1 Like
Thanks for posting, tricky shot
I tried to develop correctly hieroglyphs (at least my own interpretation of what should be the correct colors/contrast )
dt 3.4.1
ER6_4097.dng.xmp (14.8 KB)
cairo.museum.glass.pp3 (22.7 KB) RawTherapee 5.8 (Development)
Tricky indeed.
@Aliks: You asked for vivid colours, especially in the greens. I’m wondering how realistic that would be. This is a very old coffin (2000+ years at least I’m guessing) and those colours would have faded over time. I did add some pop to the colours, bit too much for my personal taste to be honest.
My try.
dt 3.4.1
Modern workflow. Slight tweaks in color calibration. Special attention to the reflection on the schowcase (tone eq). Color zones to tweak the green. Contrast via haze removal, local contrast, contrast equalizer and filmic contrast.
ER6_4097.dng.xmp (21.2 KB)
1 Like
Jade - Actually the green pigment is mineral based - crushed minerals with copper salts giving the intense green. I don’t think it fades much with time.
So I like your first image best - but as you say its a matter of taste.
1 Like
Ah, thanks for that info!
So basically a Malachite [Wiki] based paint, which is indeed lightfast. Still impressive that it holds out for over 2 millennia!
Green; The Egyptian colour of good, harmony, peace, death and rebirth.
1 Like
I never really know what to do with divide blend mode… I saw this and thought I would try it in DT with the colorize module …https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEaPq0aaDCU
I should try it in Gimp where it would be closer to Affinity…
Result with divide and colorize…will of course vary with hue , sat and opacity used…
seems a bit dark on import …maybe
Hmmm - could just be a little on the green side???
Are the colors like this one…I tried to find the piece on the internet for reference…this is not it but looks similar… 
Yes those colours look good to me. The green is probably a malachite mineral colour, and the wood colours are nut brown.
The other distinctive feature of my sarcophagus image is that the colours have an attractive “sheen” as if there was a layer of varnish on top of the paint/pigment.
I’ve looked online for the exact image but drawn a blank. I didn’t make a note of the labelling so I cant give a definitive reference.
I saw that (sheen) in many of the images. I bet that would be hard to replicate…
Sheen may be hard to replicate in regular processing. E.g., think of gold colour vs actual gold.
The particularity of metals (e.g. gold) is that the specular reflections take the tint of the metal (yellowish in the case of gold, reddish for copper, …), whereas for non-metals the reflections are not coloured. In the case of varnished metal, you can get a coloured reflection from the metal, layered with a non-coloured reflection from the varnish.
Those effects are well understood for generated images. In photography, it means you should not force reflections from (bare) metal to be neutral.
And application of varnish after the colours is still a common technique to get a consistent surface texture, and to protect the decorations. It’s one of the reasons the colours stay “fresh”, helped by the storage in dry, dark, conditions at fairly constant temperature for most of the last 2000-3000 years.
1 Like
Interesting.
I thought it couldn’t possibly be the effect of a varnish as varnishes tend to darken and discolour over time. However, a little googling shows that the dynastic Egyptians commonly used beeswax based varnishes. . . . .
1 Like
Found this page, maybe it helps (Pic # 3 from above).
“MATTHIAS SCHNEIDER : FOTOGRAFIE · ÄGYPTEN 2017 – Museum Cairo”
Fantastic, that is indeed the same sarcophagus - you can see the same damage marks.
The text in German is useful , but I can find no other references to the name Djedhoriufanch - presumably a relative of Djedhor. Is that a German form of the name maybe?
I have plans to go back to Cairo after lockdown, so I will definitely take some more pictures and do some better labelling.
The text says that Djedhoriufanch was a priest, the highest administrator of the sanctuaries of Amun-Res.
Good light for your next pictures in egypt 
Yes got that, but its strange that there is no other mention of Djedhoriufanch on the Internet (or at least not on my google)