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### 3.2.2.4 Capture tips

- Make a new directory for each painting, and keep all of the image files for that painting (including a grey card and a grid) in that directory.

- VIPS can join up images in any layout, but you will get much less confused when you assemble your images if you stick to a regular grid. This can be difficult -- a good compromise is to keep one axis fixed and grab in rows (or columns).

- You can help to reduce mosaicing errors later if you keep your rows (or columns) as short as possible. So if the painting is in landscape format, grab in columns (or turn the painting on its side and grab in rows); if the painting is portrait, grab in rows (or turn the painting on its side and grab in columns).

- The semi-automatic mosaic functions (see §3.3) need a minimum overlap between the sub-images they join of around 20 pixels. For safety, you should aim for a larger overlap than this: we recommend an overlap of 60 pixels (around 20mm, usually).

- If the overlap area is featureless, it is worth identifying a good tie-point and ensuring it is visible in both images, even if this means increasing the overlap for one of the joins.

Next: 3.2.3 Correcting illumination Up: 3.2.2 Capturing the data Previous: 3.2.2.3 Image capture Contents