how to photograph beads?

[JinxGarza]

You'll find lots of tips in How To Photograph Your Beads on the Mid-Atlantic chapter website.

Jinx

[FireBeads]

Sheryl, how funny! Our pups just had surgery and the vet put on these awful cones...we found some better ones that they can see through and they are padded so now the pups are as happy as a pup can be with a cone around its neck. My husband wanted to get rid of the other cones and I told him no, I was going to try them out to photo my beads. Glad to hear it works!
Linda

[mjcall]

A couple of additional points to be aware of for macro photography. When you go into macro mode your depth of field (the distance your photograph is in focus) gets shallower. Good lighting is important especially with automatic cameras, the better your lighting the smaller f stop (lens opening) your camera will select and the greater your depth of field. When ever possible I shoot macros from a tripod. If camera allows you to select the f stop choose the smallest available (varies by camera) your shutter speed will, in all likelihood, be slow making the tripod necessary but more of your picture will be in focus.

Digital cameras in general are more adept at macros for the average photographer. This is because by nature of their design the lenses provides more depth of field than a 35 mm in macro mode. Also they provide an automatic white balance meaning you will get truer colors regardless of your lighting source.

Foam core board makes an excellent choice for a background, it has a matte finish so it reflects little light and is available in a spectrum of colors. Most office supply stores carry it.

Macro is a field of photography all unto itself. If you are using digital experiment, you have instant feedback available and have little to lose if the picture isn’t acceptable. As I have read elsewhere on this forum Practice Practice Practice.

M_

[margi]

Boy, macro lenses and lighting and all that aside, sometimes it's hard to beat my scanner for a quick, easy, predictable way to photograph stuff. (Not everything--my cameras do a better job on some pieces.) But here, for example, is a bead I just finished as a gift for a friend--throw it on the scanner, do a bit of cropping, and boom, perfectly good picture:

http://www.petemacko.org/PicORama/Pi...m=2&p=537&a=35

Margi