Many old gravestones are fragile and certain "cleaning" actions can damage them, particularily if the stone is limestone. If you try to scrape off lichen, some of the stone may come off too. As rule of thumb, avoid any action that removes any part of the stone, and that inculdes flakes and grains of the stone. Some genealogists now say it is damaging to do a 'rubbings' on old stones and are recommending against it.

Many stones are very difficult to get the nomenclature to show in a photo. If you have to absolutely do something to get an image, then apply something that is harmless to the stone. You can whiten lettering by applying a soluble "white wash" to the lettering. Make a chalk paint. grind/crush white chalk and mix in water. Adjust the amount of water to your desired thickness. Use a small brush, maybe one about the size of a brush found in automoticv touch-up paint. Be careful not to dribble on the stone. Paint only the carved/etched lettering. The whitening will make the lettering "pop" in photos.

Another method is use dry chalk powder. A small duster is used to blow the dust gently across the face of the stone. The object is to get some of the dust to collect in the lettering groves. Obviously, this won't work on a windy day. Again, the powder should be something that will rinse away in the next rain.

Be gentle is the watch word.

I recommend whitening for only the most difficult cases. Do try different angles and look for lighting that glances across the stone rather than head-on. You can help by using photographer's parasols and reflectors. For example, you can cast a shade over the stone and then use a reflector to throw light across the stone from the side.

An inexpensive, reflector can be made by covering a big piece of cardboard with aluminum foil.

Do watch for your own shadow. Your shadow can ruin appearances, although sometimes you may be able to include in an interesting way. For small stones on very bright days, I have used my shadow to cover the stone and control its lighting provided that my shadow will cover the entire stone. Most of the time, I try to keep my shadow out of the shot.

Watch the exposure - its difficult when there is a wide ranged of brightness to dark. For example, you may be shooting a side of the stone that is opposite of the sunny side. If your camera's lightmeter is averaging the entire scene, the very bright background will cause the lens to close down resutling in a nicely exposed grassy turf beyound the stone, but the dark side of the stone will be under exposed and almost useless. For this situation, choose a metering mode that reads a small center section. Hopefully, there will be a frame displayed in the viewfinder/monitor showing you the dominant part being metered. Keep this zone on the stone. This will produce a fair exposure of the dark side of the stone and the brighter parts of the picture will have a 'burned' out look.

Digital cameras: If you have not run a "white balance" in awhile, it is recommended you do this on site just before you begin your photo session. See your camera instructions. One caution: If there is bright blue sky illuminating the target (card), it can shift the white balance because the light contains a strong blue component. You may have better results if the card is held vertical or placed in the shade of a tree. Experiment before you make the trip. Try different conditions for white balance and make test shots of, say a color wheel.

Some if not most digital cameras do an automatic white balance when the mode wheel is in the "auto" position, and ignores the setting you may have generated. Move the mode wheel to "M" where user's settings are used. Again, consult your camera manual to find what the camera does in various mode settings. For my particular camera, I use
the "M" and "auto" selection most of the time.

I do urge you to experiment and make a series of test shots before you go. Get a feel of the results for different settings. That's the nice thing about digital cameras, the images are very cheap. You can afford many test shots since these can be erased and the memory chip reused.

About your camera batteries: When the first digital cameras hit the market, it was found that some of these would soon drain the cells, Rechargeable NiMH cells were touted as the answer where the cell voltage was 1.2 - 1.25 Volts. And then it was found these, too, had a problem. Those had a high leakage rate loosing as much as 10% of charge per month and some 10% per week. New camera models were developed using LIthium Ion batteries. These were superior, but have greater voltage per cell and can't be used as a direct replacement for the older NiMH cells.

Today, cameras with Lithium-Ion cells are popular, but there are still a lot of cameras in use that use NIMH rechargeables. If you have one of those, I recommend a so called hybrid cell available from Batteries Plus. These are more expensive, but hold their charge much better than the plain NiMH cells.

There are times too when a black and white negative image is easier to read. Think of the Shroud of Turin as an example.

such good advice! when ds was taking a social studies class in college we went to one of several sites (mi) the stones were very old, but we lucked out with good sun, and some you couldn't "read" showed up on film...(some were as early as late 1700's)...

I do wish though, there was some way to maintain stones suffering from frost freeze...we have a small one surrounded by industrial buildings with stones close to falling over...(and train tracks, too)

Sorry, I just saw this thread.

FindAGrave gives the following instructions to its gravestone photographers:

Unless you are related to the interred on the headstone in question, DO NOT do anything to the headstone.

Gravestones should never be cleaned with anything but water and a soft brush. Slate gravestones from the Revolutionary era and Pre-revolutionary era are best left alone due to their delicate nature and tendency to erode.

Never apply bleach, ammonia, shaving cream, chalk, flour, baking soda, cornstarch, firm pressure or use anything abrasive. Do not post photos of recently chalked or shaving-creamed headstones.

I carry a microfiber cloth to gently remove lichen or other growths, but even that is used sparingly.

When I photograph a gravestone I take a second shot close up. This one is often easier to read, and can be enlarged on my screen more effectively.

I just looked up Photoshop instructions for converting positive images to negatives (as per Maire_Cate's suggestion), but I can't find any. I would have thought it was something Photoshop could do easily. Perhaps I just looked in the wrong place. It's an interesting idea.

FindAGrave recommends photographing gravestones at noon. I don't know if I agree with that, as I usually do it in the afternoon or morning. Of course, at either of those points the sun is shining in one direction or the other. This is great if it happens to be shining on the side of the gravestone that contains the lettering; not so great if it illuminates the blank side. So maybe noon is best after all. :-)

Good luck with your hunt! Be sure to report back to us.

Thanks all - I have found a couple of the stones on Find-A-Grave that are of my GGGrandfather. It must be limestone and he died in 1865. Some of the writing was readable when it was posted a number of years ago. The one next to him is his wife - but he had two and I am not sure which one is there with him. Only initials showed up then and those were questionable. I don't want to do anything harmful of course but wondered if it was possible to use something to show the engraving. Some of the graves in the same cemetery have no markers at all and I am sure my GGrandparents are there. The land where the church and old cemetery was donated by my GGGrandfather. I am having a plaque made to put inside the church to state this. I attended this church off and on until 1965 when we left MD., but I was young then and did not realize the signifance of it all.

For a negative look in Photoshop go to Images>Adjustments>Invert

Ah, Jodi--you're good. Thanks!!