Coin photography and white balance...added Kelvin Temp Scale for light source.

in2Coins

Nowadays, coin photography is an essential especially if you’re a dealer. You want the best representations of the coins you are selling to potential buyers. Having incorrect white balance could lessen your profit or worse, buyers simply look somewhere else even though your coins photos does not do it justice. I’ve seen and read plenty of posts that says bought this coin and it is so much better than the seller’s pictures.

In regards to setting your white balance. I’ve seen most of white balance setting done with white paper, grey card or some other tools like expodisc (something you attached to your lens and point at the light source). But hardly ever read about Kelvin setting. In my experience, I have had better success on using Kelvin white setting balance than any of the above. If your camera comes with this function, I highly recommend trying it out. With this setting, you can fine tune your white balance close to what your coins looks like. My editing really only comes down to cropping and minor sharpening because of my light source.

I’m not a dealer but do have some coins. And I also enjoy photography. Nothing beats photographing your own coins!!

thevolcanogod

The software I use autocorrects for white balance but I think it somehow makes the coin come out looking worse. I definitely agree that white balance is one of those keys for nice photos - I dislike “fiddling” with the raws as much as possible. I find that I photograph coins differently for sale than I do for my own personal records. I do more axial for personal photos where I prefer a couple strong overhead spots for sale photos - particularly no-Proof ms.

COCollector

Thanks for the tip!

Kinda new to coin photography. Especially struggling with slabs... sometimes it seems like my 13-year-old point-and-shoot Canon has a mind of its own.

PTVETTER

In the past using an 18% grey background with autocorrect gives the bast results

NGS428

Here is how I do my white balance using my Canon DSLR tethered to my PC.

1. Place a grey reference (18% grey card) on the stage
2. Perform Manual White Balance (click on the eyedropper and then click eyedropper near center of the Live View image)
3. Snap a shot of the white balance reference
4. Open the image (can be opened in the EOS Utility software) and check the RGB values in various places across the image. If any R, G or B is higher across image, adjust the WB shift and repeat process until RGB are equal as possible.

Works well for me. It will allow you to get a better balance vs an auto setting or assuming your lights are the kelvin the chart says they should be.

in2Coins

My light source preference right now is OTT. Only done with the photo is cropping and the coin look exactly like the photo.

Hemispherical

Thanks @in2Coins This is very helpful.