"Mac Lynch" wrote

My friend has a lovely carving of praying hands in medium dark polished wood.
I have tried all types of lighting conditions but cannot eliminate the shine
off the wood.

Traditional way is to use crossed polarizers to eliminate all reflection:

o one polarizer filter on the camera
o one sheet of polarizer on (each of) the light(s)

o Replace the subject with a mirror
o Fix the camera polarizer (without camera) to a stand
with tape so you can look through it; put a dot of tape etc.
at the top of the polarizer ring.

o Turn the lamps on one at a time and rotate the polarizer
sheets on each lamp so when looking through the camera
polarizer (at the lamp reflected in the mirror) the lamp
light disappears
o Mark each sheet of polarizer so adjusted with a dot at the top.
Fix them to the lamps.

o If you have hot lights (i.e. not flash) then you can look through
the camera polarizer and twiddle the lamp polarizers to add 'just
the right amount' (ha!) of highlight.

o Put polarizer filter on the camera lens and adjust so the dot
is at the top
o Take pictures

Sometimes just using a polarizer on the camera will be enough.

I am unable to treat the wood itself

There is a spray just for this purpose called dulling spray - make sure
it is the temporary stuff! - you spray it on and it comes right off again
with a Kleenex. You may not like the effect. Available at theatrical supply
houses or large photo stores.

but is there a form of indirect or diffused light

Try the biggest, best and cheapest diffuse source: outside on a
grey day. Try moving a sheet of white cardboard around to reflect
light up into the dark spots on the sculpture. This reflection technique
should also be used if you are using the artificial light method, above.

Use a lamp (a friend with a flashlight will do) to create highlights.

Also:

Try a sunny day, put the sculpture in light shade, and move large pieces of
white card, aluminum, etc. around to reflect in a little bit of sunshine.

I am using a Ricoh digital camera

You may need a circular polarizer, or you may not. If it is the usual type
of digital camera you may have to use sticky tape to hold the pola filter
to the camera. If you rotate the camera from horiz to vert you will need to
unstick and restick the filter so the dot on the filter is always up.

Any good camera store can supply the camera filter. Try theatrical supply
houses for the polarizer sheets for the lamps.

--
Nicholas O. Lindan, Cleveland, Ohio
Consulting Engineer: Electronics; Informatics; Photonics.
Remove spaces etc. to reply: n o lindan at net com dot com
psst.. want to buy an f-stop timer? nolindan.com/da/fstop/