I have developed a nice photo “trick” I am sharing with you with the desire it will help you with your coin photography. Most of the coins I shoot are “facing right” coins and I like to use only one light source when shooting coins or any other subject for that matter. My indoor studio is rather cramped and I have very little room to maneuver so it is awkward for me to shoot from the right. Consequently, I have my equipment setup for left light shooting.
LS (light source) left invariably leaves me shooting across and into the back of the head as we so often find on our coins. By far, the largest numbers of coins I encounter are facing right. This results in shadows cast across the front of the face. I have solved the problem by shooting the obverse with the head down or as we often say, “upside down.” I then use a photo editing software to flip the coin vertically and horizontally. This process places the coin back in the proper position. If you don’t have such a program, please look elsewhere within my blog for information on downloading a free edition of PhotoPlus 6.
Please take a look at the coin photos top right. The top photo I snapped in the “heads down” position and you can see the face received the full effect of the light. I then righted the coin using my photo-editing program. The coin on bottom was shot in the “natural” position and you can see the lack of light striking the front of the head. I shot the photos in low key to emphasize my thesis. Please understand that I left the light in precisely the same position for both photographs. I can’t say enough about Serifs’ PhotoPlus 6 program and the fact it is free makes it even better! Again, I ask that you look elsewhere within the blog to get directions to the site for downloading. Thank you for visiting and I hope this article helps you with your photography. God Bless.. Jerry..
LS (light source) left invariably leaves me shooting across and into the back of the head as we so often find on our coins. By far, the largest numbers of coins I encounter are facing right. This results in shadows cast across the front of the face. I have solved the problem by shooting the obverse with the head down or as we often say, “upside down.” I then use a photo editing software to flip the coin vertically and horizontally. This process places the coin back in the proper position. If you don’t have such a program, please look elsewhere within my blog for information on downloading a free edition of PhotoPlus 6.
Please take a look at the coin photos top right. The top photo I snapped in the “heads down” position and you can see the face received the full effect of the light. I then righted the coin using my photo-editing program. The coin on bottom was shot in the “natural” position and you can see the lack of light striking the front of the head. I shot the photos in low key to emphasize my thesis. Please understand that I left the light in precisely the same position for both photographs. I can’t say enough about Serifs’ PhotoPlus 6 program and the fact it is free makes it even better! Again, I ask that you look elsewhere within the blog to get directions to the site for downloading. Thank you for visiting and I hope this article helps you with your photography. God Bless.. Jerry..
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