Photography setup for skincare clinic, advice needed.

[sanj]

Thank you all for the advice. It has been very helpful.

Niels123. The 40mm seems like a good idea except that it may not be able to take extreme close ups. I will look into Cactus and Yognuo's. The number of flashes per hour is negligible.

Axtstern: Yes I agree, must keep it simple.

Neuro: Phew. Yes you pointed out the folly of 100 macro. I use FF so forgot to calculate for crop. Does the kit 55mm do macro? Centre column is again a great tip. The 60 seems perfect!

Orangutan: Yes lighting would be important. I think what she needs is uniform even light. I realise that light from an angle would help bring any skin aberrations out but that may also look to ugly and frighten people off. So the idea is to leave it visible, but soft.

Ajfotofilmagem: Will these lights have enough power to provide depth of field when shooting extreme macro at f11. When these close ups will be taken, the camera would be hand held (patient lying down etc situations).

Ruined: If I was the doctor I would have that setup.

Private: G10 will do extreme close ups? And I must use bounce light.

FEBS: Yes I prefer xxxD then G. Basically because I have never used a G before and do not know its limitations. Which xxxD do you recommend?

Cayenne:

Mt Spokane: Not really high quality portrait. 'Medical' portrait. So I am thinking of 2 cheap soft boxes.

RobertG: Wowee. You really have an insight into this. I do not understand the first part at all myself. Must research it. Thanks for all the super tips!

 

[martti]

Our cosmetic surgeon seems to be using a Canon G9. Our hand surgeon makes do with an iPad.
Here in France the surgeons have to have a documentation about any highly specialized interventions (reconstructions with flaps and grafts, for instance) they make, otherwise the insurance company says that no such procedure was done. There have been cases where the surgeon has just made a skin incision and stiched it up, that's because.

Of course the kind of lens and lighting depens on what you want to demonstrate, is it a two-dimensional thing of a scar reconstruction or a 3-D picture of recreating a breast after mastectomy. For some people this is difficult to understand. They insist on buying a more expensive camera instead of learning to use the one they already got.

The iPad is handy because you can incorporate the picture directly in the patient file.

 

[old-pr-pix]

Consider the Olympus TG-4 P&S. For close shots add the LG-1 LED light guide (essentially adds ring light capability). Camera has built-in "microscope mode" and in-camera focus stacking ability for greater DOF. I know its not a Canon, but it adds in-camera capabilities that can not be found in Canon gear yet. And, its not as expensive as a DSLR solution.

 

[FEBS]

Thank you all for the advice. It has been very helpful.


FEBS: Yes I prefer xxxD then G. Basically because I have never used a G before and do not know its limitations. Which xxxD do you recommend?

Hi Sanj,

If budget, I would go for the 750D.

 

[ajfotofilmagem]

Thank you all for the advice. It has been very helpful.

Ajfotofilmagem: Will these lights have enough power to provide depth of field when shooting extreme macro at f11. When these close ups will be taken, the camera would be hand held (patient lying down etc situations).

Yes, I believe that an illuminator with 600 LED have enough light to use F11 for small objects like a scar. Just approach the illuminator, which does not generate heat.

 

[Luds34]

I tend to vote/agree with the Rebel + EF-S 60mm. Ideally external flash/umbrellas but I think the LED lamp might work the easiest, and take up a little less space.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

Thank you all for the advice. It has been very helpful.


Private: G10 will do extreme close ups? And I must use bounce light.

FEBS: Yes I prefer xxxD then G. Basically because I have never used a G before and do not know its limitations. Which xxxD do you recommend?

Cayenne:

Mt Spokane: Not really high quality portrait. 'Medical' portrait. So I am thinking of 2 cheap soft boxes.

Like many others, I'd like to suggest a DSLR because I'm comfortable using one. However, a iPhone would do the job. My eye doctor uses one to photograph retinas!

For a medical portrait you don't need soft boxes. A G series will do extreme closeups. They have a hot shoe, so you can mount a low cost Canon 90ex flash that will work as a master and trigger remote canon flashes, or can bounce or add a diffuser. In the US, they sell for $67 currently on Amazon.

The G16 is a very capable camera, and focuses as close as 1CM! You will have to spend a lot of $$ to get a DSLR/Lens combination that does both portraits and Macro. The G16 has a f/1.8 lens, and because of the small sensor, depth of field is less of a issue, you get a lot of depth of field even at f/1.8.

The G series also has a fold out LCD, which is very handy if you are taking photos of someone lying down and are holding the camera at a 90 degree angle.

http://www.dpreview.com/products/canon/compacts/canon_g16/specifications

Here is a portrait taken several years ago and cropped using my G11.
You can view it at 1:1 and see every pore in his face.

 

[rfdesigner]

At most I'd choose an old, good, DSLR.

I'd take a DSLR so I can determine the white balance properly, important to record the colours accurately, auto-modes can wrong foot you and make it impossible to compare before and after. I used my 30d and the on camera flash to evaluate brick colours when I needed some for restoring our 300yrold fireplace. Worked a treat, perfect match.

You can pick up 30/40Ds for less than £100 these days, they shoot raw, they can be set to manual, set white balance etc, and they have on camera flash. This isn't an artistic contest, it's a scientific record. And it's going to get a relatively easy life.

(I got a photo published this year on the BBC taken with my 30D, looked a damn sight better than the iphone picks)

An 8Mpix camera will print to A3 perfectly well.

As for lens, I'd go for the cheapest going. If flash is being used to aid consistant colour then aperture is unimportant, almost all lenses are sharp at F8. An old kit lens can be had for £50... although I'd use a fixed lens.. then shots would be more likely to be comparable.

Job done, £150.. paying more than this might be desirable to get close ups, so perhaps a ring flash and a set of macro extension tubes.. but closest focus of a standard lens could be more than good enough.

We use a compact at work for images of PCBs etc, and it's definitely good enough for that, but I wouldn't like to vouch for colour accuracy.

last thought.. probably most important:

The one thing that might push me to a "better" model is connectivity.. a doctor will probably want the image in the notes as quickly and easily as possible.