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 Replies: 27 / Views: 4,840 |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
4038 Posts |
This might be as good as you can do without getting a longer lens with macro capability, or the bellows/lens route. It seems these are 1:1 crops and they will just never be as sharp as you'd like them to be. To get better sharpness, you will need to get more magnification and then downsize the images...Ray
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
516 Posts |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Quote:
Also - regarding the bellows vs longer lens... Am I right in saying that the bellows setup will probably photo the coins better, but the longer lens will have more practical applications outside of numismatics? Yes, both are true. Some of the new photos look better, but others same or worse. For instance, the 1910 dime obverse looks much better than the reverse. I think you have a focus problem! Either that or your camera is messing with your aperture. But I think you are using A mode, right? So it must be the focus. I would suggest trying a focus sequence: Set to manual focus focus until it looks perfect in the viewfinder, then focus just bit off til it starts to look out of focus. Then take a pic, and adjust the focus a tiny bit closer to perfect, take another, and keep doing that until you go out of focus on the other side. Then pick the one that looks best and compare with what the camera tells you is focused. Which is better? Ray |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
516 Posts |
Yeah - I'll try the focus trick and see how it turns out.
I also noticed with the dipoters that I have to get much closer to the coin, which throws the angle of my lights too low.. and limits the vibrancy of the toning in the pics. I guess to really get close ups I'll have to buy a new lens or bellows..
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Yep, the diopters make the lens a shorter focal length, so you have to get closer to the coin.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
9792 Posts |
I'm guessing mirror slap vibration is the cause of the softness, I shot every coin shot with mirror lock up, if the Nikon you have doesn't offer that, then use the 2 second timer it's better than your hand as it will give the camera time to settle down after your hand leaves the shutter button.
"Buy the Book Before You Buy the Coin" - Aaron R. Feldman - "And read it" - Me 2013! ANA Life Member #3288 in good standing since 1981, ANS, Early American Coppers Member (EAC), Colonial Coin Collectors Club member (C4), Conder Token Collector Club member (CTCC), Civil War Token Society (CWTS) member, Liberty Seated Collectors Club (LSCC) & Numismatic Bibliomania Society member (NBS), USMex, Member in good standing, 2¢ variety collector. See my want page: http://goccf.com/t/140440 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Your Nikon may be controllable using ControlMyNikon. It's cheap and allows you to control aperture, focus, etc then snap the picture all with your mouse, no timers, no remotes...Ray
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Pillar of the Community
United States
516 Posts |
I got a new copy stand for my birthday. Unfortunately, the coins are different - but perhaps we can still determine if the tripod was causing most of the issues? Tripod   Copy Stand   |
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Rest in Peace
United States
9104 Posts |
Looks like the same coin to me. Did you upload something wrong?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Did you use the same amount of post-processing sharpening in both of these? The second one looks sharper, but that may just be differences in PP. We need to see a 100% crop with no PP in order to see if the copy stand has improved the image vs the tripod...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
516 Posts |
The only post processing done was reduction in size of the image via Picasa. Both were handled the exact same.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
In that case the new image is WAY better than the old. The copy stand is doing the trick! But for some reason the white balance got messed up, or maybe now it's correct?
Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Replies: 27 / Views: 4,840 |
First Page
Posted 02/16/2012 09:36 am
