Last weekend I bought a new light source for 15 GB pounds. It's a desk
lamp with a flexible
goose neck, a 20 watt halogen bulb and a frosted
glass shade. This turns out to be brilliant:
The colour temperature is close to natural light and the bulb is brighter than other desk
lamps. This means that you stand a better chance of getting the correct colour in the photo (even using custom white balance), and the presence of some natural light as well (from a window) will not tint the coin blue on one
side. But I
still recommend drawing the blinds.
The long
goose neck allows the source to be placed quite precisely. Its length and flexibility allows the source to be placed high up next to the lens, giving a better view of the coin and more of a 3-D effect.
The built-in diffusion provided by the shade is very handy. What prompted me to look for this in the first place was that when I tried an overpowered incandescent bulb in my other
lamp (60 watts in a 40-watt limit
lamp) and put tissue over the end to diffuse it, there was an interesting smell of burning.
The only drawback is that it's a touch-sensitive
lamp with 3 levels of light, so the light level
flips as I adjust it!
This combination is working well for some tricky-to-photograph coins. Here are 2 examples: a very shiny
assarion of
Septimius Severus from Markianopolis, and an almost as shiny
Sep.
Sev denarius. Look how 3-D the
denarius looks, and the colour response is accurate enough to show its cabinet
toning. On the
assarion, I'm happy to see any detail at all! It's almost like a mirror with my other setup, though in the hand the detail is clear enough.
Any comments on the photos (as opposed to the coins) would be welcomed. I'm sure the
assarion can
still be improved.