Two Different Photographs of the same Silver Eagle - Proof / Mint State. Which do you prefer?

Cajunpoorguy

I was playing around with some shots today and there are two different styles. I like both of them on the Proofs, but I prefer to see the luster on business strikes. What say ye?

1st Style Proof: Straight On Shot

2nd Style Proof: Angled Diffused light.

1st Style Business: Straight On Shot

2nd Style Business: Angled Diffused light.

Here are some 1000px size pictures. Out of the camera, they're 3000+px.

Here's the Proof in the slab zero touching up light and dark. Straight out of the camera with the exception of resizing down a bit.

scotty4449

Great shots! I prefer style #1, I think you get more dramatic effect with the mirror/luster.

MsMorrisine

angled diffused, but I think I'm in the minority on the proof using it.

derryb

Are you changing angle of the lighting with a strait on camera shot in both examples or are you leaving the lighting in place while changing the angle of the camera to the coin?

Add slight angle to the camera position and see if it does not provide more surface depth. I'm a firm believer that sometimes capturing the "relief' of the coin can dramatically bring a coin to life.

MsMorrisine

how about a video?

pcgscacgold

Style #1 on both for me.

TurtleCat

You might have to use the 45 degree mirror trick to get the white reflection on the proof without having the camera reflected back. Have you tried using some diffused reflector material to bounce some light? That could give you some nice fill lighting that’s pretty soft.

airplanenut

I agree with you for both types. I like both options for the proofs because while I enjoy the contrast of the first style of shot, showing the mirrors can add some life. It's similar with the uncs, except there's no contrast, so showing no lustre can make a somewhat bland shot. The two caveats there are some of the more recent years are much more matte and have little lustre to show, and if you improperly light a coin to show its lustre, you can end up with large dark areas that I'm not fond of (the combination of the size of the ASE and how its lustre manifests itself makes it a bigger problem for them than most issues, where a bit of a dark area is normally not an issue to me).

pursuitofliberty

I like the angled and diffused ... and like asked, I am curious, are you angling the coin (to the lense), setting the lights at a much lower angle, or both?

bolivarshagnasty

Straight on for both is my preference.

Mr_Spud

If I was interested in purchasing the coins and the images were what I was going by, then I’d prefer the 2nd option with the angled diffuse lighting. I say that because I know that, in images, it’s easy to make the black and white straight on shots of the proof look better than the coin looks in hand by blacking out imperfections in the black mirrors, but I think it would be hard to do that with the angled diffuse images. For the business strike the straight on photo with all that luster makes it harder to see if there are surface imperfections and also makes it harder to see if the face, hand and other devices are fully struck (note - this would be more important for a walker half dollar than for a modern eagle, but you get the point). But they are all great photos.

Cajunpoorguy

Pursuitofliberty, for the diffused shot, it's a total rearrangement of lights adding a bounce canvas at a 45 degree angle overhead, while my lights are pointing up as the bounce canvas. I then angle the camera lens about 15-20 degrees with part of the coin catching the light reflecting off the bounce canvas. Careful not to angle too much or only part of the coin will be in focus. I use 2 led lights for this on crisp white.

For the straight on shots, I still angle the camera about 5 degrees to get any camera reflection out of the mirrors. I have 2 lights about 1 foot away NW and SE of the coin respectively and I have 2 lights about 3 feet up spaced about 8 inches apart just north of the coin in frame. All of these are LED mildly diffused lamps on crisp white.

ECHOES

'2nd Style Business: Angled Diffused light.'

I find Uncirculated coins more attractive than that of a Proof

jmlanzaf

Really nice photos

ms70

2nd Style Proof: Angled Diffused light.

FredF

What I like about the 2nd shot of each - the details in the faces (liberty & the eagle) show better. In the proof, I think the first shot shows the cameo better as the fields are closer to black.

The cool thing is that storage is so cheap, that you could keep both photos of each coin as they show different attributes, IMO. Why choose only one .

WDH

Diffused light

Catbert

Ditto diffused for my tastes.

1630Boston

Both methods have their own pros/cons IMO
great pics either way.

oih82w8

I prefer the solid black fields, straight-on shot. The diffused angle shot has it's merits as well.

Cameonut

For me, hands down straight on for proofs.
I also prefer the diffuse light on the business strikes.

ricko

I prefer the straight on shots for both,...Now, if I were purchasing a coin, I would like to have both pictures for evaluation... but the first style is the real beauty shot. Cheers, RickO
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