Taking decent pictures with USB Microscope

Here's the full shots

 

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That looks better than the few I was able to take, my guess is lighting and background? I'm just using the free software you can download from their site. Of course to get a full size picture I have to lift the scope up higher than the arm it came with allows, but that's no problem really.

One thing I'd like to achieve is to capture any luster the coin may have and for the picture not to look flat. The dime I was taking pictures of looked almost fake.

 

When still shooting coins I generally used a gray card (18%). If this is preferable to other options I do not know and is likely something debatable, but it worked well for me. However, my goal wasn't producing glamor shots, but only to provide easily repeatable yet respectable in-hand representations.

If you look at Doug's setup photo above, you'll see he uses and/or used an entirely different approach to achieve what will appear to be a black background.

 

You're highly, highly unlikely to ever be able to get anything beyond barely passable whole-coin images from such a scope. While an okay option/alternative on a budget or for one not needing/wanting to produce quality detailed closeups, they're just not a great tool for your stated purpose.

Perhaps this will somewhat help to explain things. The link below is to a post of mine made yesterday to another person's thread. What was said isn't important, but in it are two other links you may want to check out. However, and in particular, please read the post right below it by @desertgem. If there is any one person on this forum to heed advice from regarding such scopes, he's the one.

https://www.cointalk.com/threads/da...what-do-you-thinks.313406/page-2#post-3031556

 

Here's a dime I shot .
Here's the image of the RPM too .

 

One manufacturer (forget who) offers two models, a cheaper one and a better one. ONLY the better one is useful. The cheaper one is a piece of garbage.

 

One member here sells a higher quality USB type "scope", but I forget the name and it's also significantly more expensive that the ones most folks use or are interested in. Is this what you're referring to or...?

If folks want to use the cheapies they've every right to do so, but it's only fair to address both their shortcomings as well as the more obvious alternatives. Back in the day one could head off to Ritz to buy a new Quantaray-badged lens, often saving themselves a decent chunk of money in the process, but was it (generally speaking) really the smart move? I'm guessing someone with your experience in this area knows exactly what I'm getting at....

 

Indeed. We were the local competition in a Ritz town. So much junk slung into the market! As it pertains to USB scopes, my advice is to TOTALLY DISREGARD anything called "digital magnification" and concentrate on models with the maximum OPTICAL magnification. They will usually have a higher price tag.

 

The highest optical magnifications you are likely to find are in the range of 5x. Most USB scopes are in the 1x-3x range. Almost all of the "magnification" quoted is digital.

Now, that's not saying that 5x is inadequate. Filling the screen of an APS-C DSLR with the Date and MM of a Lincoln Cent is ~5x. The smaller sensors of the USB scopes have an even smaller field of view, or you could look at it as more "apparent magnification" or similar marketing nonsense. Going beyond 5x optical results in very narrow depth of field, requiring the lens to be stopped-down excessively to capture an image that is all in focus. Stopping-down further reduces the image quality, so 5x is about the limit to getting decent image quality with good depth of field.

 

Don't tell them who suggested, but go to walmart or lowes, home depot to the paint department and look at the paint samples. Kiltz has several sheets of gray which are close to what is needed.The nice thing about them is that they have stickynote type of adhesive on the back ( so you can stick it to walls, cabinets, whatever, and stand back and see) so they are about 8 x 10" in size. Easy to cut, and the paint is excellent!! Whites are also there if you need a lighter backgrounds.

 

You CAN use a white card to set exposure, you just have to open up about 2-1/2 stops from the reading off a white card.

Use that for snow scenes, too.

 

Well I guess I'm a liar, I DO have the Canon EOS Rebel XS. Not sure why I thought it was the next model up, I've had it for quite a while now. Anyway, it's been a good camera for me and was about all I could pony up at the time.

So anyway, back to the scope topic. I'm not planning to use it for good pictures at this point. Seems like it'll be much to hard to get any good pictures from it. However, it still has some uses (some of which may come in handy after metal detecting for a day). I do think I'll use it to take "inventory" pictures. The file size will stay small, it'll be easy to setup each piece and snap the photo right to my laptop.

NOW, you guys have turned me on to the idea of using my DSLR which had already crossed my mind, but thanks to some tips and ideas you guys have posted I think it might be worth pursuing. I think I could build a "copy stand" pretty cheap, so I guess that's my first goal, then I'll play around with lighting and what not. I've always been more of an outdoor landscape and wildlife photographer so this is somewhat uncharted territory for me.

 

The Rebel XS works extremely well for coins. It was one of the first Canon cameras with Live View, plus Canon's excellent Electronic First Shutter Curtain (EFSC) functionality, which together eliminate all mirror slap and shutter shake. It also has excellent tethering software to view the coin live on-screen and control the camera with the mouse. I honestly could not work without these capabilities.

Now I will make a suggestion for you...

I'd highly suggest mounting your XS to a Vivitar bellows, with a Vivitar macro stand. You should be able to buy both for <$100 on eBay. Add a T-mount Canon EOS adapter to mount the camera, then a lens/objective on the bottom, and you have a world-class imaging machine for <$200. No need to buy a copy stand, as the bellows+macro stand fulfills that function.

edited to add:

Here is a completed auction with the functions I am talking about for bellows plus stand:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Vivitar-Be...673124?hash=item362ac340a4:g:8VcAAOSwbP1abO81

 

I'm not sure about the cost of said stand, but if money is an issue I've seen basic bellows go quite cheap on goodwill. As long as one pays close attention to the photos and uses a little common sense, I've had very good luck there with camera equipment. Just food for thought....

Your insight is always appreciated, Ray. Thank you!

 

Sorry I don't spend enough time online to keep up here. The cropped image of the fake denarius was shot with the 30D shown in the scrap wood rack photo.

Before I got the 30D, I used a 300D original Digital Rebel which produced the image below For a long time I left the old camera on my coin stand because I was too lazy to change out my better Canon. Later I felt guilty not using the best I had even though the differences would not matter for the uses I made of the images. Click to enlarge.


After that I went to my current (now ten year old) Canon 5D mkII which made the shot below using the same 100mm lens on the same stand but with different light arrangement. Click to enlarge.


The differences between these images has very little to do with the camera and everything to do with lighting and other processing factors. All of these images were reduced in size and the differences might be more obvious if making a huge print (maybe 20x30"?). A small part of the 5D mkII image is shown unreduced below the reduced composite of the two sides of the coin. Do I need to upgrade to the current model or should I learn to control this one better?

Worry less about equipment but learn to use what you have until you are sure that buying something will actually improve your photos. I make better photos some days than on others. I can not blame that on the hardware.

 

Ok guys, I finally got a few minutes to play around with pictures. Keep in mind I did the pictures and editing all in about 10 minutes, this was just a test so I could sort of get an A/B comparison. This is just a 1942 Nickel I found CRHing this weekend. Oh, and it's in a 2X2 so the pictures are taken through the mylar film.

First up is my Canon EOS Rebel XS. I took this handheld holding an LED light. The flash still fired however, probably wouldn't need to if I wasn't handheld. I didn't bother taking note of shutter speed of f-stop, but I had my 18-55 lens right about at 35mm.



Next up is my USB Scope, handheld the LED light in a similar fashion as I did with the Canon.


So clearly my Canon even handheld is producing higher quality images, no surprise there. I need to come up with a simple stand to hold my camera and maybe a clamp on desk lamp so as to make taking pictures easier and even better.

However, I'm not totally unhappy with the scope for what I want to use it for which would be inventory pictures of common coins I have such as circulated coins in my folders, etc.

Thoughts, questions, and comments are welcome as always.

 

The scope image look more true view .
What the coin really looks like .

But could be like you said, you just pointed and took the camera image .

 

I actually think the biggest issue with the Canon shots are that the flash fired off. I didn't do any color correcting or anything in the software. Also, the Canon looks a tad softer, which if I recall is sort of Canon's thing. Seems like when I was comparing Canon to Nikon, Canon's pictures were a tad softer. Nothing wrong with it per se' just something to note.

 

Umm, no.

 

How incredibly helpful and insightful, a well thought out response indeed.

That being said, it irritated me enough that I had to look up what I was thinking of. I KNEW there was something that varied between brands of DSLR having to do with the in camera processing. Turns out it was color I was thinking of, particularly when shooting RAW as I often do. So while I was wrong in what I was remembering, I knew there was something I was thinking of.