Thanks to everyone that contributed on this topic. Anyone have any tips on getting faint stampings or other markings to show up better?
Like Mark mentioned, moving light sources to get oblique angles works. For small detail like engraving, playing with a single light source in a darkened room works for me.
For more general pictures, soft lighting from a soft box shown above works really well or even "bounce" flash lighting where you reflect the flash off of walls, home made reflectors or studio reflectors works extremely well. This was a flash picture bounced off a ceiling, but has no harshness to it like straight on flash pix.
I favor flash photography, but only when the pictures don't look like they were taken with a flash. A flash is portable and self contained, but often benefits from using surroundings to bounce light or using purpose made bounce reflectors to soften the light. There endless techniques for lighting in photography.
