How much is too much

Walkernut

I understand from reading the posts relating to coin photography that many of the best coin people take their raw images and spend time "post processing" them to arrive with a suitable product. Of the two images below, one has not been altered other than cropping and the other I sharpened and added some intensity. I tried not to go over the line between reality and absurdity. For those of you that keep a photo album of your coins, are the pictures altered to make them appear much better than they are?

mcarney1173

If I am taking a photograph for my personal benefit, I would be attempting to make it look as close to the "in-hand look" as possible. The point of a picture is to capture something, and an overly edited picture does not capture anything. I usually take about a dozen photos of a coin, then look at them in comparison to the coin. I keep whichever looks the most realistic.

I'm assuming this is certified and I think the focus isn't right. I can see that scratch on the slab at the bottom and that would indicate that you are not focused in enough.

mrpotatoheadd

As long as your picture looks like the coin does in hand, I don't care if you use crayons.

JRocco

My goal is to always show the coin as it looks in hand.
Most times my coin looks much better than I could show in a pic with
my limited skills and even more limited time to spend tinkering with a camera and lights.

Fairlaneman

I like to see, and try to take, pictures of coins that look like coins and not cartoons. If the picture takes a few adjustments thats how it goes.

Ken