Thread: Exhibit: 1881 S Morgan Dollar - Photographed Dec 2008 - by: Yours Truly

CONTEST ENTRY,

Beautiful 1881 S Morgan Dollar in the MS 63 to 64 Range. A bit soft for an 1881 S this coin has wonderful bloom with nice mint frost on the devices. Photo taken with Canon S51S with Canon 500D macro lens.

tdec - your Morgan is beautiful, but the color seems odd to me. However, I am not a knowledgable or experienced photographer.

I would like to post just the reverse of my 1884 CC GSA dollar since you opened the door with your nice pics (my pic's lighting could have been better at the bottom of the coin ):

Originally Posted by GDJMSP

Nice pics - how accurate is the color ?

Exactly like the picture, I honestly nailed this one. I have an interesting setup here at the house. I really need to get a used copystand. I take all of my photos freehand with out any physical support.

Originally Posted by Hobo

Your pics are pretty good - MUCH, MUCH better than most we see here.

As with most things, there is always room for improvement and your lighting could be improved. I see some sort of stray light (or something) at 12:00 and 6:00. Try removing all sources of light except for one or two lights used to illuminate the coin. In other words, shoot in a dark room (with the curtains drawn and the lights out) with only a lamp or two to illuminate the coin. This is important because different types of light show up differently in your photos. If you are illuminating your coin with an incandescent light and there is a fluorescent lamp on in the room it will be harder to get true colors to show in your photo. If you learn how to set the White Balance on your camera and you control your lighting you can get photos that are very accurate as far as color.

If you don't have it already you should get Mark Goodson's book Numismatic Photography. It has many good tips on all aspects of coin photography.

I do shoot in a dark room. This coins is very very lusterous which give off a really sharp glare. I have one incandescent and one ott light that I use.

Originally Posted by mrbrklyn

very nice photo! I love the detail of the breast, which Morgans are hard to get. the fields are beautifully depicted! Not too harsh and not without the necessary detail. Is that a better than normal strike? That is a GREAT way to kick off the contest, with a wonderful Morgan! How is the color?

Thank You so Much for Sharing this wonderful picture!

Ruben

http://www.cointalk.org/showthread.p...670#post471350

Ruben , the color is quite accurate. You wouldn't think so due to the reverse having such a pl look but honestly the reverse of the coin looks near PL and the obv just isn't. The obv was struck a little weak. Which I have found that on most 1881 s's they are struck quite heavy.

I would have to say that is quite a beauty even through there are a lot of scratches on the obverse in the focal area still a nice coin and the toning has little rusty look to it.Great photograpy.
jazzcoins Joe

Originally Posted by jazzcoins

I would have to say that is quite a beauty even through there are a lot of scratches on the obverse in the focal area still a nice coin and the toning has little rusty look to it.Great photograpy.
jazzcoins Joe

I appreciate the nice comments, its hard to find a morgan dollar with out bag marks. I suspect that there isn't too many really nice ones out there that haven't been slabbed up but who knows. Not all of them can be MS66's

Originally Posted by Arizona Jack

I find silver to be very difficult to photograph, thats because I never do it.

Nice pics Tom !!

Thanks AJ.