Photographing Baseball Cards

Wondering if anyone can lend some ideas on how to shoot baseball cards? Seems like a macro deal to me...

I suppose the issue is lighting more than anything else. Camera needs to be squared over rectangular card to avoid distortion, which leads to shadows. Tried to bounce flash all different ways to no avail. Also tried to place lighting source (desk lamp) at different places. Really struggling getting right mix of lighting for all the details (it is critical to show accurate condition of card) without creating glare on the card (they are fairly glossy).

I've never done any product photography, other than bad attempts for stuff I sell on here, so i am starting pretty much at zero.

I have a 60D, 60/2.8 macro and Sig 17-70 OS; YN 460 flash; tripod.

Not looking to buy some elaborate lighting set up, as this will be a limited need, so please keep suggestions simple and cheap. Thanks!

i'd just use a scanner unless you want more than a basic reproduction. How are you proposing to display them?

Thanks for the reply Toby. I initially tried scanning, but the resolution was way off vs photo, and I was getting strange banding/moire pattern. I can crank up the resolution on my scanner, not sure about the banding though. I'll have to play around with it some more - doesn't seem like there is an obvious easy way to get what I want with camera.

As for how they'll be displayed, it will be primarily on eBay. I'd like to be able to do 100%+ crops of corners of cards, for example, to show condition.

I'd think a scanner would be easier to, but if you want to use the camera it should be pretty simple to setup a shoot. You won't need much either.

1) Mount the camera on a tripod (really makes it a lot faster) and aim it downward. If you have focusing rails this will make focusing easier, but even without you should be able to setup most things without too much trouble. I'd the 60mm macro without question for this kind of work - an ideal tool

2) Off camera flash with a softbox over the flash itself ( a smallish one is all that is needed - lumiquest softbox size is more than enough)

3) f8 or so for sharpness; ISO 100 and 1/200sec and you're good to go

Thanks for the replies. After tweaking some settings I got my scanner on board with this. Much better than photos.

mpix345 wrote in post #12688387
Thanks for the replies. After tweaking some settings I got my scanner on board with this. Much better than photos.

Turn off any sharpening on the scanner. Scan at 200% with the card rotated on the scanner at 45 degrees and then reduce and straighten the image 50% in photoshop. Some scanners have re-screen settings in the software for scanning printed material.