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brg5658
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Posts posted by brg5658
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2 minutes ago, Insider said:
Gale Spring, Adjunct Associate Professor of Scientific Photography at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia demonstrates a method used to provide even lighting for a highly reflective object.
Hummm...
BTW, most suggestions from members are valid: Proper color, whole coin, sharp focus, etc. I have not disagreed with any of them (except
tipping a coin in some cases). Unfortunately, folks will just have to use the images I choose to give them. End of discussion.
So basically, you're too lazy to take good photos. You have time to spend preaching on these boards to everyone about your infinite numismatic knowledge, but you can't set the white balance on a camera. Makes sense.
As usual - I will wash my hands of this thread.
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3 minutes ago, Insider said: Tipping objects in the light is a common practice of professional photographers. I didn't come up with that "tip" all by myself. I was taught that in a photography class in 1982. Perhaps you should read a book on Photography.
You do not tip coins into light at the working distances required for coin photographs. The extremely shallow depth of field precludes it. There are ways of using tilt-shift lenses, but that is, again beyond the scope of this thread (which is about lighting for the umpteenth time). Based on the lack of quality of all photos I have ever seen you post on these boards or elsewhere, you are clearly mis-informed about coin photography. This isn't 1982 any more.
Could you please stop trying to derail this thread. When you have something useful to contribute please do - but you clearly do NOT on this topic.
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3 minutes ago, Insider said:
Gee, Wally, I'll guess you'll need to ask "someone" who knows.
Only kidding, You have asked a great question. There is a great explanation of color progression on the Internet. As for my images, sorry. I do the best I can.
I already know the color progression charts of Doug Kurz and others (thin film optics is dictated by physics, so this is also well known outside of numismatics). My point was that someone cannot feasibly apply those color progressions to coin photographs unless the photographer has taken photos that show mostly accurate color progressions. Thus, as others have stated - the photos need to be accurate - in color and otherwise.
I am not trying to detract from this thread. I'm trying to help you understand that these are not catty or ill-intentioned deflections by other posters here - they are completely valid points.
The quality of answers given in a thread is proportional to the quality of the post (and photos) asking the question.
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I'll post again (as have others here) since you like to just ignore whole very valid swaths of people's posts:
How would one determine "vivid colors" and wrong color progression from such awfully lit and out of color-balance images you posted? Seriously... If we are supposed to use the colors of a coin to answer your loaded questions, then take photos that display the colors accurately.
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7 minutes ago, Insider said:
Well, this thread has been dragged into the toilet by the uninformed. As posted by others, the coin is 100% AT. The clues include the wrong color progression, vivid colors, and halos completely around the letters. I PERSONALLY toned it as most students would be attracted to its color. The coin was left in a warm solution of a common chemical for several hours. Since the experiment, the coin has been returned to its normal color.
So you're a coin doctor. Cool...
How would one determine "vivid colors" and wrong color progression from such awfully lit and out of color-balance images you posted? Seriously... If we are supposed to use the colors of a coin to answer your loaded questions, then take photos that display the colors accurately.
For your education, the thing you're calling a "halo" is usually called "pull away toning" by people who collect toned coins.
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10 minutes ago, Insider said: You do? As a proclaimed long-time numismatic photographer, you have pointed out the basic concept of DEPTH OF FIELD. It allows the entire coin to be in focus when each of its sides is a different distance (when tipped) from the camera lens.
your "dodge" 
using "micro-anything" does not apply when imaging the entire coin.
Your reply makes zero sense to me, so I'm not sure how to make sense of your inability to make a cogent argument. That being said...
When taking photos of an entire coin, it is extremely important that the coin's surface be perfectly parallel to the camera sensor (or said in another way, perfectly perpendicular to the camera lens' long axis). Tilting a coin into the light source breaks this very basic rule. The importance of this is dictated because the depth of field is quite shallow for macro-photography (as I already stated). Thus, tilting a coin will cause part of the surface to be out of focus. This problem can be overcome by something called "focus stacking" of images. However, that requires taking multiple photos of a coin at different focus points and then piecing or "gluing" those images back together in software to create a fully in-focus reconstructed image. That method is far outside the scope of the post here - which is lighting.
@Insider: I nave not seen you post what I would call even quasi-professional-quality coin photographs. As such, please refrain from derailing this thread - the purpose of which is to give people pointers on how to properly light full-coin photographs.
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42 minutes ago, Insider said:
Thanks, great post (I've used up my quota of likes for today).
The only thing I should suggest folks try is to TIP the coin at various angles and rotate it into various positions. That gives many more options to "get it just right."
I would strongly disagree. If you’re just looking at a coin, tilting into a light source is a good idea.
If you’re trying to take in focus photos you should absolutely not tilt the coin. Macro photography functions with very shallow depth of field. Tilting a coin causes the surface of the coin to only be in focus for part of the coin, not the full coin.
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18 minutes ago, Insider said:
I disagree because I was there.
Perhaps one day, after you have been collecting for at least two more decades, and have seen tens of thousands more coins, you MAY have a chance to approach the knowledge of those supposed "experts" making wild guesses who just may be laughing at the moment.
Let's try and salvage your comments. Consider this: In many cases, we don't get to pick out the circumstances surrounding the environment when we get to examine a coin. In this case, the entire coin is not imaged and several members have indicated it is a terrible micrograph. Those members have swung and missed or just let the ball go by for a STRIKE OUT!. NEVERTHE LESS, other members have stepped up to the plate and hit a home run in the rain with the wind blowing in their face.
I encourage to step up to the plate again. Do you think the toning on the 8 Rls.is "market acceptable?"
Impossible to tell because your pictures suck.
And, no amount of viewing coins will ever give you magical skills to know a coins complete existence. Stop making believe otherwise.
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Unless you have followed the coin for its entire existence, the declarations of "naturally toned" (NT) and "artificially toned" (AT) are nothing more than wild guesses by supposed "experts".
The more relevant question is whether the toning is market acceptable or not.
Sadly, on all fronts, it's hard to tell anything because the photos are so awful.
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I originally posted this topic in April 2013, but the photos have since been mucked up by Photobucket. I am reposting the general content with some updates/modifications in hopes that some may find it helpful.
Preface: I have been photographing my coins for nearly 12 years and I'd say 9.5 of those years I have been happy with those photos. At the beginning of 2011 I was fed up, and wanted to figure out how to get “professional quality” coin images, but I did not want to purchase a $1500 macro lens. After a lot of reading and mentorship (especially from @rmpsrpms) on a coin forum with its own “Coin Photography” sub-forum, I purchased a bellows and a couple enlarger lenses (about $90 and $40, respectively) and 3 little lamps from IKEA for $9.99 each (Jansjo lamps). I was seeing big strides in quality, and within 4 months of having this new set-up I was finally at a stage where I was happy with the images I was taking.
One of the most frustrating and difficult components of coin photography for me (and I think for others) is lighting. In my many years of experimentation, I had been doing a lot of things that seemed “intuitive” but were actually the opposite of what I should have been doing. While there is no “magical” advice I can give, and there is no replacement for trial and error (i.e., thousands and thousands of practice coin shots), I hope this little bit of advice is at least helpful to a few.
Before going further, I want to talk about diffusion (full diffusion) of light sources. When I say diffusion here, I mean fully diffused set-ups like milk jugs, light tents, or light boxes. Fully diffuse lighting destroys the positioning components of your lights (angle, clock position, and distance/size described below) - and makes your coin images look very flat and lifeless. Stay away from light tents, milk jugs, and light boxes. Some diffusion of individual light sources (i.e., making each light source look larger than it really is) can be quite useful for some small-footprint lights. That concept is related to the "distance/size" component discussed below.
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Methods:
The unique position of a light in space as compared to your coin can be uniquely defined using three ideas.
- The angle of the light(s) as compared to horizontal above your coin.
- The clock positions of the light(s) around your coin circumference.
- The perceived size of your light (a combination of distance of your light(s) above the coin and the actual size of your light(s)).
FIRST, let's talk about the angle of your light sources. In the following schematic, I have defined the “angle of the lamp” with the pink arc on the left - it is defined as the angle from horizontal (90 degrees would be pointing straight down on a coin from above).
One of the keys to decent coin images is to keep this angle of your light source as high as possible (as close to 90 degrees, and as close to your lens as you can get without throwing reflection on the slab or coin). As the angle of your light source decreases, the lower contrast your light appears on the coin surface. You can see in the following set of images how the angle changes the look of the coin photos. I have shown the left light source, right light source, and both together. This shows how the two light sources at the standard 10-2 positions work together to light the coin’s surface.
Photographically, a lower angle of light source manifests as a decrease in contrast between high points and low points on the coin, and the overall image appears “flat” and somewhat lifeless. In terms of the levels histogram (pictured below), you can see that as the angle of the light source decreases, the histogram becomes more compact (lower contrast). In other words, the range between the lightest part of your image and the darkest part of your image (called contrast in photography) decreases. As the angle of your light source increases, the range of lightest and darkest part of the image is much wider. Also note that you can generally tell how a coin was lit (with regard to angle of lighting source) by the corresponding halo around the devices (low angle) versus the shadow around the devices (high angle). Summary: Lights at low angles make coins look flat and lifeless (low contrast) - high angles make coins look lustrous and the devices stand out (high contrast).
SECOND, I want to touch on the number of light sources. In all of the images above, I have used lights at the “standard” positions of 10 and 2 (this notation refers to the “clock positions” and is typical among photographers). Two light sources may not always be sufficient to fully light the coin’s surface. The coin I have depicted is about the size of a USA half dollar. You will note that there is a bit of a dark area at the bottom of the coin. In reality, when I am photographing coins larger than about the size of a USA quarter dollar, I use three light sources at positions 9-12-3 or some other modified positions. Some modification of these lighting positions may be necessary for coins with particularly high relief or with designs with devices that may look best if lit from behind or below.
Light positions is a somewhat subjective. You can use any positions for the lights that illuminate the coin's surfaces fully. Use common sense for things like lighting the face on a coin - lighting from below the chin simply looks odd. There is no magical positioning of lights that will fit all cases. Positions of 10-2 and 9-12-3 are only where I start, and I am constantly moving the light positions around to light a particular coin appropriately (I can see real-time what the lighting changes look like through the Live-View screen on the camera).
Below I show a schematic of the 10-2 and 9-12-13 lighting positions for the same coin lit from a high angle with only 2 lights versus 3 lights.
LASTLY, I want to briefly touch on the ideas of light distance and light size and their role in the perceived size of the light. This component is newly described here after comments of @rmpsrpms in my original post 7.5 years ago. In particular, he writes:
A given source (eg Jansjo LED) will look "smaller" the farther you move the source away from the coin. At large distances, it will eventually look like a pinpoint source. This increases contrast and thus luster presentation. Moving a source closer to the coin makes it look "bigger" compared with the coin, and this spreads the light out more across the coin, reducing contrast. This is also what happens when you diffuse the source.
This is indeed a very important idea. Because I use very small footprint Jansjo lights, I do use some diffusion of these lights at the source. The little diffusers I use are a modification of those described by @rmpsrpms on another coin forum. I construct them by rolling a piece of translucent plastic, and then crimping it and taping it on one end. This cone-like tube is then lined with black construction paper above and bright white paper below on the top side. This accomplishes the goal of creating a larger perceived size light source, but maintains separate light sources so it does not flatten the coin images. The take-away here is that the perceived size of the lights needs to be sufficient to properly light the coins surface. Too small of a light source will create hot spots or overly conspicuous luster bands (while leaving other parts of the coin in shadow). This diffusion is very different from what I called fully diffuse lighting like milk jugs or light tents.
I hope these illustrations have helped describe how the lighting angle, number of lights, and the size/distance of your lights can affect the final image quality. I will just emphasize again, there is no substitute for practice. Over the past 12 years, I have taken tens of thousands of coin images, and variables like the metal content (silver, gold, brass, copper, etc.), the surface texture (matte, satin, lustrous, mirrored proof), and toning all modify the way I light a coin. Practice, practice, and practice some more.
Happy collecting (and photographing)!
-Brandon
- Crawtomatic, coinsandmedals, Prethen and 3 others
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On 10/12/2020 at 5:31 PM, Coinbuf said:
As a comparison here is one from my first submission almost a year ago, notice how the NGC photo looks dull and blah. The other photo was done by Mark Goodman, same coin night and day difference.
What is this beautiful coin graded? That is a stunning coin, and I agree 100% that NGC photos in this case missed the mark.
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2 hours ago, MarkFeld said:
You said you wanted to improve this (coin) forum. All of your posts on COVID are having the opposite effect. Please stick to coins.
Well he made it onto my ignore list after having taken his bait for far too many posts. He may know coins, but he seems to be unaware of how profound his ignorance is on most other fronts.
I still wish when you ignored someone on these boards that their authored thread topics would not show up in your feed. It’s a pity.
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2 hours ago, gmarguli said:
I've used the PhotoVision service and the results are fine. I'd be ahppy to use those in auctions. However, at a cost of $8 vs free, I can't do that. In the last year I've submitted around 2500 coins. That'd be an extra $20K in costs.
I don't think I'd say it's exactly "free" at PCGS. My understanding is that PCGS forces all World coins (except "Modern" 1965-present) through their "Gold Shield" $5 per coin process and that also includes TrueView images...
PCGS Regular submission (non-Modern) fees: $35/coin plus required "Gold Shield" service at $5 per coin = $40 per coin.
NGC Standard submission (non-Modern) fees: $35/coin plus $8 per coin images = $43 per coin.
If I'm reading the price structures correctly, the $8 for PhotoVision would be partly offset by the fees PCGS requires per coin.
In addition, depending on what specific years and price points you're submitting, the NGC "Modern" tier is more inclusive (1955-present) than is the PCGS "Modern" tier (1965-present). Further, NGC has a value limit of $3,000 versus PCGS $2,500 limit before you have to move to a higher grading tier.
But, point still taken - even $3 per coin for 2500 coins is $7500 - and nothing to sneeze at.
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1 minute ago, Insider said:
...plagues are a part of our life. It's Mother Nature's way of culling the herd. As I wrote before, most humans will eventually test positive. While that is happening, some will die.
Possibly the most fatalistic philosophy I have ever heard... I guess all of medicine should just stop, and we should let "Mother Nature" take her course? Dumb. And, yet another straw-man argument.
I'm also washing my hands of this thread. It has turned into a personal thread to spout mis-information from @Insider. Adios troll.
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15 hours ago, MAULEMALL said:
We miss jom
What happened to jom?
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To stay on topic, I got this cool token at FUN 2015 in Orlando:
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8 minutes ago, Insider said:
LOL. In CNN nonsense we Trust; and God didn't make little green apples either.
No, in science I trust.
I read about 30-40 scientific articles per day on COVID. The literature is immense, and largely consistent - there is NO EFFECTIVE TREATMENT FOR COVID. That is a FACT.
Stop deflecting your ignorance and conspiracy theories on others. Are you well read on the COVID literature? Are you working in medical research and know how to interpret that literature?
Why must you be so divisive and profoundly/aggressively contrarian? The facts are clear and accepted at this time - whether you like them or not.
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5 minutes ago, Insider said:
We are to wear them for both cases. And the flaw in your argument is VERY OBVIOUS to anyone who cares to think about it. if the virus can get through most types of masks when you breath in... wait for it, wait for it...
COVID is largely spread by respiratory droplets (sneezing, coughing), and what @CRAWTOMATIC said is 100% true.
Stop creating straw man arguments and admit your ignorance. Seriously - any time someone cites or gives FACTS your deflect to your normal conspiracy theory BS.
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12 hours ago, RWB said:
You are looking for excuses to avoid doing what are best practices acknowledged world wide. That is false, foolish, and demonstrates a lack of concern for others. Also, don't bother with the phony "personal freedom" dodge - EVERY right comes with responsibility, and protecting all supersedes your petty and selfish "right" to possibly spread disease. ("Typhoid Mary" couldn't grasp this, either, so you're in deadly infectious company.) The transmission rates reported in parts of Texas last month, for example, were approximately 75% lower in jurisdictions that encouraged distancing, masks, and hand washing -- even for the "unwashed masses." Europe controlled the virus far better than the US as a whole through the same very simple protections. Similar results are reported by the CDC in parts of FL, GA, AL, CA and other states. In Virginia, the northern counties have consistently had much lower rates of infection than other areas where populations have been less consciousness.
As for so-called "flip flops" that is yet another sign of self-serving ignorance and lack of rational thought. Science, as opposed to "dogma," is built on measurable data. Initial recommendations will normally be less focused and effective than those made after more data is collected and analyzed. After a couple of months (Jan-early Mar) the data from China and other infection loci demonstrated increasing confidence that distance, masks, and hand washing were very effective in reducing (but not totally preventing) community transmission.
The "herd immunity" touted by ignorant dogmatists is not effective except when isolated populations reach approximately 75-80% immunity. For the USA, that's about 272 million who have survived, and 5.5+ million who have died. We've seen the results of lower immunity levels in outbreaks of measles and other "childhood" diseases originating in multiple closed communities where vaccination rates are below 75%; the spread is rapid and easily caught by thousands who were deliberately victimized by anti-vaccine groups.
The kind of perverse stupidity expressed in your post is why there is presently no nation-wide "light at the end of the tunnel" except an approach freight train. The people about to get run over by ignorance and dogma are middle and lower wage people -- the same ones who perform much of the national consumer-goods production, food production and a host of basic necessary services that the rest of us chickens take for granted. These wage earners do not have large stores of cash or assets, and an increasing proportion are running on financial fumes with little hope in sight.
Let's be brutally honest. The economy cannot fully recover until the CoVID-19 virus is under control and states and communities can respond quickly to small outbreaks. No amount of hope, prayer, invocation, promise, dogma or anything else can change that - and unless a very effective vaccine becomes available to a very large part of the population, the most effective means we have to reduce spread are -- now say it all together: "Distance, Mask, and Wash!"
Enough, Insider.
I'm going to wash my hands of this.
Most succinct and correct post I have read on the subject in this thread and in the other "poofed" thread. This country is saddled by conspiracy theories and weekend "scientists" who know nothing about public health or infectious diseases. The rampant selfishness is profound.
Thank you @RWB for your post.
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21 minutes ago, Insider said:
We have several very effective treatments right now. As for a vaccine, don't hold your breath.
BTW, the masks most of us are forced to wear DO NOT KEEP VIRUS PARTICLES OUT! If the press in this country were doing its job - many things we think we know would be much different.
There are no effective treatments for COVID-19.
- Insider and Abuelo's Collection
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tipping a coin in some cases). Unfortunately, folks will just have to use the images I choose to give them. End of discussion.
your "dodge" 
using "
LOL. In CNN nonsense we Trust; and God didn't make little green apples either.
Lighting techniques for coin photography - updated
in US, World, and Ancient Coins
Posted
Yes, it does not work for all of the reasons I have already told you more than once. It may work if you don’t care if a coin is all in focus, but that isn’t the point of my replies and you know it.
And a question for you:
Have you ever taken a professional quality full coin photo of a coin? I have never seen you post anything besides very poor quality micro-graphs. I get that you know grading and conserving coins. I don’t believe for one second that you know anything about professional quality coin photography. Prove me wrong and let’s see some of your recently taken professional quality coin photos.