Creative Photography

@TypeCoin971793 's pile on thread got me to thinking. Some of us are really good with photography. Me, I am really pretty bad. But that doesnt mean I dont like a good photo. It occurs to me that some people may have really interesting methods of photography, and ways of presenting coins in a manner that is not just a simple 'obverse and reverse' presentation. So....show us your skills! Let's see what you can come up with. I just took these very simply, based on relief:

 

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Nice pics and idea for a thread! There are some great photographers here.
I like combo pics:
one of my favorite coins and a Roman plumb bob


four anchor, up coins


three cast bronze pieces, two pieces of plates (broken on all sides) and a piece of a cast bowl


some markes bronze pieces next to drawings of similar pieces an Garrucci

 

Some coins lend themselves better to photos beyond drivers license level. My main venture into 'art' has been limited to angles





and stereo.


The problem with stereo is my eyes are used to antique stereocard format with parallel images while many people prefer cross eye format where the right and left images are swapped. I tried making some triple images to allow people to use whichever outside image worked for them using the method they prefer. Whichever works for you, there will be another image pair floating there with the depths reversed that looks just plain wrong. This confused more people than it interested so I soon stopped playing in that technique. I will mention that I can not imaging anyone seeing these in 3D on a phone so don't ask how to do that. Stereo was once a popular thing in photography but never was able to overcome the problems of competing formats. I have never tried to convert one of my images into something viewable on 3DTV of the modern era.




Close ups can be fun even in 2D and you can play 'Whatsits'. The above is a centration dimple of pit from a Provincial showing what happens if the tool turned in the rotating coin rather than gripping tightly. That is a game for another post.

 

Top-down doesn't always capture all of the detail in a coin. I much prefer the side view of my Aegina stater as it shows the relief (despite a slightly soft strike on the shell):

 

All are great but the stereo shots are amazing! I was able to see the 3D effect immediately utilizing the stereo viewing skills I acquired from the time of the MAGIC EYE books of the previous century. I received several of the books from that series for Christmas in the nineties.

​

 

I always enjoy those, Doug. Thanks for posting them.

The triple shots are interesting. I'm right-eye dominant and cross my left eye to get the 3D effect. If I lock in the focus when the 3 shots become 4, the second image (or image set) from the right is the one with the correct dimensional effect. The third image from the right is wrong. For instance, in the last set showing the centration dimple, when crossing my eyes enough to get four separate images, the second image from the right shows the dimple as incuse and the third image from the right has the dimple in relief.

If I were able to cross my right eye instead, I wonder if this order would be reversed? In other words, would it be the third image from the right which is correctly seen as an incuse dimple? I don't have enough eye control to test that.

Again for the series of three images, if I continue to cross my left eye until I see five complete images and then lock my focus on the center image, it is 2D! The 3D effect is gone. Figuring out why is too much for my brain right now but I'd guess that it is because the two overlapping images are identical.

 

@dougsmit , I've very rarely been able to see a stereo image - I can count on one hand the times it's "clicked" for my eyes - but it just worked with your Nero! What a stunning effect!

 

Love that shot @AncientJoe. Too bad our modern coins don't have such great relief.

 

The artifacts on top of the line drawings is very clever.

 

I love that turtle and those images, @AncientJoe! It inspired me to take similar shots of my Aegina. It isn't quite as dramatic but it still very impressive relief .



Regular view:

This weekend I have some coins to photograph and I'll try some nonstandard shots to see what happens .

Here's one from a while back that turned out nice without the aid of Photoshop. I wanted to show the stamped initials on the edge of this Robert Ready electrotype. I put the coin on a piece of picture frame glass with black paper under the glass and shot from a low angle. I think the composition turned out very well with the natural reflections from the glass.

 

No, the difference would be that if you caused your eyes to not converge at all but just look straight forward so the right eye saw the right image and the left saw the left, the correct image would be the third from the right rather than the second. This is how I see the set. My eyes are trained to 'wall' rather than cross from my years as a collector of antique stereo views. In their day, people bought these cards rather than postcards and enjoyed 3D versions of places they had been. When photography was new, lack of 3D was seen as a bigger problem than lack of color. Most people who had cards also had viewer scopes that allowed easy viewing but collectors like me learn to freeview cards to avoid buying poorly made cards with two matching photos and no 3D effect. An appropriate 'date night' event would be to sit together and look at the viewcard collection. There are wonderful scenes available today showing the world as tourists saw it 1850-1950 when people started watching TV.
Egypt in the 1850's


The Barnum museum after the fire with icicles fire NYC

 

I totally just did that same magic eye approach from back then and I too got them to pop off the page! That's fantastic @dougsmit !!!

 

You will need red/bluegreen 3D glasses to view these photos.

 

That lit piece of the Dronino meteorite makes for a rockin mirror.

Erin

 

I happen to have one of the scopes that Doug describes. Never knew I could get a DATE with this thing....

 

Yours is relatively late (early 1900's?). This group has viewers from c.1860. I suspect this shows parents and three daughters.