Why is it so hard to photograph doubled dies?!?

[cherrypickerrrrr]

Why is Class I rotated hub doubling so hard to take good pictures of?!

How do you properly manipulate lighting/shadowing/glaring/angles when taking pictures of die varieties?!

Especially on the reverse of a Lincoln cent...?


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[mustbebob]

Lighting is the key. If you can illuminated the notches, or a separation line, that will draw the viewers eyes to it. For some coins where I couldn't get decent photos, I made a small ramp so that the coin sits at an angle to the light source. This usually helped a lot.
For as many doubled dies as I have photographed over the years, I am disappointed in the majority of them. However, as you are finding out, you just gotta keep at it. The biggest thing is focus. If you can't get a sharp (or at least not too blurry) photo, then illuminating it properly just won't help.

[cherrypickerrrrr]

Thanks for the advice, Bob!

What do you think of my baby by the way......so you agree it is a CW Class I rotated hub doubled reverse?

[mustbebob]

I just plain can't tell. The photos are much too blurry. Are you taking the photos while holding the camera? If you can find some way to stabilize the camera, I bet the photos would improve immensely.

[GrumpyEd]

It looks like you took a full coin photo then cropped and zoomed on the area you want to show.
That tends to make it very hard unless you have a great setup.

If you are trying to get the most out of a simple setup or camera, it will be much easier if you add a lens even if you use trial and error and somehow add a lens in a cardboard tube or whatever you can tape or attach so your photo only gets a small area of the coin instead of taking a full shot and cropping it. It puts all of your pixels to use on the area of interest.