Whats the trick to taking good photos of slabbed books? 3 3

[KirbyJack]

I get decent results by taking pictures on bright days, using indirect light.

 

[lizards2]

On 4/16/2022 at 12:35 PM, ThothAmon said:

 Now that’s a deep dive. Too lazy to go back in time and figure out what I was responding to?  

I am sorry for your laziness?? 

[paqart]

My setup is ridiculous overkill but I have the equipment, so I use it. The setup in these photos is slightly customized for shooting comics but was originally setup for a different type of shot. Before I took it down, I realized it would work for comics also if slightly altered, so I hauled out a pile of comics I want to sell on eBay and shot them all in a huge group. The key to this setup is the following:

1) Tripod

2) Support for comics, so they are at the right angle to the camera and to block direct light

3) Flash with scrim to create broad light

4) White foam core in front of camera/comics to reflect light back into comics

5) Tethered laptop to view shots as they are taken, adjust focus and light levels

NOTE: I considered shooting with a black background for the same reasons others have suggested. However, as a collector, I like to see if the whites in a comic are actually white. For that reason, I used a white sheet of foam core, adjust color temperature so it is white, thus allowing anyone who sees the image to compare the paper color to the foamcore white to determine for themselves if the paper is white or not.

Edited February 7, 2023 by paqart

[rexinnih]

Very nice!

[seanlinc]

Man glad I stumbled across this post. I was struggling to take pics of slabs without getting horrible glare. Just the simple act of using full light a white background and an elevated angle made a huge difference. 

[VintageComics]

On 2/9/2023 at 3:04 PM, seanlinc said:

Man glad I stumbled across this post. I was struggling to take pics of slabs without getting horrible glare. Just the simple act of using full light a white background and an elevated angle made a huge difference. 

Taking pics in sunlight works best (but not always practical).

Sunlight give your camera lense the most saturation.

Sunlight off to the side seems to work best but can be made to work with a sun directly overhead as well. 

Then you can work angles for glare.  

But bottom light is the more light you use the better the pic will turn out. 

Also, classic things like TAKING YOUR BOOK OUT OF THE BAG helps. I can't believe how many people think it's a good idea to snap a picture of a CGC book while still in the protective bag.

 

[BlowUpTheMoon]

Looks a little skewed to me.

[southern cross]

I take photos during the day.

Works ok for me.

Raw book photos are better.

[pushperaj65]

I can't figure out the trick.  I either have a reflection of my camera, a reflection of my light fixture/ceiling fan, or it looks like it was shot in a cave.  How do ya'll do it?.......

momix

indigocard.com activate    

Edited February 18, 2023 by pushperaj65

[paqart]

On 2/9/2023 at 3:11 PM, BlowUpTheMoon said:

Looks a little skewed to me.

The image plane isn't precisely aligned with the foamcore backing and the balsa support is slighted tilted downward. The image plane is a simple keystone modification in Photoshop, as is the balsa tilt. All I'm illustrating here is the light setup. Post processing is totally separate and quite simple. For an example of that, here is a shot of a Pokemon card.

[GACollectibles]

I still use a variation of this for magazine slabs

Posted August 30, 2019 (edited)

On 8/29/2019 at 10:59 PM, Jasanity said:

How did you take a picture with such little glare??? Mine always turn out terrible 🤦🏻‍♂️

So here is my temp setup for taking cell phone pictures of slabs, I'm still fine tuning the process and will move it to more permanent location.

1) Basic setup is three pieces of black foamboard: one on surface, one as backdrop(spaced forward with a comic box) and one in front of the setup.

2) Place comic/magazine against backdrop

3) Put camera up to hole in front foamboard.  This hole is oversized as I was experimenting, if you are using a camera you can cut the hole to the size of the lens

4) Take picture

5) Crop and post!

This setup is temporary and not even level but allows me to set it up almost anywhere.  I should have the front piece higher and the hole more in the middle, I'll adjust that later when I'm not just setting it up on some boxes for a few quick pics.  It is recommended to use some light from the sides(if needed), I have some ceiling lights in that area that were good enough for what was doing.  This picture is slightly blurry as I was not stabilizing the cell phone enough.  It's a heck of a lot better than the glare I used to get taking pictures of slabs and on black covers like that ASM 28 is a superior image choice. 

I picked up some white sheets as well but haven't tried them yet.

Edited August 30, 2019 by GACollectibles

[seanlinc]

On 2/10/2023 at 12:04 AM, pushperaj65 said:

I can't figure out the trick.  I either have a reflection of my camera, a reflection of my light fixture/ceiling fan, or it looks like it was shot in a cave.  How do ya'll do it?.......

I was right there with you, saw this thread and tried basically the easiest tips and saw a big difference on the first try. Just simply putting white poster board on the coffee table turning on the overhead light zooming in slightly and taking a pic at an angle.