Picture of coin

Taking a picture of the coin is a very important skill, especially if you would be using the picture to sell the coin online. Picture is a huge part of marketing in online auctions and it's known fact that auctions with better pictures would bring the best results. Here are some pointers on how to take a good picture of the coin:

Picture of the coin

Scanner VS Digital Camera

Although scanning coins are faster, it's probably the only reason why you would choose a scanner over digital camera for taking coin pictures.

Pictures of the coins taken with digital Camera show details of the coin much better than the scanned coins see example below:

Coin Photo

Coin Scan

Conclusion: Digital camera is a better choice for taking coin pictures, especially for coins with ramaining mint lustre.

Taking coin pictures with digital camera

Fix your camera with a tripod and use macro mode or macro lense to take coin pictures
Don't even try to use internal flash of the camera, it will reflect from coin surface and you will never get a good coin photo
Use LCD monitor when taking coin pictures, you will be able to preview depth of field
Cross-lit the coin to bring out details
Switch to aperture priority mode and select a small aperture such as f/8 (F8) this will increase depth of field and show details of the coin better.
(NOTE: Remember smaller the aperture bigger the F number)
Use Adobe Photoshop or any other image editing software to resize these photos. You can do it very fast with free Image Resizer by Microsoft.