Photoclubalpha

Hi
Here are some really nice jewelery pics I took a few days ago with the help of mi Minolta 50mm f2.8 Macro lens which I like a lot.
Lighting were two flash LED lights attached to my camera.

Stunning jewelry Armen - the diamonds alone must be worth a lot

I imagine that shots of gem stones must be very tricky, trying to get the best lighting through the many facets of the stones.

Heey I am glad that you liked the pics here are better ones I think:))

Hi Armen,

Some gem set indeed. Apparently you like these miracleous stones from thousands of years' hard work. But who doesn't like precious stones that contain, refract and reflect light into millions of flashing beams in so many directions... ?

I like the compositions best but I think you could go a little sharper on the most focal parts, also by using the lighting amount moderately, hence letting the light travel through the stone rather than drown it with light; a little subtle lighting might have worked better to show off the crafting and the facets of the daimonds.

And I think they need some cleaning...I'm not sure but there appears to be some dust particles or tiny dirt stains on them .. or maybe that's because the photos are rather small and for the web.

Thanks for sharig your work! : )

Yildiz

I like this shot for composition, clearance and sharpness best.

Yildiz

I agree with you concerning the clarity and dust particles.
There are some circumstances which made obstacles on my way to take the best shots of these precious diamonds.
1. It would take like few hours to clean some of these diamonds because the biggest ones are of 1-2 karats. And they still are not that big to clean them rapidly. My friend is the seller of these stones and even I had trust I couldn't take on me the cleaning of these stones because of their tiny sizes and danger to loss them. They really cost above $5000. Even the smallest ones cost something ...
2. These pics are in raw state and not treated by any PP program.
3. I hadn't enough time to arrange the best convenient lighting. I used 3 flash LED lights on mini tripods under different directions.
4. My Minolta 50mm/2.8 lens is not the best to capture a bunch of diamonds in 1:1 without croping them because even if I close the aperture until 22 only a few stones are in the focus.
5. To be fast I took the photos under ISO800 mainly although it is nothing for a550
6. These shots are only preliminary versions and these shots will be posted in some websites in very small sizes and in the future I will capture for bigger posters.
7. I hadn't Doc's 30mm/2.8 which I think is the best for these kinds of sessions

Using a shorter lens would mean the focus depth will be even shallower because you'd have to get closer too get the same magnification. But then you could take those clusters of loose stones from directly above, that could be one way too get them all in focus at the same time.
Some nice sparklers there Armen, I don't think we've ever had diamonds here before.
Greg