Discovery - Ancients and Photography

I want to get better at taking pictures of my coins and I invite any suggestions, criticisms, or whatever that may be useful or related.

I took a bunch of pictures yesterday - most were of my tokens - but I did photo the ancient's I've never posted to CoinTalk. The equipment I'm working with right now: a point & shoot w/macro and some adjustable settings I don't fully understand and a tripod. For processing I have MSPaint and Picasa (just got it) and had Paint.net but I tried to do something and had to delete it but I hardly know how to use it.

Here are my first attempts with only processing them enough to combine the obverse with reverse and to reduce the size, using MSPaint. I used a white sheet of paper as background and before the coin was placed on it, I set the white balance to the paper. I also used a two second timer and had the zoom set two 2x, whatever that means. This is what I got:
Too much white. In fact all of the first twelve I took were too white. See some more...

 

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Here are the next six:

 

These are all good clear photos. I see nothing wrong. I imagine the coins are a bit darker in hand.

I prefer the black back ground as it draws your eye to the coin, and creates the floating in space feel. I do like your raw images, and for a first attempt I would say your pictures are better than most. I often feel the white background washes out the image, unless its done digitally. Only my opinion, your images are more than acceptable.

 

With only viewing them on the tiny camera screen, nothing jumped out at me as being "off" but I could tell it wasn't quite right. I had to stop for a while but when I came back I could see view them on my computer and was disappointed. Anyway, I photoed a bunch of my tokens and was used an auto program mode and I was happier with those results, but my demands of the token images are less than my ancients. I tried the auto program with the next two:

Well the background is purple now but the coin color is much closer. So @John Anthony and @Bing graciously took my picture and edited it, making it look better, and thus encouraging me to try a little harder with editing software. Here's the first attempt that I'm happy enough with to share - trust me, I spent way too long last night getting nothing I liked. I blame the burboun, and @green18

 

@Ancientnoob I like black too, and in hand shots. I don't like the shadows around the coins. I'm using white right now because I don't have a way to yet control light. I also thought it would be a way to make photo editing easier. Lessons learned.

I'm going to play around with the photo editor a little more tonight and see if there are any lamps at the store also.

 

The first set is all really good in terms of white balance. The only issue is that on certain automatic settings, especially using macro, the aperture is too wide, or the exposure is too long, and there's actually too much light allowed into the lens. Do you have the ability to control aperture and shutter speed? If not, you can always darken some of the images in the post processing. Here's one for example. I decreased the luminosity, then tweaked the brightness down and contrast up, no change in color...

 

I actually think I can control both. I'll have to Google what they mean...and an instruction manual for the camera because I've never seen it. My wife bought it after I left for Korea so sometime early 2013. It's a fine point & shoot and easy enough for her to use to send pictures with it. Loved getting pictures in my email when I was gone.

 

Oh, the first 12 coins were my first ancient coins I ever bought - back in Jan 13 from a forum member. They sat in my collection, being marveled until I finally attributed them all this year. Had lots of fun doing it too.

 

A problem with white backgrounds is that they can add flare to the image making the result lower in contrast in ways that are harder to correct. I have worked with wite a bit but really prefer black. One answer is to shoot on a lighter gray and clear out the background to white. shooting with a coin raised off the background always makes it easier to clear the background. You then can make it any color.
http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/coinphoto2011ez3.html


I still prefer coins shot on black.

 

great topic

 

Appropriate emoticon!

Found some lamps at the store and they were 25% off. Reading Doug's article has given me a way forward (I've read it before...but wasn't ready) and I'm going to try take some new shots tomorrow.

 

BTW, that is a very nice set of coins - I would happily have them in my collection. When I saw the FH, I did a double-take, because it looked awfully damn familiar. I also have an FH from Heraclea, from the same officina no less, that looks incredibly similar...

Yours...



Mine...



They are not die-matched, but the style of the reverses is unusually realistic and artistic. I wonder if we have two coins engraved by the same hand.

 

How about that! I plan on working on these a little more, attempting to get photos that make me happy with minimal amount of post processing...but it looks like I'm going to be changing shocks on my truck...

Fascinating to think about the engraver. These two do look very similar.

 

I purchased some supplies earlier this week: a clip on lamp, bulb (incandescent daylight 60w), black poster board, and rubber bands. Today I had a chance to take some photos but I don't have time before work to crop them all. This one is my favorite today. The only processing I did was combine the obverse and reverse, crop, and resize. Think the reverse may be slightly out of focus...I forgot to set the timer. But I love the colors and the back ground. I appreciate any feedback.



Original

 

I like it but suggest you play around with the light angle raising, lowering, bouncing off a white card or the ceiling and compare all of your experiments so you see what action had what result. In the end, the best one may be the first one but you will learn something and make mistakes on this test that you might not want to make later when you are in a hurry to take a great photo of a new coin. At the rate you are improving so far, we will be really looking forward to your future posts.

Bad news: You may find yourself buying a new coin, perhaps silver, just so you can learn how to photograph it. After a while you may avoid buying a certain coin because you know how much trouble you have shooting that type. Coin photography is another hobby just like coin cleaning and history studies. You can get carried away if you don't watch out.

 

Getting the right picture is a devil sometimes. You want the coin to appear as 'in hand' but the results sometimes/oftentimes vary. I like shooting with a black background, backing off on the exposure a bit and then adding some light and contrast in the post editing process. Bright copper and proof coins sometimes befuddle me......the lighting has to be just right so you're gonna be shifting around the light source(s) a lot to get just the right shot. Old coppers and silvers I find much easier to photograph, and I suspect that you ancient fellows have much the same experience as me, with your coins lacking in luster and such.

Shoot tons of pictures JWT, till you get what you deem acceptable. After all, it is the digital age, not like in the old Kodacolour days. You can always delete and start over.

 

Thanks for the feedback! @dougsmit your articles and suggestions have helped quite a bit. I'll try what you suggested about messing around with the light. I also want to order a couple of those bulbs you mentioned. I also used

@green18 You're right, I need to take tons more. I've only barley attempted my tokens and many were still in their cardboard holders (no new flips yet so there they stay for now). Haven't tried anything I have in slabs or proofs.

My setup is very...improvised...right now. I'm starting to like the photography. I probably won't have a chance to play around with my setup until tomorrow afternoon.

 

So I'm messing with photography today. I took some shots and was fairly pleased with this one until I uploaded it to my albums because then I noticed the backgrounds aren't the same. Observe:



You can see the faintest line down the middle! Argh

 

It should be a pretty easy fix if you can find the colour-replacement tool on your picture editor...

 

Well thanks zumbly. What do you think of the reverse image? I'm not sure, but I think it may be slightly out of focus...

I also think the color is a little off. It should be a little greener.