critisicm please
 

i'm starting to find taking photos of coins kinda fun. to that end, i just snapped a few shots of an 1881 $10 eagle. i'm hoping for constructive criticism, specially from TomD/other keen photographers. these are taken with a pretty simple digital camera which allows me very little control over any of the settings...turning the flash on or off is about as advanced as we get, though it does have macro mode (which these were taken with):

Attachment 64777Attachment 64778

these are downsized to fit as GiM attachments, full size (2mb apiece approx) here and here.

and a PS, if anyone knows how i might reasonably remove that black residue from the liberty head side, advice appreciated. i've had a gentle scratch at it with a fingernail to no avail. would a drop of acetone strike horror into the hearts of numismatists? i read the best advice on cleaning coins is don't, but that gunk is just ugly.

Re: critisicm please
 

Nice shot, Uranian, however, did you get TomD's permission to do a photo coin thread:questionm He is GIMxo's official photographer...:biggrin:

Re: critisicm please
 

Uranian those are great shots, better than I can produce. Are you using a macro lens?

My only critisism would be the lighting. The coins are illuminated at the tops more than the bottoms.
Have you seen Tom's light box, where filtered light illuminates the coin from every direction?

Good work you are almost there.

Re: critisicm please
 

i've at least PMed Tom to make him aware of the thread :biggrin:

thanks for the feedback foolsgold. not using a macro lens, i just took a few shots and daylight from the windows seemed to provide the nicest lighting. the flash looked pretty nasty. i've not seen a lightbox, will have a read on that, cheers for the advice.

Re: critisicm please
 

Use a black background to get the gold color to stand out better. I've seen some pics of gold coins against white or really light backgrounds where the coin doesn't even look gold!

Re: critisicm please
 

Better said than I could. Experiment with backgrounds and coin placement(s).

Fantastic START - if it was easy we could all do it! :5_1_120:

Re: critisicm please
 

ok, shall try a black background and build a lightbox. not in a rush but i'll upload those pics when i'm done with that.

cheers guys :coolbeer:

Re: critisicm please
 

Great shots!

Background seems to pull attention from subject.

Re: critisicm please
 

Agree, background...make it black felt and use early morning sunlight...the kind that makes you think of home....

Re: critisicm please
 

ok, so black background and maybe i should crop the pics a little more to focus attention entirely on the coin. all good advice.

Re: critisicm please
 

The crop is good. You don't want to take away the border. 20% should be enough. Take it away and it washes out. A white cow in a field of snow? Think 'contrast' and balance.

The golden mean = 4/5 repeatedly happens in nature. Make the coin = 4 and the border = 5.

Play with the layout. Try a 50:50, 60:40 etc. then see which one 'pleases' the eye....

edit...

also try different aperture settings and shutter speeds. Take notes....

Re: critisicm please
 

now you have me considering using the golden ratio for the height/width, lol. the camera isn't up to adjusting the aperture or speed, but thanks for the suggestion.

Re: critisicm please
 

I think you've done a great job on the coin, it is well lit and the image is sharp. As for the background, that doesn't bother me at all. You might have noticed that I'll use a black or sometimes a patterned background. Just for fun I played with your image a little and toned down the background. I honestly don't think I could have made a noticeably superior image than yours. Looking to see more.

Re: critisicm please
 

thanks tom! i like the lightbox idea, and i will give it a go with a black background to see if it brings out the colour more, but kind words from GiM's generally adjudged photo king suggests i'm doing ok so far :smile:

Re: critisicm please
 

:36_1_32v: The EXPERT (who's rather good) has spoken. I used to take badge pictures with a 35MM and frankly it's quite a job. Finally I bought a camera JIG with an adjustable slide and the camera screwed into the bottom of it.

It worked grand once I got the proper background (I used a thick dark green scrub thing that I cut out for the badge findings/pins).

It's quite an art - but now with digital it is INSTANT - the old days - it was wait and pray for the development.

Best wishes,

HS

Re: critisicm please
 

Don't clean numismatics. It will reduce the value. Photoshop the image if you must, but leave the coin as-is.

Re: critisicm please
 

cassandra, i see this comment over and over, yet it seems to be because dealers have seen coins cleaned with brasso, metal brushes, etc. from a brief read, the acetone dip for a few hours won't discolour the coin, might dissolve that gunk, and i will rinse it under cold water and pat it dry. do you really think that such a treatment is still going to devalue the coin more than the obvious black gunk?

Re: critisicm please
 

The pictures are very good IMHO. Those pictures are 10X better than the past pics I have posted on GIM. Good job.

Re: critisicm please
 

today's efforts:

Attachment 64887 Attachment 64888

tried using a lightbox but i ended up using long exposures (1 second) in relative darkness, then using photoshop to balance the colours. these look more golden in colour than yesterday's pics, i notice that natural light seems to make the coins look almost like silver, so i tried with artificial light. darker background too.