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 Replies: 21 / Views: 2,408 |
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Moderator
 United States
23522 Posts |
The project I've undertaken over the last few days has proven to be a little....larger than I'd anticipated. 15 man-hours, 200 pictures (1000 shutter actions, but I didn't save everything) and 600 megabytes of data later, I've gotten all of the coinage shot. Now I'm editing it all. Here's a couple of teasers:    I'm here to tell you, shooting toners is tougher than it looks. |
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Valued Member
United States
264 Posts |
Those are some nice shots. You have special equipment I take? Need to find a newbie's guide to coin photography.
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Member
United States
703 Posts |
Dave, very nice photos. Great Photography is a lot of work, Huh?
I still haven't found time to add more pix to my site, but I think I will this weekend. I did add about 140 nature shots though.
Good job, errrrrrrror
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1626 Posts |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2335 Posts |
Those are some good looking photos, I'm sure the rest will be the same high quality. There must have been quite a response to your offer of handling this grading submission.
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Rest in Peace
United States
3730 Posts |
Very nice pictures. I'm impressed.
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Valued Member
United States
57 Posts |
Every time I see pics like that, it makes me want to do it myself. Every time I think of the effort required to do it right, it makes me want to curl up in the fetal position..  Edited by Sagan
08/18/2007 01:33 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2254 Posts |
quote:
You have special equipment I take? Need to find a newbie's guide to coin photography.
Madmartigan, yes, Dave has some serious equipment when it comes to the camera itself, so comparing his pics at maximum pixels to someones basic digital camera would be tough. But, and this is a BIG BUT, you can absolutely take quality photos with an relatively inexpensive digital camera. Most cameras have the capability, it's a matter of finding the perfect lighting, distance from the coin, manual settings is offered etc. In my honest opinion it is more an effort of time/experimentation than it is equipment for 75% of the cases. Have a look at the coin photography forum and peruse the subjects. Keep in mind some topics pass by quickly so you may have to go back a few pages to even see topics from a week ago. Then take some pics and post and we will help for sure!! |
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Moderator
 United States
23522 Posts |
quote:
There must have been quite a response to your offer of handling this grading submission.
24 coins, evenly mixed between copper, circulated and lustrous silver. Each requiring their own specific lighting. I feel like I have a corner on the Two Cent market.  When I add up the setup time, shooting pics, and then time in the graphics software, I'll have more than an hour in each coin. Most of that is in the Gimp. I take the best two shots of each face and crop away the extra background. Then I sharpen and color-correct each (my white balance settings aren't as perfect as I'd like), saving intermediate copies along the way. Each of these has to be done with the coin at hand, so I can compare the screen results with reality. For some of them, there are detail shots to highlight die cracks or repunches, each requiring their own processing. Then I create posting images of each, downsized and downsampled to be Internet-friendly. The originals for each coin run 2200+ pixels in diameter, and over 3MB. I spent most of one evening just with the quarter, and I'm nowheres near satisfied with my results. |
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Member
United States
703 Posts |
Dave, and you are charging how much per coin for the photography? Hours of and hours of WORK.
oh yea. photographers are artists and shouldn't be paid.
errrorrorrrr
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
quote:
Dave, and you are charging how much per coin for the photography?
These are a grading submission; the pics are part of the deal. On a commission basis, I would probably handle things on a case-by-case basis depending on the relative difficulty of the job and the value of the coin. |
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Member
United States
703 Posts |
"These are a grading submission; the pics are part of the deal"
15 man hours at what per hour got you how much?
My point is that What you are doing is giving an extremely great service for not very much compensation is what I'm guessing. I know you are doing as a service, and I know you love doing it. But what you are doing is very specialized, you spend lots of money on photo gear and the computer. You have a skill and you should be paid well for that. As a Master photographer, I think I get about 50 cents an Hour. Get it!
errrror
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1267 Posts |
Beautiful photography. Did you use PhotoShop or some other type of photo manipulative software?
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
quote:
Beautiful photography. Did you use PhotoShop or some other type of photo manipulative software?
I've abandoned Photoshop in favor of the Gimp (GNU Image Manipulation Program), a free image editing program. It's very powerful software, and is (in my opinion) far more subtle and controllable than Photoshop in the areas of sharpening and levels/contrast. Part of the excessive time spent with this project has been due to my learning curve with the new software. http://www.gimp.org/Errorcoins, in reply (as well as for the information for anyone else reading), this is not something I'd do for free under any circumstances but this one. I fully intend to take these skills public once they're better-developed (no pun intended), and it won't be free by any stretch. Consider, as I do, that what I'm doing now is the formation of my online resume. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1267 Posts |
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Member
United States
703 Posts |
Dave, Understood and good luck with it. Your skill certainly has value. Dave in the future. you could also get "property rights" releases signed, shoot high rez files and build a stock of editorial content. High Rez is the key on that one.
Anyway, as you know great photography takes quite a bit of "time".
All the best, error
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Replies: 21 / Views: 2,408 |
Posted 08/17/2007 10:51 pm
