Idealscope & Taking Pictures with a Digital Camera

[Colored Gemstone Nut]

Hi Garry:

I am in the near future going to purchase an idealscope..

I have some intial questions for you or any other individual that has pictures and is well versed posting the ideal-scope images.

I would like to take a photo or magnified photo of my diamond through the ideal-scope viewer. I want to capture the image in a clear concise manner like some of the pictures off your site and other clear pictures posted on other sites that use these images in marketing...etc...

Question 1: Is there a way to use a magnifying device to put over the lens of the ideal-scope & what is the easiest way to take a photo of the image through the idealscope using a digital camera while stabalyzing the stone with a tweezers.......

Thank You....

-Josh Rioux
Sitka, Alaska

 

[CP]

Dear Josh,
Unfortunately there is no easy way to take Ideal-Scope photos

Using tweezers can make it harder but should give very good results.

Lighting - make sure that your light source is moderate to strong and that the light is not overly coloured - this will effect the Ideal-Scope colour.
It is not a huge issue though - be aware pictures always come out red-pink whereas in real life stones look more pink.

A very handy trick is to do a "custom white balance" on your camera (if it has that function) with the background and ideal-scope pink in place but not the stone. This whitens the background off and improves the contrast between leakage and light return.

Make sure that you use diffuse background light - direct light is not accurate. Also make sure the lighting is equally strong from all directions behind the stone. Make sure also that you create good "head shadow" by not allowing too much direct white light into the view hole of the I-S.

In terms of magnification it is difficult to achieve good photographic results with the $25 Ideal-Scope. The Expert model ($119.95) will give you better magnification but because it is a 10X lens it is difficult to capture larger stones in the field of view. (do not alter the viewing hole size of the pink plastic - this will give you incorrect "head shadow" (black) results.

We no longer use the scope magnification. I use Tiffen close up lenses(10X & 7X) on a Canon G2 camera to achieve high magnification and simply use the pink insert from the $25 model to create the correct Ideal-Scope environment (correct light and head shadow).
These Tiffen lenses are quite cheap, I do not know what camera you have, they might not be suitable. http://www.tiffen.com/digital_canonproducts.htm (close up lens for Canon G2 = 43CU710)
I found them to be better than the Canon macro adapter which was much more expensive

Stone placement. If you are using tweezers make sure the stone table is flush with the bottom of the pink plastic - if it is a distance away you can over accentuate the leakage of the upper girdle facets.

I hope these tips help.

PS - we should have a photo system for sale or for licence in the next few months. This will make taking and processing Ideal-Scope photos very quick and easy.

Sincerely
CP
www.ideal-scope.com