met Niki Simpson for the first time in July 2005 at the XVII International Botanical Congress in Vienna, I was immediately struck by the plant images she exhibited. They were novel in the technology used, yet followed the established tradition of conventional botanical illustration. In order to make the public in Germany aware of this new approach, I offered Niki the opportunity to exhibit her work in the gallery of the Botanical Museum in Berlin. When Leonhart Fuchs sat down on 1st March 1542 to write the preface for his famous herbal De historia stirpium he noted “What sane person, I ask, would despise a picture, which certainly expresses objects much more clearly than they can be delineated by any words, even the most eloquent? Indeed, it has been thus arranged by nature, that we are all captivated by a painting; and those things that are set forth and pictured on canvas and paper are fixed even more deeply in our minds than those described by bare words”. Yet 465 years later we need only substitute the word painting with ‘image’ and add ‘or screen’ to canvas and paper, for the same to be true. When Fuchs used hand-coloured woodcuts on paper it was then a recent innovation in the field. Today Niki’s innovative approach makes use of much more sophisticated equipment, yet her immediate purpose is identical to that of Fuchs and his collaborators – to produce a very precise illusion of a three-dimensional plant on a piece of paper. And so is their ultimate purpose – the accurate dissemination of botanical information. This development may well lead to a world of interactive imagery in botany. I wish the exhibition ‘Digital Diversity’ great success – here in Berlin and wherever it subsequently will be put on show.
Berlin, 16 January 2007
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Niki Simpson
Awards
Plants have always held a fascination for me and I have drawn plants since childhood. My association with the Royal Horticultural Society in the 1990s, working first as Plant Records Assistant and later as the Horticultural Database Administrator, brought me in close contact with a wide range of plants. It was at this time that I developed an interest in scientific artwork, involving dissections and magnifications, with all parts accurately scaled. In 1998 I was awarded the RHS Gold Medal for my watercolour paintings and I have had artwork published in books and journals, such as the RHS The Plantsman and the European Garden Flora. With my background in horticultural computing and botanical illustration it was perhaps a natural progression to want to experiment with the possibilities of digital botanical illustration. The turning point was a Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust award in 2003 to fund a personal investigation into developing digital techniques for the specific purpose of botanical illustration, which at that time was largely untried. Recognizing the potential of digital work, I have, for the last three years, concentrated on developing my digital imaging techniques, whilst working part-time in the Botany Department of the RHS at Wisley, England, where I now work with the RHS Herbarium photographic collection.
1989: RHS Grenfell medal (paintings) 1989-96: RHS Silver and Silver-gilt medals (paintings) at various shows 1991: AGS Gold Medal at the 6th International Rock Garden Plant Show 1998: RHS Gold Medal (paintings) 2003: Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust award 2004: RHS Silver gilt Medal (photography) 2005: RHS Silver gilt Medal (photography) 2005: RHS 2005 Photographic Bursary
Peter Barnes Peter Barnes is a freelance horticultural botanist and writer working from his home in Wales. His career has included twenty years as Botanist at the Royal Horticultural Society’s garden at Wisley in Surrey as well as practical nursery work. Special interests include hardy ferns, the flora of Japan, photography and botanical illustration. His contributions to the development of this work are numerous; they include photographs, especially of micro characters, help with botanical research and advice, image and caption checking, technical input, together with the creation of Niki’s website.
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What this work is about In my view, it is the botanical information conveyed by an illustration that is of importance, rather than the medium in which it is created. This new botanical work is about pushing the limits and challenging the practices of the time-honoured ways of depicting plants. While a certain sense of betrayal to contemporary watercolour artists is felt, I firmly believe that botanical illustration exists for the dissemination of scientific botanical information and that as such, it must move forward alongside the other technologies in use by botanists, if it is to retain that core purpose. Not only is this new work about challenging practices, it is also about challenging the uses to which plant illustrations can be put; to look ahead and consider how the power of digital images can be utilized in new ways to benefit botanical science. From the start I conceived and designed these images with on-screen viewing and interactivity in mind, and further work is already in progress in this direction. For me, the future of botanical illustration lies in continuing to explore the potential of the dynamic digital workspace. I present this work as one approach for the future; and am aware that in certain
Davidia involucrata
instances there will still be situations in which photographic-based work, for some reason, cannot adequately either capture or portray the required botanical information, and where traditional work will still be required. These new images, while leaning heavily on historical work, look to the future - to interactive educational software, digital floras and beyond. Consequently they have relevance, not only to botany, but also to those involved with education and the public understanding of science.
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What’s new and why At first glance these images look similar to the traditional botanical plate, containing accurate diagnostic and characteristic features of the plant concerned, with appropriate sections and dissections and with all parts shown accurately scaled. However these images are virtual equivalents, created electronically from image capture through to print or screen display. By utilising photographs for illustration purposes, full realism has been achieved and with it a new level of detail. On enlarging a painting, the brush strokes will simply be magnified, whereas using the magnification power of software to enlarge these digital photographic images, the fine detail of, often diagnostic, surface structures is revealed. Standard image software now allows the Above: Arum maculatum – full digital composite illustration Top right: Amanita muscaria – to show the technique used to illustrate fungi Bottom right: Magnolia 5 soulangeana ‘Lennei’
excision of the individual plant part from its photographic background, and also for photographs to be manipulated, so that damaged plant parts can be mended. Unlike the traditional fixed image, these images are truly flexible; all parts remain as discrete items and are fully interchangeable and individually scaleable, such that the composite illustration can be readily re-arranged or re-emphasized, or even re-layered so that any overlap of parts can be reversed.
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From the artist’s perspective, the ability to correct or improve an illustration is amazing, while for the botanist, enhanced communication at all stages with the artist, enables discussion throughout the process. These illustrations are comprehensive with a high information content being achieved not only through the high number of parts, but also through the addition of new features, such as a colour key, time bar and a new graphic symbol set, which I have designed especially to work with these digital composite illustrations. While neither quick nor cheap to produce, the inherent flexibility, especially in the scaling and re-formatting, of these digital images means that the images can be truly multi-purpose. Potential uses, both onscreen and in print, for science, education and even marketing include: digital floras, interactive keys, Image specimens to supplement herbarium specimens, comparative charts and educational diagrams, book and journal illustrations, web based applications, and visitor information displays.
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Fagus sylvatica Component parts re-arranged to create a horizontal composition
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Sexual arrangement:
Key to botanical symbol set used in the illustrations
männlich
male
weiblich
female
zwittrig
hermaphrodite / bisexual
Geschlecht unbestimmt
sex unknown monoecious
einhausig
dioecious
zweihausig steril
sterile Life forms:
einjährige Pflanze
annual
zweijährige Pflanze
biennial
Stauden
herbaceous perennial
Halbstrauch mehrjährige Gehölze
sub-shrub
Strauch
shrub
Baum
woody perennial
tree
Parasit
parasite
Hemiparasit
hemi-parasite
Miscellaneous: Geruch
smell
giftig geschützt
poisonous
*
Information
protected status further information
Hybrids: Hybride Pfropfhybride
hybrid of sexual origin graft hybrid
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Development of a new symbol set As part of my early work with these composite illustrations I looked at ways to increase the information content and trialled the use of symbols to indicate the sexual arrangement of the plant. For these I used the universal symbols for “male”, ♂, and “female”, ♀, together with the combined symbol for “hermaphrodite” (not available as a standard character). Failing at the time to find any symbols to denote “monoecious” and “dioecious”, I simply created my own. However, in researching more thoroughly for such symbols for my later images, I found that a wide array of botanical symbols has existed. Many have not withstood the test of time and have fallen out of current use, but nevertheless I thought some suitable, and others adaptable, for my purpose. I then considered widening the scope of symbols used in my images, to include symbols to denote features, such as life-form, hybrid sterility, and other descriptive features, such as smell, toxicity and protected status. For example, smell, pleasant or otherwise, can be a useful, even diagnostic, feature for the identification of certain taxa, and is not one that can be included in a visual description. A further example is sterility; the absence of fruit and or seed within a botanical plate can be ambiguous; implying
either that the plant is sterile and can never produce fruit/seed to depict, or simply that the fruit/seed simply hasn’t for some reason been illustrated. A symbol denoting sterility would instantly clarify matters and would be especially useful in depicting cultivars, many of which are sterile hybrids. Similarly a symbol for sex unknown would be useful for portraits of seedlings or young plants of dioecious species, before the gender of the plant becomes apparent, or for where dioecious plants are seen and recorded at a non-flowering or non-fruiting time of the year. In addition, I realised just how few of the symbols that I did find are included in commonly available fonts. I had no wish to use outdated symbols which are no longer generally recognised, but finding a need for symbols where I found none, I set about putting together a non-alphabetical symbol set. I confined myself to those symbols used to describe a plant and created the symbols I needed in line with the established ones; either updating old symbols or creating new ones. Those created were designed either with reference to traditional but disused ones where possible, or with a logical construction for the particular meaning. I have designed them to be simple, botanically appropriate, and functional for illustrative as well as textual purposes and to be suitable for both handwriting and, perhaps more importantly today, for computer use.
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Taxus baccata
Photography and plant portfolios Behind each composite image is a large supporting cast of photographs. A considerable portfolio of images has been amassed in studying and recording each plant. For every shot used, many more were taken and stored for possible inclusion and very many more were rejected. Photographs were taken throughout the year and include habit shots as well as botanical details. Having always admired the stunning black backgrounds often used in close-up plant photography, a black background was considered, but I decided instead to follow the lead of traditional botanical artwork and portray the parts positively against white. This is, after all, how we perceive plants and has the benefit of its use as a background against which colour can be matched.
Note on nomenclature and colour references With botanical progress, the scientific names of plants can change, usually for taxonomic, misidentification or nomenclatural reasons. A consequence is that the same plant may be listed in different places under different names - synonyms. For these illustrations and their captions, we have in general followed Brummitt’s Vascular Plant Families and Genera (1992) in the attribution of families - hence, Digitalis is placed in the Scrophulariaceae, rather than, as recently proposed, the Plantaginaceae. For specific epithets and cultivar names, the RHS Plant Finder (2006-07) has been followed. For the colour recording, the colour-reference used was the RHS Colour Chart; 1995 version.
I view each composite image as a work in progress; when I obtain an improved part, I simply delete the earlier less informative part and replace it with the new one. The photography for this project was undertaken over a three and half year period, between April 2003 and November 2006, in order to capture all the required parts. The work on display comprises approximately 1,000 photographs in total, with an average of 18 individual photographs to each composite image.
Technical information These composites are digital multi-media images. Created by digital manipulation, using standard image software packages, such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator, they can contain photographs, manipulated photographs, flatbed
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scans and scanning electron micrographs. Where extra clarity of botanical information was required, some digital enhancement and/or digital drawing have been added. To increase the depth of focus at close range for some microscopic details, stacking software, such as CombineZ, was used. The final image files are constructed for output at A3 size with the AI file size of the composite images ranging from 50MB to 110 MB, depending on the number and size of the component parts. The first photographs were taken with a Canon EOS 500 non-digital camera, with 28-80mm and macro lenses, later upgrading to a digital SLR camera, a Canon EOS300D, and most recently to a Canon EOS350D. Consequently the earliest image parts (e.g. for the Digitalis, Iris) were taken using professional quality film and the slides subsequently scanned on a home slide scanner. The latest image parts were shot RAW and converted to TIFs (e.g. for the Acca, Nyssa). The kitchen functioned as my studio, and nearly all the photography was done indoors. Daylight was used throughout, with no artificial lighting, in order to avoid colour bias and achieve as close as possible colour accuracy without expensive equipment. Liquidambar styraciflua
The prints exhibited are giclĂŠe prints of exhibition quality, printed to Fine Art Trade Guild standards, using lightfast UltraChrome inks on 300gsm archival paper.
Scientific aims To allow botanists to view the diagnostic characters of plants throughout the year, in full photographic realism, using the power of the magnification tools in image software. To demonstrate how digital techniques can be harnessed for the creation of reference-standard images for scientific illustration. The emphasis has not been for perfect photographs, but towards developing a manageable and affordable technique to portray plants accurately. Such composite plates could be used for both published and on screen identification aids, by depicting the general characteristics of a taxon, or could form a graphical record of a particular plant specimen, and so provide a supplement to the herbarium Specimen of that particular plant, in the form of an Image Specimen.
Educational aims To create a means to allow and encourage investigation of the plant world by way of powerful imagery - ultimately in the form of interactive public displays in museums, botanical institutions, gardens open to the public, as well as in web-based curricular applications.
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Using the impact of full realism I want to show plants alive and kicking - to portray them, neither laid out lifeless like corpses, nor flattened like the pressed versions of herbarium specimens. Although I primarily aim for the strictly scientific, I am keen to show the intricacy and stunning beauty of our native and garden flora. So many of our very ordinary everyday plants are fascinating if you know when, where and how to look. I have always thought that if respect for the environment is to be felt, one needs to learn to understand plants, and to want to take the trouble to understand plants one must first be attracted to them. I feel that powerful, informative and attractive images are a key way to draw non-plant people to take a closer look; to encourage them to go into and beyond the image, and so take a step towards developing that understanding. I hope that my images go some way to achieving this end.
Publications 1. S impson, N. (2005) Botanical art goes digital. The Plantsman n.s. 4(4): 208-215. 2. S impson, N. (2005) XVII International Botanical Congress 2005 Abstracts. Poster 2711.
Iris ‘Prophetic Message’
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Acknowledgements I would like to give special thanks to Professor Dr. H. Walter Lack for giving me the opportunity to exhibit this work at the Berlin Botanical Museum, and to The Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust for part-funding the original 2003-4 experimental digital botanical art project, on which this work is based. This work could not have been completed without the help and encouragement of Peter Barnes; I would like to also thank him for his permission to use the following photographic parts: horsetail: G; ivy: FGLM; holly: HJPQ: snowdrop: FG; primrose: L; hellebore: FGHJQ; aconite: EFG; yew: FGJK; violet: PQRSTU; hamamelis: HJKP; jasmine: DEFGHJ; and parrotia: FGHJK, which are © Peter Barnes. Also, PalDat for permission to use the SEM of Viscum pollen, which is © H. Halbritter. For permission to use garden and wild plant material: Jim Gardiner, Curator of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Garden at Wisley, and Adam Owen and Brian Parnell of Guildford Borough Council, respectively. Anna Saverimuttu for help with photography; David Hyde for the design and production of this catalogue and Ed Bailey for the production of the virtual book. I would like to thank my colleagues at RHS Wisley for their support, but particularly: Dr John David, Richard Sanford, James Armitage, Barry Phillips, Susan Grayer, Bernard and Patty Boardman, Janet Cubey, Barbara Collecott and Geoff Denton. Finally, my long suffering and wonderfully supportive family, who realized that this was something I just had to do.
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Contacts: email: nikisimp@aol.com email: peter@barnes-botany.co.uk website: www.nikisimpson.co.uk website: www.barnes-botany.co.uk
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