Best camera for details on metal surfaces

March 6, 2006 8:57 PM

Yet another digital camera question: what camera would you recommend for taking close-up pictures of metal objects?

Hubby needs to take pictures of turbine blades and other precisely-machined metal pieces to show abrasion and wear patterns, so a good macro or zoom function is essential. In fact, the ability to mount diopter lenses would be great. Also, subtle color changes on the metal's surface are important, so the camera must be able to "see" the difference between silver, pewter, gunmetal, etc.

He is thinking about one of the Canon A series, like the A80 or A85, or maybe the Nikon Coolpix 5400. Any comments on these? Anything you'd recommend instead?

Under $200 would be great, but he can go up to $300.

Thanks!

posted by Quietgal to Technology (11 answers total)

Best answer: for $2-300 you will probably not get the ability to mount close-up lenses, but you won't need it. The powershot series are almost certainly the way to go. I've owned a shitload of digicams and I like the Canons best (although I currently tote around the Panasonic LX1 which I like very much).

For best results turn saturation, contrast and sharpening to minumum and do manipulations in PS (if you have those skills anyway).

The key to shooting abrasion and wear is in fact NOT the camera but the lighting. You neeed raking light coming from a shallow angle ('side-light'), like the light from the sun just before it goes down. This will show up surface imperfections which a top-light would conceal.

For this, on-camera flash is absolutely the last thing you need. So you should choose a camera which allows you to turn off the on-camera flash and use the ambient (available) light instead. A cheap incandescent studio light placed to one side of the object being photographed should be fine.
posted by unSane at 9:20 PM on March 6, 2006

for $2-300 you will probably not get the ability to mount close-up lenses, but you won't need it. The powershot series are almost certainly the way to go. I've owned a shitload of digicams and I like the Canons best (although I currently tote around the Panasonic LX1 which I like very much

That dosn't matter, most of the super-tiny cameras these days have the ability to do closeups, my canon SD-450 was able to take this picture, for example, or this one. Those are full, 5mp frames, not cropped at all.

That said, I am completely disappointed with this camera. My old Sony DSC-V1 too much nicer pics (although lacking the macro mode, many small sonys now have it). Both sharper, less grainy, and seemingly higher dynamic range. The SD-450 is not very good for any sort of indoor shot without the flash, IMO, unless you like grain.
posted by delmoi at 9:57 PM on March 6, 2006

here are some more macro mode pics I took with the sd-450. this is of some metal, but I ajusted the curves in photoshop.
posted by delmoi at 10:00 PM on March 6, 2006

Save the money you'd spend on a more expensive model and get a good tripod and lighting. Like unSane wrote it will depend a lot more on the quality of light than the details of the camera.
posted by Rhomboid at 10:12 PM on March 6, 2006

I took this macro of a stapler with a 7.2 megapixel Sony Cybershot. You can easily see all the pits and scratches.
posted by iconomy at 1:10 AM on March 7, 2006

I just took this shot of the middle of a fan with the same camera.
posted by iconomy at 1:57 AM on March 7, 2006

Depending on how much magnification you need, you might want to consider taking photos through a reversed 50mm SLR lens. I've used this technique with a sony v-3; it's quite fiddly to get set up, but it gets phenomenal magnification. If you're thinking of leaving the camera set up in a sort of mini-studio it would be ideal.
posted by primer_dimer at 4:14 AM on March 7, 2006

I took this picture (recently seen on AskMe) with a Canon A520 (5 MP, 4x zoom, US$170). I used the macro mode, no flash, a tripod, and a limited amount of zoom. It was taken indoors in poor light; with better lighting I might have been able to zoom in farther to pick up more detail.

Canon's cameras seem to have the best color reproduction in the under-$200 range.
posted by mbrubeck at 6:27 AM on March 7, 2006

Stay away from the Nikon 5400. I had one for a couple of years and it always performed poorly in macro situations. Terrible focus problems.
posted by owen at 8:32 AM on March 7, 2006

I have the A80, bought it to take incredibly close-up shots of handmade jewelry. Works like a dream.
posted by ersatzkat at 6:29 PM on March 7, 2006

Response by poster: Hubby says thanks, everyone, for the good suggestions, and the photos were very convincing!
posted by Quietgal at 5:39 PM on March 8, 2006