Lets start a discoution of best practices for photogrpahing toners. I know lots of people on the board like take pictures of there coins. I know it will help people liek me who have no clue how to get good pictures.
Toners are VERY difficult to fully capture with a camera. First off, your lighting must be very good. Without good lighting, you'll never get a decent picture. I find myself having to use camera angles to capture the toning. Eventually, I'm going to change my lighting setup because I feel that's 90% of it. This is how Todd at bluecc does his magic, he's a master of light. He appears to use multiple, diffused sources which he manipulates to bring out the toning. He's also using a high-end camera that's able to capture and process all the colors uncompressed.
I have to do the same as BT...change the angle of the camera in order to capture the colors of a toned coin. I try not to set the angle too drastically, as I like to he keep the coin as close to a perfect circle as possible, not oblong. Also, when too much of an angle, the details near the top of the coin aren't sharp and crisp...but that's just due to my lack of experience. Here are the most recent shots I took of a couple Lincolns. However, I just purchased an OTT lamp today, so will try to retake the pictures using it and see how they turn out, as I need to lighten the 1950. -LTB
Keep the light source as close to perpendicular to the coin as possible. You will not have to angle the camera then. Even have the lights directly positioned over the camera and coin at the same time. Careful because I use 100 watt bulbs and the camera heats up quick though. Here are some of my shots... www.pbase.com/frattlaw
Very nice work frattlaw! So you're saying try to have the light source (bulb) as close to the lens (next to) as possible? See, every time I try that, it devoids the coin of all of its color from the toning. I'm not saying it doesn't work because you have amazing results, it just doesn't seem to work for me. But I'm sure in my case it's operator error From what I've experienced, the key to extracting the color out of coins is to bounce the light off the coin's surface and directly into the lens, and the closer you are to hitting the imaginary bullseye on the center of the lens with the light, the more bright and vibrant the colors will be. But the experts do confirm your method...I just haven't been successful with it. Got a new ott light today, but haven't toyed with it...I'll try your recommended method first...as I have been using PAR30 and GE Reveal bulbs... -LTB
It's not due to your lack of experience. It's the physics of the camera. The camera can only focus on one plane...if the coin is tilted in reference to the camera's film plane (film plane=back of camera if the back is flat, or front of lens with flat glass) there will always be a portion out of focus. You could stop way down to try to regain some apparent focus, but then you lose sharpness due to slow shutter speed and diffraction from the small aperature. Even a coin in a slab, laying on the table, may not be flat enough for a sharp pic if the coin is mounted in the slab a bit tilted. If this is the case, you can use a coin to prop up the slab in the appropriate direction so that the coin is perfectly parallel to the film plane. I'm reading the book Numismatic Photography by Mark Goodman, and I highly recommend it.
