Dumb question...What''s the best way to photograph my rock?

[KatieS]

Hi all - I''ve been posting my dilemma on the RockyTalky board and would like to get an up-close photo of my diamond up for the experts to take a look at it. What is the best way to clearly photograph my ring? Can I do it with my digital camera or do I need to take it somewhere?

 

[sevens one]

Check out the "my long awaited ering" on this forum. I also think there are instructions if you check past posts. Good Luck. I'm going to need step by steps (by my teenager) when my "project" is ready for the eyes of PS.
Nan

 

[ttmd]

Check out verticalhorizon's jubilee -- used a standard loupe next to the camera lens with the macro setting. Good luck with your diamond, I hope it works out.

 

[Skybluewater]

I had pretty good luck with my Nikon Coolpix 4300. It has various scene modes, one of which is for extreme close ups. It allows me to get the lens within 2 or 3 inches of the subject.

 

[verticalhorizon]

Yes, I used a Canon digital camera in macro mode, with a standard 10x loupe that I got from AGA. You have to hold the loupe right up to the lens, just like you would with your eye.

Use the LCD to focus, b/c most low-to-mid range cameras aren't Single Lense Reflex (SLR), meaning what you see in the viewfinder isn't what you get on 'film'.

I've heard that it also works with a standard magnifying glass. Either way, you also need a steady hand or a tripod.

Here's my examples.

 

[limey]

We have had luck with a flat bed scanner, just rest the ring on the glass, or hold it. You can even hold it upside down and although perspective is wierd it might turn out.

Our recently purchased Canon has a useless macro zoom so to use the camera without a loupe I do this:

1. Set camera to highest resolution, picture quality possible (reason will become clear)
2. Turn on Macro
3. Zoom in as close as possible while ring remains in focus. Try to avoid digital zoom. The ring might only take up a small portion of the middle of the camera display but all is cool because you are taking a very high res picture so you can "zoom" again later with your image editing software, i.e. crop.
4. Snap away. You may need to adjust light balance and/or flash settings. I have had most luck by setting the flash to -3 since our diamond just looks like an explosion of flash when it is higher.

limey

 

[tomatoe]

If you dont have a loupe, use the macro function on your digicam, dont go in too close to the diamond / ring and snap pictures, use a tripod if you dont have steady hands. Take a few pictures and open them up on your pc to take a look at them, to check if they're too blurry, generally you cant get too close even in macro function before it gets blurry. Practise if you need to and after taking a clear picture, use a software that allows you to crop the picture like Photoshop and crop the picture to the size you like or resize it down. For me, it's always best to crop the picture before I post it. Good luck and I can help if you don't have the software to crop the picture down