This is a guide for those who want to capture the beauty and pristineness of etopps in-hand cards.  I recommend a digital camera.  Rather than depend on megapixels to get the best picture, work with the light that you're using. 

The main problem with photographing an etopps card is the camera flash.  All etopps in-hand cards have a refractor-like finish so adding additional light to the mix is challenging.

For any etopps card, you will probably need to take at least five pictures.  Once you see them on the computer, you may need to go back and take more photos of the card to get it right.

Here are a few tips:

• Background: use a couch or someplace where you can have the card stand up straight on its own.  Having anything around the card or any color pattern other than a solid color is distracting.  You also don't want a background that will reflect light, rather you want something that will absorb the light.
• Lighting: have an overhead light or a floor lamp off to the side.  The higher the wattage the better.  You may see this light reflect in the card.  If so, move around so you loose that reflection.
• Camera approach: take the picture on an angle.  Why?  If you take it straight on, the flash will be reflected in the card.  Also, take the photo on the side of the picture rather than in the middle.  Even if the card is on the right or left side of the picture, cropping will center it in your picture.
  
• Distance: take it about two feet away.  Too close and the flash will overexpose the card; too far away and even the best cropping won't help the card look anything but small.

In the above picture, the card is on an angle and I took it to the right of the card.  By cropping it becomes this:

Notice that light still reflects off this team card.  It's hard to avoid this but at least it captures what the card looks like if you held it in your hand.  Since when you hold an etopps card in your hand, it's hard not to see light reflecting in it anyway.

You can use the light that shows up in the card to your advantage too.  I'll use the set of three photos of Big Ben as an example.  In the left photo, you will notice that a ray of light slices across Ben's torso.  This did not look cool to me.  But in the middle photo, the light is aligned with Ben throwing the football.  I thought that was cool so I chose this one over the left one.  The right photo is what the middle one looks like after I cropped it.

Good luck and have fun taking and finding the best digital photo for your etopps card.

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