Any Tips for Taking Better Photos of Coins?

Discussion in 'Coin Chat' started by *coins, Apr 12, 2018.

  1. MontCollector

    MontCollector Well-Known Member

    Photoshop seems to be popular for its ease of use. I personally use Gimp and Photoscape. Both are free to DL and use.
     
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  3. *coins

    *coins Well-Known Member

    Would Paint or Windows 10 Photos work? That's all I have right now. Is photshop free? I have never used it.
     
  4. Dave M

    Dave M Francophiliac

    I've never heard Photoshop and "ease of use" in the same sentence :) No, it isn't free, but it is very good and way overkill if all you need to do is process coin images.
     
  5. rmpsrpms

    rmpsrpms Lincoln Maniac

    I mostly use the Digital Photo Professional software that comes free with Canon cameras. I also use paint.net for doing overlays, an old copy (Win95) of PaintShopPro for adding notations, and ezgif.com for doing animated gifs.
     
  6. MontCollector

    MontCollector Well-Known Member

    I used to use this as well. I didn't like the cropping tool and this is why I switched to Photoscape.
     
  7. -jeffB

    -jeffB Greshams LEO Supporter

    I started using DPP when I moved to a camera not supported by my old version of Photoshop. I don't like its tools nearly as well as Photoshop's, but I've been making do. I've done a bit with Gimp, but not when it comes to RAW file import. Lately I've just been using OS X Preview, and I'm afraid it shows. :(
     
  8. rmpsrpms

    rmpsrpms Lincoln Maniac

    I really like DPP's cropping tool. What didn't you like about it?
     
  9. MontCollector

    MontCollector Well-Known Member

    The simple fact that it only allows for one color background when cropping. I should say "Didn't like " were the wrong words. More like it didn't do what I needed it to do.

    I find some coins stand out better when you can change the background color to white or grey instead of black. Photoscape allows for this and I never found a way in DPP to do it.

    Photoscape also has a combining tool that is really useful as well. It is very easy to go from cropping to combining with it.

    I use Gimp for the auto white balance feature when I don't do a manual adjustment on my Canon. It is easy to use and works well. Just do this step FIRST if needed. Photoscape also has this feature, but it isn't as easy to use. I also use Gimp for scaling my images down before I upload em.

    I do like Canon's Zoom Browzer Extreme program and use this for viewing and adding text to my photos.

    I still haven't found a good program to put arrows on a photo to point things out though. I currently use Paint for this and not really happy with it.
     
  10. dwhiz

    dwhiz Collector Supporter

    I must admit I've gotten lazy with my imaging.
    I purchased a new Samsung Galaxy smartphone, I don't like it now that I've had it for awhile, but it does take decent pictures.
    What I do is lean the coin against my coffee cup coaster, then I use Photoscape to crop.
    This is one I did real quick as a sample, I can do better with the phone. DC 1.jpg DC 2.jpg
     
  11. rmpsrpms

    rmpsrpms Lincoln Maniac

    Ahh, true. I end up making any color changes using PaintShopPro.
     
  12. bsowa1029

    bsowa1029 Franklin Half Addict

    CA = chromatic abberdtion?
     
  13. Beefer518

    Beefer518 Well-Known Member

    Yes, chromatic abberation, which is a phenomenon that occurs with some/many lenses where there is a purple or green (typically those colors) color fringing. It's caused by a refraction of the light wavelengths, especially in out of focus areas.
     
  14. Pickin and Grinin

    Pickin and Grinin Well-Known Member

    I only get the purple and blues when I have my IS set to high. Shooting under a 400 ISO in most cases will correct that.
    Shooting over 400 will also remove a lot of details on the coin.
     
  15. -jeffB

    -jeffB Greshams LEO Supporter

    Huh. I thought the Canon 100mm had a particularly good reputation for low CA.

    As I think about it, though -- I'm using a 1.6-crop sensor, so I'm leaving out a lot of the periphery of the image circle from the lens. And I do tend to put my subject close to the center, and crop away the periphery (I'm more about documentation, not art.)

    I thought my days of photographing brightly-lit rulers and zooming in on image corners were past, but maybe I should do another check... :rolleyes:
     
  16. *coins

    *coins Well-Known Member

    Ok, I got PhotoScape and tried some things out...
    Here are the before and after pics. I think they look pretty good if I do say so myself. DSC_5049.JPG DSC_5052-cutout.png
     
  17. *coins

    *coins Well-Known Member

    Any tips to make the background look more normal? It just doesn't look right.
     
  18. V. Kurt Bellman

    V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

    Well, I've now located both my Canon FD and my Nikon F adapters for my Sony. The Leica M is still "hiding". Time to play. Now to find a way to keep "Wacky Cat" from stealing the coin while I'm trying to photograph it. He literally jumps up and removes them.
     
  19. BooksB4Coins

    BooksB4Coins Newbieus Sempiterna

    Any chance those you have actually hit proper infinity?
     
  20. V. Kurt Bellman

    V. Kurt Bellman Yes, I'm blunt! Get over your "feeeeelings".

    Both do, because the Sony body is way thinner than either the Canon or Nikon bodies. No mirror to be flippy-flapping.
     
  21. *coins

    *coins Well-Known Member

    Here's another one I just did. DSC_4841-cutout.png
     
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