Hi everyone, I'm starting my own website for sales, so I was really trying to improve the level of photos. Im trying to use Photoshop to get the obverse and reverse into one picture. A problem I am having however is that whem Im taking my photos,Im taking it with a coin flat on white paper and my phone directly above it, and it always creates a shadow as shown in the pic. If anyone could offer advice as to how to eliminate it, it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Use the elliptical tool to crop the coin, copy it, and then paste to a background of your choosing. Easy peasy.
@BooksB4Coins- the problem is with silver, the magic selection tool isnt to great with filtering silver and shadow. So sometimes it gets a bit of the rim off. Thanks
I used Photoshop for this very purpose for years. Use the elliptical marquee tool as suggested. It may take a little practice to get the positioning correct, but will do what you appear to be asking about. That said, if doing this for sale purposes, you may also want to invest some of your time into improving your imaging method. Using additional lights would likely make for a fine first step. Kudos for making an effort to present your wares in a professional manner, but there's more to it than just photoshop.
Not sure on your phone, but on mine the flash is about 1/2 inch below the center of the lens. That doesn't matter for much, but the close up for a coin, it does matter. Usually a small led light from the opposite side will replace the needed light a little. I have relatives that get prescriptions by mail order in a hard styrofoam box. I trimmed the height to close to the focus distance for the lens, and the white reflective walls tend to even out the direction.When I use it for gemstones, I have another with a slit in a wall and put the lid on top for the stone and holder. Ask around or buy a foam beer box at a 99 cent store. Jim
For raw coins I put the coin on what I call a "transfer disk". I place the coin on the disk, then transfer it to the stage where I will take the picture. The disk makes it much more convenient for moving the coin around on the stage to get proper framing. One side of the disk is a true grey surface that is useful for white balancing. Other side is photographic black velvet light absorber material that the coin sits on. With proper exposure settings, the background goes "nearly" black. It often will show up as 2,2,2 or even 4,4,4 depending on lighting and settings. This is easily pushed to black by changing the black level to darken it a bit, or alternatively increasing contrast a bit. This method eliminates the need to do circle crops. It also more faithfully preserves the look of the visible edges of the coin, so they don't end up looking jagged due to cropping. I make these disks myself...PM me if interested.
Thanks for posting the visual. It just dawned upon me that as opposed to misinterpreting, he may not have known about said tool.
With the elliptical eclipse tool, I cant get it to fit exactly over the coin, some background areas are selected toom Any recommendations on how to fix this? Thanks
As said earlier, it may take a little practice getting the starting position correct, but it will work. First crop very close to the edges of the coin leaving what is very close to a square photo, and then start in the upper corner.
The major problem is because you photographed the coin at an angle the coin is out of round. Try to take the photo of the coin perpendicular to the lens.
MY method, I use what I call the coaster method. 1-Take image with the phone I dislike but takes good pictures. 2-Download it. 3- Open Photoscape 4-Straighten if necessary 5-Crop 6-Re-crop for round image
Here's a melting pot rescue Peace $ taken on the black velvet background. I moved the coin off-center so you can see what my normal black background would have looked like (see upper left corner of image).
Another method that hasn't been mentioned yet is setting the coin on top of the lid of a cent tube (in the case of a $5 Liberty) and taking the picture. Some light will go under the coins, so the shadow won't be as strong, and will have a larger spread. It'll also be out of focus, giving you a pretty clean looking, although grey, background. A half dollar tube came in handy for me at CSNS when shooting a $20 Liberty that had holes drilled through the stars with rubies set in them, so that I could get a little light to come through the stones. Lots of stuff to try here. Something will give you the results and workflow you want.
@messydesk, I like using a Staedler Mars eraser cut with a knife into a right sized chunk. Soft and easy to use.
