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 Replies: 34 / Views: 5,087 |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
4038 Posts |
The sensor in my camera is only 16mm, not much different from your 13mm, so a new camera won't change much. Just eyeball it and take pics! ...Ray
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
548 Posts |
I'm now pleased with the setup. Sure, I'd like to have a rail to adjust things when I have to photograph different size coins, but in general, this combo in working well. This is from a GSA Morgan, through the plastic.   I think those pics will do.  To summarize, - Olympus E-420 DSLR - Olympus EX-25 digital extension tube - Olympus 40-150mm F3.5 zoom lens about F8, shutter speed whatever it takes, manual focus Oh. Notice those nice die cracks on the reverse.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
627 Posts |
Lobby, that's beautiful. What did you use for lights? Very nice!  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
548 Posts |
The same LED lights from Target I showed in the 1st post.
I'm learning that lighting is "everything." Well, maybe not. But poor lighting will turn a good setup into a mess.
I'm still not happy with the light setup. It doesn't seem repeatable for me.
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
Quote:
I'm still not happy with the light setup. It doesn't seem repeatable for me What works for nickel doesn't work for copper, and silver is different from both, as is gold. A circulated coin needs different lighting than a Mint State one. Heck, the obverse and reverse of a Morgan require different exposures under identical lighting. Your latest Morgan is a wonderful shot. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
548 Posts |
Quote:
What works for nickel doesn't work for copper, and silver is different from both, as is gold. A circulated coin needs different lighting than a Mint State one. Heck, the obverse and reverse of a Morgan require different exposures under identical lighting.
Your latest Morgan is a wonderful shot. Thanks, Dave. I was gonna post a pic of my penny setup (using books to raise the cent closer to the lens). But I couldn't get the light to work right. It seems like you have my computer hacked and can see what I'm working on. |
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
Having managed that Morgan so elegantly, you will find just about anything else different, but easier.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Lobby...good job on the Morgan dollar image! It has MOST of the qualities of the perfect coin image: - Clear Focus - Natural Color - Balanced representation of Luster - Good Shadow Detail on the Devices - Sharp all over Two comments/questions: A. The order of priority in any image is 1) Focus; 2) Composition; and 3) Exposure. You nailed 1 and 3 but you really need to rotate that coin so the devices are flat to the sensor! B. The image has an odd histogram. How much post processing did these images go through and of what type? You know you're doing well when the biggest criticism your image gets is that the coin is a bit rotated! ...Ray Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
548 Posts |
So, "devices flat to the sensor" means, for example, that the eagle on the reverse isn't straight up and down? Is there just a compositional thing, or is there some technical reason that affects image quality? I did no post processing. Just a jpg import into iMac PS Elements 9, and crop. The only "tweak" was the color setting on the camera (a little bluer than daylight, IIRC). |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Yes, just a compositional thing, not a technical issue. But other than focus, composition is the 2nd most important element in any image.
So when you say "crop", do you mean this image was not downsized from the original, just excess cropped away? Or do you really mean downsized? It's clear that you must have done a circular crop around the coin, but is that all? And curious, if you indeed downsized, what ratio did you use? ...Ray
Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
548 Posts |
Oh, I see what you're after.
I just cropped excess. The background I used was sorta fugly, so I chose to crop in a circle instead of the squares we generally do. There was no downsizing of the picture.
Until I uploaded to my photo sharing site. Smugmug. I suspect Smuggy resizes automatically, else they have to address exponential storage growth. I think there may be options on that site that I can select to change this... Not sure.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
OK, still sort of confused...
The images are 800x600 after Smugmug's processing. What was the size of the images before you uploaded to Smugmug? Pixels, not MB...Ray
Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
548 Posts |
The obverse file is 1.30 mb, 3648x2736
I suppose those are pixels...
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
So Smugmug is downsizing your photos by a factor of 4.56 for you...Ray
Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
....and that Morgan is actually too big for any monitor available to display all at once.
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Replies: 34 / Views: 5,087 |
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Posted 01/29/2012 1:58 pm
