Nonmortuus

Doh!

Easiest way Nordle is to left the corner of the foam with something so you can lift it out and then flex the foam to pop the coin out

I would rip them out sorry and use Quadrums as you can open and close them whenever needed to take pictures etc

So I have decided to send a few coins to CGS in part because I had to send two slabs in anyway for reslabbing so I decided to sanity check my grading against a TPG. @azda asked me to post what I was sending in so you could give your own grades and I was discussing the whole process with @Paulus yesterday. I had these down as: Coin Obv Rev 1817 HC GVF GVF 1911 HC EF gEF 1912 HC aEF EF 1913 HC aEF aEF 1916 HC gEF gEF 1918 HC EF EF 1919 HC gEF gEF

It really is hard to say because it depends on the light your looking at it in at the time. Both are getting close to a fair representation of the coin in hand.

@RLC35 So, I had had a play for an hour or so with the Raynox DCR-250 Macro Attachment last night and for the money (£45 ish) it does seem to help bring out the detail in higher res pictures on smaller coins. I did taking some pictures of farthings but found they were out of focus due to the tripod being on carpet and every time I focused the camera any movement caused the carpet to flex and the tripod to move. I am new to the DSLR game (previously used a bridge SLR point and shoot) so I am still getting my head around white balance etc The pics below were taken with the Raynox. The lighting still isn't correct, I am having to play around with it for both Bronze and Silver, but it should give some indication of the performance of the attachment regarding detail levels. Hopefully as I get the light and focus issue sorted the pictures will improve. This is my current set up: Nikon D3100, 14mp Res Raynox DCR-250 Macro Attachment 2 x LED lamps with 6500k bulbs Lightbox to bounce/diffuse the light

Hi @brg5658, thanks for the feedback it really is helping. They will show up blue as I have not played with the white balance yet and the lamps are 6000k so more blue than the 5000k lamps I would like to use.

In the UK I am not sure how Azda. The coin is the same and the grade attributed to it will be the roughly agreeable to most people. As long as people do what everyone here preaches i.e. buy the coin not the slab, I am not sure what difference it will make in the UK as to what slab/label is on the slab. In the US I take your point that a PCGS slab will carry far more weight than CGS. As long as people continue to buy the coin and not the slab in the UK then selling them should be no harder than before.

Not a few hundred pounds at all, probably the cost of a decent George V Halfcrown all in.

At which point, in any of my posts, have I said I had got these slabbed for commercial reasons and by that I mean to turn a quick profit and resell? Everyone seems to be going off at a tangent here. The primary reasons I sent them to CGS were: 1) To check my grading, as a total newbie I wanted to see how CGS would grade them against the grades I had in my head, hence me posting my grades on the initial post. Whether you agree with CGS/PCGS/NGC/whoever it was to make sure I was picking out relatively problem free coins. Some of you have been collecting or dealing in coins for years and often seem to forget that for newbies like me spending £50, £100, £200 is a lot. CGS 'were' the cheapest option to get a TPG to look at them at the time. 2) Recommendations from active forum members who had expressed that they had were happy with the results form CGS. Yes I had read some of the negative comments as well but speaking with some of the members on here who use CGS I felt reassured that I wasn't making a massive mistake (This was pre takeover etc etc) These coins are going to sit in my collection for a long long time and yes, I am sure I will upgrade my 'mid level coins' at come point, however for now this exercise has served its purpose. It has helped validated that I am not buying dipped or messed with coins, it has demonstrated that my grading isn't a million miles off with George V Half Crowns and now they will sit in my collection for the foreseeable future

I think I am in the same boat as yourself, I tend to make my decisions based on the upper ear, tash, general hair detail, the usual I & P, the Harp, how fully struck the upper part of the shield is and the lions faces. Pretty much the standard places we all would look for wear etc. Although I had the 19 down as gEF, which is what they graded it as, I was slightly disappointed with its grade when compared to the others. Over all though it has served its purpose for a newbie to help confirm I am not making huge mistakes.

Here is my first attempt (top) compared with tonight's attempt.

Here is tonight's attempt with the lights nearly directly over the coin and a bit of paper over the lamps (house didn't burn down!)

To be fair he has a lot of deals on the go via facebook so I wouldn't be surprised if some of these reviews are from people buying from him on there where he does get good feedback.

If you read the questions section it should tell you if they are GU10. The lamps won't go directly over the coin without obscuring the coin from the lens but they can get very close to being directly overhead.

Very similar yes, just cheap and cheerful lamps

So the results are in! The Obv & Rev grades below refer to what I had them down as before they were sent in. Coin Obv Rev UIN CGS grade 1817 HC GVF GVF 0039729 CGS 50 (GVF AU55) 1911 HC EF gEF 0039730 CGS 65 (GEF MS 60-61) 1912 HC aEF EF 0039731 CGS 75 (UNC or near so MS 62-63) 1913 HC aEF aEF 0039732 CGS 75 (UNC or near so MS 62-63) 1916 HC gEF gEF 0039733 CGS 78 (UNC MS 63-64) 1918 HC EF EF 0039734 CGS 70 (AU MS 60-61) 1919 HC gEF gEF 0039735 CGS 65 (GEF MS 60-61) As an exercise to help validate my grading I am fairly happy with the results. The decision for me is whether to pay and persist with CGS or move any future coins that I get slabbed to another TPG. I would welcome peoples feedback on the grades.

That would be good to know! I am currently experimenting with 3500k for copper/bronze (following advice on here on this thread! Thanks!) and 6000k for silver (both GU10 LED lamps)

@brg5658 when you say diffuse the light at the source, how far away are we talking? Should I be using some plain white paper pretty much up against the bulb or an inch or so away? My first thought was I will just cut some white A4 printer paper down and tape it over the lamp (that last picture was taken using only 1 lamp, no other lighting was on in the room), bring them in a tad closer and increase the angle of from around 45 degree to 78/80 ish. I would welcome your thoughts as your toned pictures are always stunning!

The last image was not taken using a lightbox. It was taken with the shining from the top of the coin with the lamp being about 6" away give or take using the 3500k bulbs at a bout a 45 degree angle. I will certainly try and give what you posted a go

I tried the 3500k lamp tonight and these were the early results, I still need to work on the manual focus:

I was watching this and the sellers others also but I ended up keeping away as I thought they had probably been cleaned. Could someone with more knowledge explain to me how they could remove the dark toning while leaving the fields unmarked etc?

Thanks for the tips guys. When I say auto focus is not working I mean its actually knackered on the lens full stop, the motor has gone lol. So I have to manually focus each shot. I have 2 GU10 lamps that came with the lightbox I am using. They came with 3500k bulbs which had a yellow tinge. I replaced them with 6000k bulbs that are more white. I may just have one as a Bronze 3500k lamp and the other as a Silver 6000k lamp and see how they perform

As the Auto focus is playing up on my one and only lens I am having to manually focus via the view finder, I am then using a remote shutter button to snap 4 or 5 images to review. The colour still isn't right. the 1915 has a more red tone to the toning and bronze isn't representative of the coin in hand, the 1931 Penny has a great deal of luster but the picture doesn't demonstrate it at all.

A new 1915 Halfcrown, not the highest grade but nicely toned. I am playing around with a new camera at the moment, trying to find the correct setting to represent the coin as it is in hand. This is one of my first few attempts. I think I may need a tad more shadow/contrast.