Once you draw the circle, try the various tools under Edit > Transform.
This isn’t an answer (which most of us will be happy to offer here), but an alternative that you may not have thought about. I offer it because it was recommended to me when I was having trouble trying to photograph a coin I found.
But: Have you considered scanning your coins instead of photographing them?
I got really good results <
http://sparkbox.blogspot.com/2007/10/time-warp-coin.html> almost immediately, with no fussing about with lighting, or dealing with trying to "un-distort" the coins back to circular shape. The image at the link is a composite of both the reverse and the obverse. I didn’t spend a whole lot of time making an accurate selection around the coin, but I’ll admit I went a little overboard with some of the color/exposure corrections. It took virtually no time at all to get a high-resolution, well lit and focused image to start working with. Looking at the big screen image and comparing it to actually looking at the coin in my hand gives pretty favorable results.
See the following for coin scanning tips:
<
http://www.telecoins.com/scanning.html>
<
http://dougsmith.ancients.info/scan.html>
Have you tried using guides? Just drag in 4 guides (2 horiz, 2 vert) that surround the coin, then using your elipse tool, start the elipse from the top left corner of the quides and drag out to the bottom right corner. Then you can copy and paste the coin into another document.
Hi,
Using the guides worked ok. It just seems like a lot of work to copy the coin image. I would have thought a way would exist to move the marquee easily
Thanks
I would have thought a way would exist to move the marquee easily
Control-t.
Then, you can rotate and scale the ellipse marquee shape easily, by dragging out the handles. Or press the control key while grabbing a corner or edge to distort the selection. Or press the control + alt to skew, and control + alt + shift to do simple perspectives.
OldBob had it in post #1.
J
OK, then…so my suggestion about scanning the coins is so worthless to you that it’s not even worth commenting about?
If so, so be it. I don’t necessarily live and die by having my suggestions validated. Acknowledgment is kind of nice to see, thouygh.
If you insist on your current workflow, maybe you’d like to know this little trick:
As you drag out an elliptical marquee, you’re going to try to be pretty close to properly surrounding your coin, right? Well, before you let up on your mouse button to commit to the ellipse, press and hold your space bar. This will allow you to drag your current marquee around the document window. Move it so it’s closer to accurately surrounding your coin, then let up on the space barKEEPING YOUR MOUSE BUTTON DEPRESSEDand you can continue to resize the marquee.
Now, having said that, and knowing that you’ve remarked that you’ll be doing a lot of this type of photography, it would seem to me that your efforts would be better served by figuring out a way to properly shoot the coins so that the circular distortion you have to correct for is eliminated. Since you say the reason you have to tilt the coins is to get a better capture of the color, my guess is that you need to focus your efforts on a better lighting scheme. Get the light correct, and you’ll be able to shoot the coins straight-on, eliminating the circular distortion, and a whole lot of repetitive, finicky work in Photoshop.
I don’t know about anyone else, but *I* like the scanner idea. I just tried it out. I seemed to remember trying this years ago and getting poor results, but dang if it didn’t work wonderful. A little tweaking here and there maybe. I’ll finally be able to catalog my collection. So, thanks for the tip and the links.
Ctrl T transforms selection content. I think the OP was more interested in transforming just the marquee.
To do that, there is Select > Transform selection (no default shortcut, but you can probably set one up).
I think Phos’ suggestion (scanning) is excellent. I’ve done that myself – not coins, but other metallic objects – and it works great.
"I seemed to remember trying this years ago and getting poor results…"
That’s exactly my story, Bob. I don’t know if there were radical differences between the two scanners’ way of working, or what, but when I explained how I was trying to photograph the 10 pfennig coin for my blog, the suggestion of scanning it instead just seemed like the respondent was guessing it might work. My earlier experience caused me to not even consider the idea.
But DANG! My current, crappy Epson scanner here at home did a great job on it. Then later, I read the articles on coin scanning that I linked to above, and saw that there are some cool methods for combining multiple scans in order to really capture the details of the coins’ surface. I’m sold on scanning for coins. It’s much easier (especially for someone who only does casual work like this) than mucking about trying to get the right set up with a camera, a copy stand and off-axis, diffused lighting.
"To do that, there is Select > Transform selection (no default shortcut, but you can probably set one up)."
As long as you keep the Marquee Tool active, "Transform Selection" will show up under your cursor when you call up the contextual menu.
But yeah, it could be handy to have "Transform Selection" configured with a custom shortcut. I HATE going to the main menus for stuff, especially for the functions I call on often.
Select > Transform selection (no default shortcut, but you can probably set one up).
you definitely can. i have it set to Crtl-Shift-T because i use it all the time.
phos, nice tip on scanning the coins! 🙂
Dave,
Thats an excellent tip. I should have thought of that. BTW Phos is right about using the scanner. It can be used for more than just documents and photo’s. A few years back I pick a leaf off the ground and scanned it in. Works great for solid objects.
Edit: If the OP wants to use a camera, then he is better off getting him self a macro flash for his camera. Then he shouldn’t have to tilt the coin.
If the OP is going to keep photographing coins (BTW, I think scanning them is good alternative as well) look into polarizing your light source AND using a polarizing filter on your camera lens. That combination will eliminate almost all reflections, plus allows you control (through rotating the lens polarizing filter) to gradually bring in enough reflection to make the subject look normal. No need to tilt your coin. The results of this double-polarizing technique can be pretty amazing. The only drawback is a 2-4 stop loss in exposure.
Hello,
Thanks for all the tips! I did not mean to offend about not answering the scanning suggestion, I just kind of skipped over it. Here is a sample of what I’m doing:
<
http://i292.photobucket.com/albums/mm21/wchormicle/Troys45-C opy.jpg>
I built the template and did all the correction work with the $60 program "MS Digital Image Pro"
I will try these suggestions tomorrow and see what happens. BTW, I would welcome any constructive criticism of the sample above. Keep in mind that up until a few months ago, I had never shot a digital picture with anything more than a $50 camera. Up until now, the only corrections I had done were basic crop, brightness and contrast adjustments. At 56 years old, it’s hard learning new tricks!
Wes, (in response to an email he sent me asking about my double-polarized setup.)
I bought my laminated polarizing film from Edmund Optics. <
http://www.edmundoptics.com>
I jury-rigged a holder for the film in front of each light on my copy stand (Wire and clothes-pins!). Don’t get the film too close to the light, it will melt and discolor. Also be sure the pieces of polarizing film are oriented in the same direction. Camera is mounted on copy stand or tripod with a polarizing filter on the lens. Rotate the on camera filter for desired reflections.
Wes,
A couple of comments. Since youre shooting at a slight angle to begin with, get a piece of white foamcore art board about 12" x 12" (Id actually make it a 16" circle) and cut a hole in center, the size of your lens (you can use the lens shade as a guide and draw a circle around it). Affix this to the front of the lens. Hang a diffusion medium (I like Diffueuse from BD Supply, but Rosco sells similar material) to form a white box around the art board. Light through the diffusion material to get the relief that you want. The light reflecting off of the art board will fill in your coins face evenly, as its white. Watch that the black inside circle, where your lens pokes through, does not get reflected by the coin.
For your knockout, draw a circle with the Ellipse Tool (using guides for the center of your coin, hold down Shift & Ctrl to draw a circle from the center of the coin). Convert this Selection to a Path. Save the Path as Working Path, and then adjust the Bezier handles on this Path to exactly match the tilted coin. In the Paths Palette, choose Make Selection. If you are not yet comfortable with Bezier curves in Paths, play with it a bit and read the manual and F1. This is a powerful tool for what youre doing, so all learning can be easily applied to the rest of your coin shots.
Good luck,
Hunt
