Homemade camera stand

Those are good, have you tried any of the manual focusing camera apps?

Are you actually focusing from the distance shown in the first post and digitally zooming in?

What is the closest distance that LG will focus at zero zoom?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Haven't tried any apps yet. Just getting the basics down for now, keeping the phone steady and playing with the lights.

No digital zoom, I raise the phone up and down untilled centered. I just tap at the center, and it seems to focus.

As far as "zero zoom" goes, I guess I'm not sure?

 

I believe on that camera you can pinch in or out to zoom while the camera has the screen. I don't recall if they come with volume being able to mechanically toggle the digital zoom although you can reassign to do that.

I am curious as to the working distance and suggest you may get even better results by making sure your zoom is pinched or slid to zero and work as close to the coin as you can.

I am pretty sure if your snapping pix from the general height of where the rig is shown in the first post, you just about have to be "zoomed in" as I know any better LG will macro/close up focus much closer.

The images appear you are in macro mode and check to make sure. It's been a while since I putzed with an LG and seems like they had some interesting camera features. The last one I rooted and such was a 4.

Less or no optical/digital zoom may prove to be best.

Does it run Android 5, 6 or 7?

When you get a good comfortable handle on it, search the playstore for "manual focus" and complicate your life more if you like.

Pretty soon focus stacking macro for android will be a reality where your cellphone will spit out digital stereoscopic type of quality pictures with virtually no effort. It is in the works.

 

Don't touch the zoom. It's digital, not optical, and what happens when you're using it is, the camera's software inserts pixels where it "thinks" they ought to be based on what's already there. Or, even worse, it just effectively increases the size of the pixels so a smaller area of the coin covers a larger area of the fullsize picture. Either of those options, by definition, decreases the quality of the resulting image, most normally enough to completely ruin it. Your camera can only return its' best results using no zoom whatsoever; the onus is on you to determine the closest distance at which it will achieve sharp focus.

It appears, in this case, that you can achieve pretty sharp focus at a distance close enough so that the coin more than fills the sensor. This is a good thing, because it allows you to increase the distance between camera and coin, which helps with lighting.

The first minor modification I'd suggest for technique is endeavoring to get the entire coin into the image every time, rather than losing detail off the 1080px edge of the sensor. Your images are good enough to contemplate grading, and viewers will want to see the whole coin. In addition, crop away extraneous detail; just the coin, please.

As regards color, what you're showing here seems pretty close on hue - if a little desaturated - to the actual color of a Dansco 7070. If your background color is accurate, the coin's color will be accurate. Makes me want to ask if you see that "golden" hue under the exact_same_lighting used with the camera shots, because I think the camera is close to getting it right. Here's your coin with the saturation increased in postprocessing somewhat to what I remember as close to the actual color of a Dansco album:



I didn't need to play with any individual color channels, just all of them at once, which tells me the camera is getting the basic color correct even if it's desaturating it somewhat. It added a little color to the coin as well, but I don't necessarily know if that's accurate. Coins really ought to be shot on a monochromatic background, because color of any sort in the background tends to play hell with the camera's ability to color-correct since that color is being reflected back into the lens and therefore onto the sensor.

A typical incandescent bulb, with a color temperature around 2800-3000k, is going to impart a yellowish cast to anything it illuminates. We generally learn to somewhat tune that out subconsciously, but if you switch the bulb in your table lamp from Soft White to a Daylight (5000-5500k) design, you'll see a very different set of coloration around you. If your in-hand viewing is via incandescent, and you're using some other color temperature for photographic lighting, it may be that this is the first time you're actually seeing the true color of the coin.

That's more theory than explanation; I could be wrong.

For the moment, while you're refining your technique, steer away from really lustrous coins. They present a whole different category of lighting problems, and will only increase your stress level and slow your learning curve.

If you need magnification greater than what your camera can offer, better to explore add-on lenses rather than degrade image quality with digital zoom. I've heard good words about the Olloclip line, and there are other inexpensive possibilities.

But if you can do this well with a Half, I'd have to say you've got a pretty decent camera there. And keep in mind for down the road - the slabbed retail value of the coin you're presenting here will come very close to putting you into a system capable of images as professional as any you'll ever see posted here....

 

If he is taking those pictures from the height shown in the first post, it is digitally zoomed quite a bit. If that is the case, he needs to adjust it to no zoom and the pictures would get even better.

 

Sorry for the confusion. The original pics show the height of the stand at no particular distance. When I get photo of a single coin, it's much closer. I lower the arm until the image fits the screen. Or I raise to get a broader view.


Thanks all for the input and suggestions, there's a few things I'll try out.

 

Have you tried your LG's flash for coin pictures? Several of the LG's have a very good flash and may surprise you. One of the earlier versions has an interesting dual tone flash that can be amazingly useful for certain situations once you take full control of it.

Which LG is it and running which android version?

I am asking to determine if yours has laser focus and regardless, some versions of android will allow your camera to natively function in ways others will not. For example, yours may be able to produce RAW image files and put your mind even that much further from ever considering investing in high end and special purpose 35 DLSR equipment, when you see the difference between them and jpgs.

The focus lock capability is interesting although would be likely more useful if you were using a microscope stand having very fine adjustment. This will lock focus wherever you wish, closest and infinity typically most useful, and then you simply position the camera wherever you wish.

Take a peek at one of the most recent stereo zoom posts, consider that scope head comes out of that base with 2 clips and a phone will lay across the opening. Focus locked and you can do stepped focusing for stacked layers. All manners of superb lighting options available and often very affordably.

An expensive copy stand with servo or micrometric adjustment rail taking up space and its usefulness outside photography quite limited?

I don't need one. If I did for some un-fathomed reason, I'd use the FADAL 4020 nearby that will step off increments to 4 tiny decimal places with repeatable reliability.

 

If the background is white. The color temperature seems to be on the yellow side of the spectrum <>3500K you need a color temp that is neutral @ 5000-5500 between Red and Blue. The focus looks sharp. Overexposed photos limit the detail of the coin. Macro photography requires a lot of experimentation to get it right. I ended up purchasing 5000K CFL lights, a refurbished Canon T2i, Macro Lens and I mount the camera on a CamStand. I use manual settings and save in RAW format so I can correct minor setting errors with an app such as Photoshop.

Your photo was altered digitally using a free app called Irfranview. I think all you need to do is make some minor adjustments on lighting and exposure and your photo will be much better than the altered one below. The exposure now shows more detail but the color is a little pinkish.

 

Your image now doesn't reflect what should be the appropriate color of the background, a Dansco album which is more parchment/beige than white. That, in turn, alters the color of the coin to something less accurate.

Color temperature of the lighting is immaterial in the presence of decent color correction in the camera or in post. His phone already has a good handle on that, since it only lacked a bit of saturation to show an accurately-colored background.

 

And for no particular reason at all other than almost every touchscreen smartphone, shy of the mini versions, lay across this like it was made for it. Add a harbor freight dial indicator and it's on.

Shown at it's lowest position and superior for this camera mounted to a tripod since the fools put the battery/SD card so that you have to remove it from the dovetail hinckey to access either. Not a big deal since it will get data to a pc a couple easy ways.