Here's My Dilema!

Thanks tights24, The copy stand is small. I can only get like 4" away from the coin when the lens is extended. I just emailed back and asked for a gallery. I'll try one with no macro and auto focus now.

Lookin' pretty good there, Mr. Merc! Have you adjusted WB (White Balance) to match your light source? This will give you truer colors. You're not very far from getting some excellent photos. Congratulations! The only trouble with taking good coin photos is you have an even greater urge to buy more coins to photograph and share with us! LOL

I agree with Thad and Hunter. These are looking pretty good from a camera that's not a dedicated rig. The part I like best is that your camera is almost identical to mine, so hopefully you will share your final set-up with me. Teehee.

I bought an expandable tripod for mine. The legs collapse down to about 6 inches, but extend out to probably 4 feet. It is pretty heavy duty, and I think it was under $20 at Walmart. I have found on complete auto settings with no adjustments, my best pics are those in which I can get the most light. As you've found, there is a minimum distance with no macro to get focus to work. You can try something as simple as two shoe boxes on end, supporting the edges of the camera like an upside down "U", or bridge. It will be stationary, and about 12 inches away. You can put a light in front and back, and use the timer function after focus is set. Stupid little things like that.

Regardless, your pics are nice, and it makes me want to play some more with my own settings. Unfortunately, work is very busy right now and I haven't the time.

Oh, one more thing taken from Superdave and earlier posts of his, not verbatim of course:

When adjusting aperture and white balance etc, have a pen handy and write down what coin and what settings your using, or you will lose track for sure.

I want to thank everyone for all their support, tights24 I went to Walmart this morning before I read any of this to get a few things and I went over to the camera section and saw that small tripod for $16 and bought it. I'm going to a coin show here in about a half hour. So hopefully I'll be able to take some pics of some new coins and compare them, tripod shots at 8" and copy stand shots at 4" in super macro. The main reason I got the tripod is I think I will be able to acheive better lighting.

Tighe I use the same tripod you have ,, it works well for many things photographic .

and I think I have the whimpy one you talked about also ,,it works good for my Fugi Film camera but the Konica /minolta is to heavy.

Fully colapsed but I set the coins on a stand to make them about 4 inches from the lens (for larger coins then I try to get about 6 inches from the coin) ,, The Camera is a Konica /Minolta Dimage Z2 settings portrait/ super macro/ auto focus.

I do a few coin pictures and also Rocks which is another of my Hobbies ,,but I do alot of nature/still life photography mostly with the Olympus OM2n ,,but some with the digital .

Larger pics

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Here's a pic of a 1922 AU silver dollar that I took using the one touch white balance on my camera. It's actually fairly close to the color as the obverse of the coin has some slight golden toning. Still need more work on my lighting.

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