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Shooting through plastic.....any pointers?
CoinZip
Posts: 3,253 ✭✭✭
Man I hate taking pictures through plastic....anyone have any pointers?
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angle, angle, angle
set those lights free
.
Your camera may not be level to your coin.
manual focus
f8 or higher
Hoard the keys.
Best said, angle, angle, angle.
I take that to mean angle of the slab, angle of the camera and angle of the lighting.
For me distance is also a big factor along with the zoom of the camera and then cropping and resizeing the picture.
2. Make sure the focal plane of your camera is parallel to the plane of the coin.
What everyone else has said.
Everything pointed out is on the plastic.....but it sure looks like its on the coin in the photos.
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BTW this .....
Became this with about two minutes polishing.
...best thing to do is pull out of slab, shoot, put back in slab!
<< <i>I don't think the slab has come into play here
manual focus
f8 or higher >>
Not higher than F8. Mid range is best unless you have to angle the coin for some reason.
Use "aperture priority" mode ("A" setting on camera). You set the aperture, camera figures out the shutter speed for proper exposure.
Keep lighting as high and vertical as possible (but not above the camera). If you have a low contrast coin use fewer lights. If high contrast, more lighting.
Todd's right. In time the plastic means nothing. Polish scratches, of course.
Focus looks off on the obverse especially.
Lance.
<< <i>Looks better then i can do.
What he said. From the looks of things, it seems to me you're doing just fine, though I know it's a challenge.
Collector since 1976. On the CU forums here since 2001.
<< <i>Georgiacop = I hope you are kidding about putting oil on the slab!
Why? Oil works well for temporarily filling in scratches that are hard to buff out. I wouldn't use WD-40, since it foams, but just a drop of something else -- mineral oil, machine oil, canola oil, ... -- smeared around with your fingertip. Be sure to wipe it off before putting it away, though.
Keeper of the VAM Catalog • Professional Coin Imaging • Prime Number Set • World Coins in Early America • British Trade Dollars • Variety Attribution
If you're serious about photographing coins, buy Mark Goodman's book. It's paperback, roughly 150 pages, full of photos, tips, techniques, and all but a small portion of it is focused on shooting coins in slabs. Reading and digesting it skipped me forward several grades. I might have gotten there eventually, but it would have taken me ages to discover all the tricks on my own.
<< <i>Plastic is poures....won't the oil eventually breath into the coin and cause damage? >>
Acrylic isn't porous... I haven't polished a slab in close to 2 years.
I place the coin under the camera and focus then remove the scuffed up slab and add oil.
Shooting under halogen you need to work fast with oil or your will quickly fry a slab.
I use 5-6 drops of mineral oil right from the bottle as a eye dropper will add bubbles then rotate the slab until the whole coin is covered.
Another oil shot as this NGC slab was scratched to death.
Top two oil shots are under 75w halogen this is under 300w halogen.