Rock and minerals macro photography: small crystals growing on bigger crystals.

solominer (72)in #rocks • 6 years ago (edited)

Part 4: manganese oxide elestial quartz

I found these at the Diamond Hill mine in South Carolina. The orange color is from manganese that was in the soil when the crystal formed.

A link to my adventure at Diamond Hill mine: https://steemit.com/photography/@solominer/diamond-hill-mine-in-south-carolina

elestial crystals are defined as crystals growing out from greater crystals. If you look close at these fractures, some of them are small crystals forming.

Up close, the fractured patterns inside the crystals are really interesting. But they still have points, many of them.

The base of the stone seems to be more pure quartz, then moves into iron and manganese impurities.

Bottom of the rock, looks basic until you turn it over.

Reference photo next a quarter dollar.

#geology #georgia #rockhound #minerals

6 years ago in #rocks by solominer (72)

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photovisions (69) 6 years ago

Hi there! As a photographer I see a problem with Your picures and want to give You an advice, I hope You wont see this as something wrong.
You should try to change the light in the place where You take photos on something more white, more "cold", there are different types of light bulbs available, the temperature of the light should be more cold to avoid this orange look of Your pictures. Or, if You have such posibility, to change the White Balance in Your camera? Go down with the numbers, try different settings, You can reach the setting in Manual mode, If You are not sure where just check the manual of Your camera. The look of Your pictures and the look of these beautiful minerals can be much more improved thanks to that! I will post below one of the pictures which I fixed using photoshop. Tell me if these are the real colours of the crystals?

If You have more questions just write, I will try to help You!

$0.03

2 votes

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solominer (72) 6 years ago

@photovisions

I greatly appreciate the feedback. Thanks for taking time to write out the white balance issue in my pictures. I think you are correct on the white balance, ill explain. My camera is a full spectrum camera, originally I bought a used Lumix GH3 and sent it to LifePixel to remove the camera's hot-mirror. They sent it back to me with updated white balance settings, to use in infrared and ultraviolet photos. But my colors have always been a little off when I use a hot-mirror (UV/IR cut filter) screwed on the front of my lens.

Maybe I need to dial in my white balance better for my hot mirror use, or just correct as you did in Photoshop. I use GIMP and ill look into correcting my photos, but good point ill see if I can correct the white balance in normal light with my camera.

Here is a picture of the rock in full spectrum without the hot mirror, looks terrible in normal light.

So either my white balance is off or my screw on hot mirror is just not cutting good enough. Im going to go to GIMP and see if I can fix what ive already taken.

$0.78

2 votes

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solominer (72) 6 years ago (edited)

Used the auto white balance option in gimp and I think it fixed it. Thats from the last photo with my hot mirror screwed on with GIMPs auto white balance.

Ill correct the others, thanks again @photovisions

$0.81

3 votes

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photovisions (69) 6 years ago

Yes, this is it! Auto White Balance working well, now Your gems looks like real GEMS! ;) Glad I could help! Hope to see more of Your fantastic finds and wish You good luck in Your searching activities!

$0.61

1 vote

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gandalfthewhite (48) 6 years ago

Dear photovisions,
Seems like you know what you are talking about my friend. I like that photo a lot - looks lit.
Yours truly, Gandalf The White

Well, @solominer, bro you know, I am always honest, always. I do not want to be impolite or anything like that but many of your pictures here definitely got this orange "touch". I still really like them; "this rock" looks pretty interesting.

Have a lit day! (:

$0.07

3 votes

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