Check these out..

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aorr/1557372266/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aorr/1557202660/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aorr/3047994671/

Anyone try using a ringlight? I recently purchased one but have not yet had time to play with it.

The usual way is to set up a piece of glass at a 45 degree angle over the coin and aim your camera straight down through the glass. To light, you shoot a strobe at the piece of glass and the light bounces off the glass and onto your coin.

There's a more technical explanation of it here: http://www.coinnews.tv/Secret-is-in-the-lighting.htm

Go to the drug store and buy two pieces of poster board: one white, and one black. You can then use the poster board to reflect the desired tonal range. Position the coin relative to the poster boards to get the desired combination of dark-to-light reflection (actually, since coins are small, you could probably do this with just white and black index-sized cards). To get a more "metallic" looking reflection, try a piece of blue poster board. You can light the white board with diffuse daylight (e.g., a window), a flash, ot even a daylight-color temperature household fluorescent fixture. A fancier option is to use gray card, then light the card with a gradient (light-to-dark) lighting effect, and reflect that.

Lighting is definitely an issue. I shot this using 100% natural light. It's actually sitting on the windowsill. I would think that a flash — unless it was a directional flash — would cause reflection issues.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gdanford/5579410878/

btw i also have a Raynox DCR-250 (http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=raynox%20dcr-250)

which i used a lot on a Canon G9(attached) and on Pana TZ10 (handheld)

*while i'll move to a proper lens later in time

(this is an example with a nikon camera with that 'glass' attached
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeff-js/2886832349/
i changed the plastic ring (big one) with a metal step-down ring, since it's known to be weak, in time)
when i have all the kit ill take a pic of it :x

I have tried a couple times, but haven't done too well. Recently I tried my new 105 micro, but lighting seems to be the issue still. With the flash you get a glare, but I don't have enough lights in my house to make them look good. I will have to post a picture from my buddy's flickr later of some coins that looks really good.

hi, i am a coins collector :P and i get the d7000 today
i hope i can show you some attempts later on

cheers
:)

How do you take photos from coins?

- Which lens do you advice for this task
- Which light should be used
- What additional setup is required? (tripod, etc)

Here is a quick-and-dirty OOF photo from a bunch of coins.. do you recognize some?