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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;RonSanderson, post: 2757550, member: 77413&quot;]<font size="6"><b>Animation and Coin Photography</b></font></p><p><br /></p><p>I have received some questions about the animated images I have been posting.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]632919[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>An animated photo uses the same approach as a cartoon or flip book. Take two similar still images and just flip between them. It takes a lot of words to describe, but creating one is&nbsp; easy.</p><p><br /></p><p>I have some more examples, such as</p><p><br /></p><p>·&nbsp; this <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-lincolns.192928/page-238#post-2743179" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-lincolns.192928/page-238#post-2743179">Lincoln cent</a>,</p><p><br /></p><p>·&nbsp; a <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-nickels.200787/page-62#post-2739930" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-nickels.200787/page-62#post-2739930">Buffalo nickel</a>,</p><p><br /></p><p>·&nbsp; a <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/lets-see-your-newest-acquisitions.158772/page-1024#post-2715848" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/lets-see-your-newest-acquisitions.158772/page-1024#post-2715848">Standing Liberty quarter</a>, and</p><p><br /></p><p>·&nbsp; a <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-morgan-dollars.118394/page-130#post-2702616" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-morgan-dollars.118394/page-130#post-2702616">Morgan dollar</a></p><p><br /></p><p>I make these animations for several reasons.</p><p><br /></p><ul> <li>Luster is very difficult to portray in a static image. Most coin photos have to be underexposed to keep the highlights from being too bright. This also suppresses the luster – it becomes a gray area on silver coins. One image cannot show that the luster moves around. With just a couple of images you can show the light at two different angles. Alternating between two images can simulate tilting the coin in your hand, giving the viewer a much better feel for the coin.<br /> <br /> </li> <li>More subtly, a slightly animated image, even just two frames, works with the brain to fill in the gaps that you can&#039;t see in a still. You get the information about two positions. The brain turns it into something much more – a 3-D map of the surface.</li> </ul><p> <ul> <li>Two or three images can reveal surface conditions that one light angle may not. Often a single image is chosen to portray the coin based on its attractiveness. With two or more you can still have that glamorous portrayal. Taken as a whole, the entire set of photos will be more clinical in showing the entire coin from different angles to the camera and to the lights. (If you follow the link to the Morgan above, you can see that one angle hides the chatter in the fields, while the other reveals it. Don&#039;t forget to click or tap on the image to expand it.)<br /> <br /> </li> <li>If you shoot photos through slabs, any marks on the slab will show in two different positions on each photo. When animated, they seem to float above the coin and are clearly from the slab, not from the coin.</li> </ul><p>Ideally, I would like to make the static image obsolete. Animations are easy to make, and the animations are internet-friendly. Their detail would be a boon to internet buyers; the ability to show luster would be great for sellers. Any artifact that is hidden at one angle will be visible from another, so simple animations could end suspicion about “juiced”, suspiciously lit, or intentionally misleading photos.</p><p><br /></p><p>Many effects can be achieved with animations. Some of them can be seen on this site. Of course, the more spectacular the effect, such as rotating the lighting all the way around a coin, the more photos need to be taken and more labor expended.</p><p><br /></p><p>My goal is limited to revealing the luster that a static photo does not.</p><p><br /></p><p>My process is pretty simple - incredibly so. Anyone can do it.</p><p><br /></p><p>I got to the point where I found lighting that works and a camera setup that takes adequate images for the web. I take two shots of the obverse and two of the reverse. I rest the coin on a black foam insert to reduce reflections from its surroundings. The first photo is taken with the insert tilted up on one side on a piece of cardboard to get a good lighting angle. Then I slide a second piece of cardboard under that edge to increase the angle and take the second picture. I do the same for the back.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here is the setup for the first angle. For the second photo I slide in the second piece of cardboard. You could also change the angle from side to side to capture the luster. My setup has the lights at the 10:00 and 2:00 positions adjacent to the camera lens, so tipping it further up at the bottom will tip it more toward the light. I can choose to fully illuminate the fields or just move the coin around to get some diffused light around the devices. Any difference, really, between the two photos will make a good animation.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]632926[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>For the four photos I erase the background down to black, and crop each image to 800x800. You want the two obverses to be the same size and close to the same orientation, and the same for the reverses, too. I join the first front and back photos side-by-side, then the second front and back photos, to make two images like these.</p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b>First joined obverse and reverse</b></p><p>[ATTACH=full]632927[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p><b>And the second obverse and reverse joined side-by-side.</b></p><p>[ATTACH=full]632928[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>These I save as .JPEG files and .GIF files. (The .GIF files are needed because I use the world&#039;s oldest and worst piece of software, Microsoft GIF Animator, from 1996. It&#039;s only able to join together GIF files.)</p><p><br /></p><p>Many applications are available to join image files together to make an animated GIF. If you don’t have one, you can search the Web for free applications. In the application of your choice, you specify the two (or more) image files to be used in the animation. The animation is set to <i>repeat</i>, and to “<i>loop indefinitely</i>”. You should also modify the settings of each frame (each input image becomes one frame of the animation) to show for 1.0 seconds.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here the obverse and reverse have a little bit of rotation between the two images. This accentuates the illusion of movement. The top image in this article, of the 1950 Lincoln Proof, has better alignment so the coin appears more motionless - as though only the light is changing. Both are satisfying to me.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]632929[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>I hope you try it. You can see more examples over in the <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-lincolns.192928/page-221#post-2657990" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/post-your-lincolns.192928/page-221#post-2657990">Post Your Lincolns </a>thread.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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