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Question: Digital camera for photographing jewelry up close!?
I want to find a used camera on ebay, and I want to use it to photograph jewelry up close (maybe an inch or so away from the subject) so what do I look for!? Is it the zoom capability!? Do I look for 8X zoom!? Or would it be the lens quality!? thanks!.!.!.Www@QuestionHome@Com


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:
If you don't want to buy someone else's junk, buy your camera from someone on craigslist for a used on or one on sale at your local electronics store!.

How small is the jewelry!?

You will need a light tent with lighting and tripod too

You really don't need a 8x optical zoom at all, not for shooting jewelry!.

A 3x zoom with a decent close up feature will do fine!. Just go into an electronics store and test a number of P&S cameras in your price range to see which can shoot tight on your smallest piece and then make sure it has a white balance setting for incandescent!. Auto white balance is not accurate!.

How close you place your camera is not as important as if you can fill the frame with the jewelry!. Actually the further back you can get, the easier it is to compose and adjust the lighting

I use a 24-85 mm lens about 18 inches from the jewelry and a light tent!. http://www!.ezcube!.com/features!.htmlWww@QuestionHome@Com

Before you DIGRESS to Ebay (aka: Evil Bay), use up your other options!.

ALL other options!.

That includes local searches like http://www!.craigslist!.net in camera gear for your city and going to camera shops, flea markets, classifieds, and the trading times or local counterpart to a people to people sales mag!.

I'm not trying to say that Evil Bay is unreliable!.!.!.

I AM SAYING IT'S UNRELIABLE!.

You have to buy a warranty if you want one, most used equipment (especially devices with technical and sensitive parts like leaf shutters) can not only get damaged in shipping or handling (most often the accusation of the seller) but warranty service is almost unknown!.

Now, to address your question: The Camera records what the lens allows!. In short, the camera has NOTHING to do with what you photograph other than processing of information and capturing what is provided to it through 1) you're control of the exposure, and 2) the lens capability!.

You want a lens that CAN perform macro!.!.!. not zoom by itself!. You do want lens quality (Nikkor, Zeiss) but a lens that can perform critical focus with long exposure (depth of field) with your understanding of hyper focal distance (how to effectively focus for 'acceptable clarity' throughout your image)!.

A vast majority of photographers do not photograph intricate objects with attention to the total outcome of the end result!. Time is the critical factor in successful photography of small objects and proper lighting and setting will sell it every time!.

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I just got that information from photoflex from olympus which has a school on e mail and it is not the camera its the lighting that magnifies the jewelry, try different lighting techniques and you will see!. You'll have to play around with it but you'll see the the results!. The jewelry was taken with an olympus 7!.2 megapixel camera!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

No you'd simply need a good macro ( or super macro in your case)!. There are some good new cameras coming up with 1cm super macro (1cm away from the subject), i've looked in jessops with these types of cameras and the one that struck me was the Olympus C560 ( also Olympus FE340)!. This would focus on litterally anything and if you want to see some examples, you could just simply visit my flickr page!.Www@QuestionHome@Com