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 Replies: 15 / Views: 2,410 |
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Valued Member
United States
75 Posts |
I am not having much luck, my pictures tend to come out in a way that is not flattering for the coins. Is there a photo nut on here who can help me out? BTW I am using the 13MP camera on my phone, which does incredible shots for everything else but for some reason I'm not having any luck with coins!
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2781 Posts |
you probably want this in the photography section, BUT some basics are
CAMERA SETTINGS: look for the macro setting (little flower icon), it will allow you to take closeups that stay in focus, I find that 4" away is optimum but camera's will vary. other settings to watch are the light filters, using indoor, outdoor, fluorscent, tungsten, sepiatone etc will all give different toning on the picture. different settings for different metal compositions. play with your camera until you find the right ones. and while not directly camera related you want to stay with a solid neutral background if you can.
TRIPOD: can't stress this enough, especially on macro setting ANY camera movement (even from pushing the shutter button) will quickly knock closeups out of focus. resting the camera agaisn't something solid will help but it really should be "locked down".
LIGHTING: good light without shadows being cast over the coin. flexible LED lamps really come in handy.
SOFTWARE: for cropping backgrounds and minor color adjustments.
check out the photography section, dont be imtimidated by some of the photos or equipment in there, many of them are professionals with decades of experience - but all are willing to help newbs.
Edited by Wade
07/08/2013 11:20 am
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Moderator
 United States
188904 Posts |
I moved your post to the 'Coin Photography' forum for the proper attention.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
Wade gave excellent suggestions.
What would help further is for us to see a picture you've taken, and have you describe what you don't like about it, so we can see what's going wrong. Just snap the best pic you can, resize it small enough to upload, and upload it for us to view. If you have problems uploading or resizing, email the full size image to me and I'll post it.
Ray
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Moderator
United States
188904 Posts |
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Valued Member
 United States
75 Posts |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2781 Posts |
penny pics look like you might be too close to the coin.
the others look like you are off on a bit of an angle, you want to be as straight on the coin as you can with one or more light sources (without causing a shadow).
diffusing the light (even with just a piece of blank white printer paper) should help eliminate the lightning streak effects. (you want a dull glow to illuminate the coin rather than sharp focused light)
with a piece of paper overhead the coin might look dark through the viewfinder but should auto-white blance once you take the picture.
btw silver/nickel coins can be a bugger unless really worn/dull or perfect mintstate. any circulation nicks and dings REALLY show.
Edited by Wade
07/08/2013 7:45 pm
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Pillar of the Community
2087 Posts |
I attended the two sessions of the ANA Summer seminar. In the first week I did the introduction to digital photography: what I learnt: Tripods are evil as they can not keep the camera still. Use a a solid copy stand. You can find them cheaply from an old dark room set up. Point and shoot cameras may be great for ebay, but they will never match a DSLR or equivalent. "Or equivalent" meaning: Sony no longer makes DSLRs. they produce a DSLR like camera series that uses a fixed mirror technology that has the advantage of preventing shaking due to mirror movement. When using a DSLR use the mirror lock function: The mirror lock function operates by moving the mirror out of the way and locking it in place before operating the shutter, when the shutter release button is used. Its better to take good photos than rely on digital editing as you minimize editing time...and of course make the editing straight forward. We were able to try out a number of different lighting methods I found the best light came from a beam splitter and back light set up( check on the internet you will soon find an example ot what this is) The room we were taught in was on the second floor of a building. Every truck going by caused blurring ( especially noticeable with long exposure times) in the photos we took. The lesson: where possible take you photos at ground level on a very stable surface. Know your camera!!! This one was counter intuitive for me: use a high F stop number (ie very small aperture ) and long exposure. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2781 Posts |
point and shoot may never match DSLR but they are much, MUCH better than "great for ebay". for 99.99% of the collectors (collectors - not professional photographers) it will more than do the job. the following are all filtered down to under 100 kb, shot with a $50, 6 year old 4 megapixel canon camera, using an evil tripod & (no lightbox) natural lighting.     Edited by Wade
07/09/2013 01:14 am
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Pillar of the Community
2087 Posts |
I have used point and shoot and now Use a DSLR type My experience is the DSLR is better when it comes to tough coins to photograph( the highly reflective ones especially) I stand by my viewpoint the point and shoot are best for ebay! If its for keeping a record of your coins...a DSLR has the higher resolution and better depth of filed for photos that keep insurance companies on your side. I also find the DSLR makes a USB microscope redundant. Here a very quickly taken shot of a dollar sized coin I have then selected a 5mm by 7mm area of the coin out of the full sized photo. This was done very quickly in day light using F22 and a 4 second exposure. Its not a great shot but it shows the potential of what can be done.  Edited by austrokiwi
07/09/2013 02:14 am
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4038 Posts |
mizugori...
I see just a few things that you could change which would greatly improve your pictures. By the way, you have made a good start of it, since the pics are generally clear and the colors look fairly natural. From here on it's a matter of small improvements.
First, as Wade said, you want to make the coin flat to the camera. This allows better focus across the whole surface and eliminates the need for small apertures, which improve depth of field at the expense of making the entire image fuzzy.
Second, it appears you are using a single light. It's better to use two or more to spread the light more and allow more flexibility in light placement. As Wade also said, try a little diffusion on any lights you use, depending on how lustrous the coin is, etc.
Third, it is unnatural looking with coins to have the light coming from "below". From your pics, your single light is coming from ~6:00. The classic placement is two lights, one at 2:00 and one at 10:00. You will want to adjust the exact placement to optimize shadow detail for each coin type.
Ray
Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Valued Member
United States
75 Posts |
Thanks everyone, I will try the suggestions that I am able to implement and report back with (hopefully improved) pics!
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
Quote:
Thanks everyone, I will try the suggestions that I am able to implement and report back with (hopefully improved) pics! Idle note: If your phone has the camera on the end like mine, you can use a stack of books in lieu of a tripod - just dangle the phone off the end. |
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Moderator
United States
188904 Posts |
Quote:
If your phone has the camera on the end like mine, you can use a stack of books in lieu of a tripod - just dangle the phone off the end. For the record, I use the box that my Droid Razr Maxx came it. It works pretty good. |
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Moderator
United States
16679 Posts |
This was taken with my 8 year old Olympus 500UZ (6 megapixel, 10X optical zoom) which I still use today on a black cotton glove, camera hand held in my photography studio (my bathroom) under fluorescent lighting. I am starting to use Ssuper's suggestion with even better results. [URL="http://s246.photobucket.com/user/stonecypher_photos/media/P6220002_zps528889d7.jpg.html]  [/URL] swcoin.ecrater.com
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Valued Member
United Arab Emirates
283 Posts |
A very general question, which I like :)
I personally use my iPhone 5's camera.
It shoots very clear macro when under good light conditions, sunlight is preferred.
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Replies: 15 / Views: 2,410 |
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Posted 07/08/2013 11:23 am
