I've been relying on the flash on my camera to get the detail of most of the coins I photograph. But the other day I was shown that it's not always necessary. Here is a picture of the coin (lying flat on velvet, camera above, macro lens) Edited: Rules prohibit self promotion URLs in body of text. such must be in signature: Read rules. I almost never ever try working out of program mode. But these were taken in Manual mode with a high F-stop and long exposure. Also 2 L-shaped foam board pieces were placed around the coin. Kind of a makeshift light-box if you will. The coin has some blue from on the edge it's because I was lazy and didn't fully close the shade by the window. F-Stops and depth of field are still pretty foreign to me. So it's always refreshing to get help from a more experienced photographer, and then take that advice and see the difference in my own photographs. It worked really well for any silver proof, or clad proof. That same set-up didn't really work to bring out the details in Morgan / Peace and copper coins. So I may unfortunately use the flash for those ones until I can figure out the lighting problems. Taken with Flash... Just wanted to poke in and say this little bit. I am still very much in awe of some of the pictures people post here, like that "post your indians" post. Jeebus some of those photos are ridiculous. I still can't photograph copper cents in that definition yet. But please let me know what you think. Oh yes and Happy New Year!!! ~ CWS
In the case of the indian head cent I like the one without the flash better. Usually you do better adding extra lighting and not using the flash
Not sure if you meant the indians, but both were taken with a flash. The ASE is the only coin in the post that didn't have a flash.
I don't know how you do it but every time I use the flash the picture is washed out...... Sent from my KFJWI using Tapatalk HD
Green18, I also saw that at first. But with patience and the ability to modify my camera settings I was (and you as well be) able to tweak the shutter speed & F-stop to a place where the coin isn't being washed out completely. That's what I did. but it wasn't fun at first because the coin kept being washed out. Trial and effort.
Here is my setup. 2 old gooseneck lamps with CFL bulbs, Canon SX20IS with adapter ring and 1x, 2x and 4x macro lenses and a tripod. Here is a large cent Here is a kook Here is a panda The Canon is basically a point-and-shoot. Before I got the adapter ring, taking coin pictures was super frustrating and unsuccessful. I set 2 seconds on the camera timer, press the button and get out of the way. I am satisfied with these pictures, however, others in this forum take really awesome shots.
With all due respect, it was unnecessary; you could almost certainly achieve better results by dropping the flash and simply using lights. Also, the black/blue background does not help your presentation and draws attention away from the coin. What you're using are diopters which can be a worthwhile option, especially for those on a budget: an expensive camera and/or lenses are not necessary to produce acceptable coin images. While I would suggest changing the background (for the same reason mentioned above), your results are quite nice.
Anyone know how to get good photos with a smart phone? I have a Samsung Galaxy phone with 8 megapixels and it has a macro lense setting, but struggle to get great pictures. Any tips? By the way, nice job of plugging your site in a subtle manner OP. Real nice.
If you're not planning on editing, any neutral background color (black, gray, white) should suffice, but with certain coins, one may be better than the other. It is not that the red textile is that bad, but at least to my eyes, it draws attention away from the coin.
A few members have lauded an inexpensive attachment used on iPhones, but I do not know if such a thing would work on yours, or if something similar is made for the Galaxy. Any chance you have an old SLR normal lens? You should have seen it before the edit.
I did try using a lot of lighting and the flash method seemed to work best for the copper coins. And I made a lot of attempts before using the flash. The blue/black background was a favorite for me. But was recently traded out for black felt. Colored backgrounds aren't just distracting they can also distort the color of your coin. Both were things I wasn't really aware of when I first started photographing our coins. shameless self-promotion what?
We use a plastic milk carton with the bottom cut out. This creates your light box.Cut just enough off of the pour spot so your view is unobstructed. Flood light at 75 degrees and another on the opposite side at just above horizontal. Coin is placed flat in center with black or green background. Keep the background black for nice contrast on gold and silver proofs. The green background is for use with any coin if you want to eliminate the background with a background burner or alpha adjust in aperture on a Mac. We use a Canon T2i with Macro. Results are flawless. Rich
