coinsbygary

Though it's not free, I use Photoshop Elements with exceptional results. Elements can be had for less than $100. Of recently, I have been dabbling with axial photography with great results. One of the pieces taken using axial photography is this half-dime with unusual die clash marks. The other coin is one of my non-round coins.

That is a really good picture! Good job! I think that silver is much easier to photograph than a lot of copper coins, especially when they have dark brown toning. I think red-brown coins make for the best copper coin pictures. Good job on nailing down how to edit coins that are not round. It took me a lone time to figure that out also. I find raw coins much easier to photograph than certified coins because of the plastic. Gary

Nice looking type set! I enjoy photography as a second hobby akin to collecting coins. If there is anything I can help you with, feel free to message me and I'll be more than happy to help! Lighting is a key aspect of photography, but the good news is that it is one of the least expensive tools used in photography. The hard part is getting it right! Gary

I always use the registry and point system to compete with myself. I can't compete with expensive registry sets, but I can always strive to make my sets the best they can be. The registry and the points assigned to the coins in the registry help me to improve the quality of my collection. In the end, I may not have all the top pops, but I do own several snazzy looking sets like my 7070 type set. https://www.ngccoin.com/registry/competitive-sets/73886/

@coinsandmedals I live in a town where there are several dealers within a short drive. In an imperfect world we are largely influenced by our local experiences. We adapt as we must to enjoy the hobby we love. Older people are less likely to embrace new technology because they don't understand it and therefore don't trust it. Now retired, I worked in technology my entire life. I have embraced the electronic marketplace. I have embraced the registry here at NGC and have won 5 major NGC awards for my registry sets and 7 for my journal posts. I have also bought and sold coins on E-Bay. E-bay has done more in my estimation to make the world a marketplace for collectors than any other forum. This has been good for the hobby and me in particular, because my collection literally exploded. Heritage Auctions has also done a lot to open things up to dealer and collector alike. Often I have bought coins from dealers, only to find they bought them through Heritage. I also enjoy the dealer from Old Pueblo Coin in Tucson, Arizona that does You Tube videos. I have been watching his videos every day. To date I've managed to adapt very well. Because I was burned, I have a huge mistrust of social media. In fact as I get older, I am cherish my privacy all the more. I don't need social media and I don't want it. I tried Instagram not long ago but had trouble trying to figure it out and quickly lost interest. Fortunately, I am largely able to access the technology I currently use and remain somewhat anonymous. Another reason for my feeling comfortable is the high level of character I see displayed by most coin collectors. Over the last year in the era of COVID, I have worked very hard in my church to modernize how we do church. Working with a congregation that has mostly older congregants, I've had a very challenging time trying to get them used to using ZOOM to conduct our services. Others have very old computers or none at all. Thankfully, one of our older congregants doesn't mind connecting to ZOOM over their phone. All this to say that my coin club is comprised of a significant number of retirees. They are more likely to get in their cars and drive to regional coin shows. We even charter a bus to the Central States show in Schaumberg, Illinois! We have a 100+ person membership in our club and currently have our club meetings via ZOOM. Sadly, only about half the people that attended our in-person meetings before COVID now attend our ZOOM meetings. I wish more people would avail themselves to ZOOM as it has opened the door to a lot of things we would have never done before. For instance, we watched an ANA video on grading coins over ZOOM at our last meeting via screen sharing. In fact, I may ask if I can do a presentation on photography at a future meeting. It is the younger people that both like and use social media, and I in no way want to discourage them. I just don't want to be a part of it. I frequent the ANA's member blog where there are a number YN's that are all in. One of them is starting a weekly newsletter that they want me to critique. However, as I get more into helping them get established in the hobby, the risk of losing my privacy increases. Because they are enthusiastic about social media and all in, they tend not be as wise about privacy and identity theft issues. Hopefully, over time, I will be able to be a positive influence on them. In fact, truth be known, we all need each other to grow the hobby! I totally get that you live in a rural area and that electronic media has opened up the world to you. Though more difficult, I also understand how to develop trust over electronic media. I have met both dealer and collector alike on the internet who I eventually met in person that I trust. My only caution over social media is that some people might get left behind. This is the main reason why I fear my club will eventually shut down the webpage in favor of Facebook. Since I am a member, I will most certainly vote against that. That said, because of my mistrust of Facebook, I am unable to access my club's Facebook page. However, for me, that is a price I am willing to pay to preserve my privacy. In fact there is a person in my church that puts tape over her computer camera because of a huge mistrust of Zuckerberg and the internet! In the end, I am not against change, but I am for people using technology at a level that they both trust and understand. I am however, concerned about sacrificing the older collectors on the alter of change because they either don't understand or want to change. To put things in perspective, when I graduated high school there was no internet or for that matter, cell phones. (Funny how most of my life I worked for a cell phone company with technology that didn't exist when I graduated high school. No 5G, in fact no "G"). There were however, numismatic magazines. These magazines had dealer advertisements and mail-order coins for sale. Mail-order is how I developed my collection when I was in high school. Now hardly anyone uses mail order through magazines. Fifty years from now, coin collecting will continue to evolve and I won't mind! Gary

Sounds like a plan! Watch out though, like most plans, yours is easier to make than it is to follow! Especially when coins you don't currently own are tugging at your heart and wallet!

I'm pretty much a flip guy mainly because of the 2X2 staples. Prying staples from 2X2's to move them into a cleaner holder with new writing area can be very risky. It only takes a slight slip of the hand to damage the coin inside, especially if it is a larger coin like a silver dollar because the margin for error is much less.

To me this is a troubling trend. To gain the newbe's you risk losing the collecting veterans. Older collectors have been asked to adapt to the changing market place, and for the most part they have. However, my coin club maintains a webpage and a Facebook account. I wonder, in an effort to keep their costs down, when my coin club will ditch the website for Facebook? I used to have a Facebook account until somebody hacked it and used it to extort money from me. Fortunately, it turned out to be a hoax I never paid off on, but still, Facebook is done for me. These new social media platforms have a big red target on their backs for every would be hacker to take their shot at. Identity theft and the like are real for anyone who uses electronic media. I spend money to protect myself from identity theft that I would rather spend on buying coins. Yet it is the world we live in, and the price for doing business. Sadly, it is the brick and mortar shops where you develop a trusting relationship that makes this hobby much more personable and in my estimation, enjoyable. This is the direction we need to steer our newbe's, rather than simply accommodating them

I took time to figure out what it means to short a stock. There is something in my brain that just can't wrap it's arms around betting on a stock going down. It just doesn't make sense. However, if I have learned anything, it is this, where there is greed, there is a way. Now that I'm retired and living off my 401K, I'm ticked about all this. I am the little guy who is figuring out how to preserve and live off my 401k for the next 30 years and still have something left to leave to my kids. My broker tells me that this current environment is not sustainable. We'll see. After all, things rebounded well from the COVID hit. As far as silver goes, I bought a couple rolls of SAE's several years ago as an investment before I realized that I am a collector first and foremost. So, I decided to hang on to them and wait for silver to make a move before selling them. There are local dealers in my coin club that can't get their hands on enough SAE's to meet the demand. I'm thinking that I'll have to pay them a visit soon. In the end, I have the bulk of my collection, which is substantial, if I should need it to live on it, and a house that is $5,000 away from being totally paid off. I am blessed to be in a good position to weather a financial crisis should things go south. That said, I would rather not have things go south. Much better to have the resources, should I need them, rather than having to use them in order to weather a storm. Gary

Watch out! There's enough gold coins in your picture to give you gold fever! I got gold fever as a youth and still I have not been cured of it. This in spite of being retired with very little money to spend on it. The good thing is, I saw this coming a number of years ago and went on somewhat of a binge. While this has helped to lesson the severity of the symptoms, it has not cured me! There's just something about precious metals used in circulation that captivates my imagination! Good luck on the second box, I hope you don't have to wait 13 years to fill it! Gary

Congratulations! I can tell from your writings and photos that you are really happy together. I wish you many more anniversaries together! All the best! BTW, Nice gifts! The coin could not be anything else but a 70! Gary

Pristine coins and a top-notch collection! I look forward to your future posts. A guy in my coin club collects Irish coins but his are medieval coins. I photographed a few of his coins for him and for conversation pieces I'll post them here.

I'm sorry for your loss, and I understand the ebbs and flows of life that change our focus from what's important to what's more important. What I do know is that I miss you around here. Times change and I'm not around like I used to be. It has always been the good people here that keep me coming back. The coins are a common link in our relationships but are not necessary to the friendships forged here. Rick, for lack of a better term, you're what I consider, "good people." All the best. Gary

When I first look at a coin, I often ask myself, "What's this coin trying to tell me about itself?" Sometimes that coin's story is in its date, mintage, mintmark, die variety, and metallic composition, to name a few. However, I almost always find my coins' design features far more interesting than its technical characteristics. If they say a picture is worth a thousand words, I want to know what my coins' allegorical images intend to communicate. To help me research and understand the symbolic images on my coins, I ask myself five questions. They are: * I want to know "WHO" designed or commissioned my coins' minting. For instance, knowing that Augustus St. Gaudens designed the 1907 double-eagle tells me volumes about the artistic and symbolic images featured on that coin. * I want to know "WHAT" my coins represent or the message they convey other than a means of exchange. As an example, the Roman goddess Libertas or Lady Liberty appears on most of our classic coins. This message expresses the importance of personal freedom and liberty to our culture and society. * The "WHERE" of my research focuses on the nations and people issuing my coins. A country and its people tell me a lot about a coin's design. Conversely, a coin says a lot about the people and country circulating it. * The "WHEN" is the year and historical context of my coins. Coins don't pop up randomly in history. World events, at any point in history, have an impact on coin designs. Not only did the Standing Liberty Quarter represent a renascence in coin design, but it conveyed a message to the world of the United States' standing in World War I. * The "WHY" is the purpose of minting the coin. The ancient Romans used coins to disseminate propaganda. In polytheistic societies such as Ancient Rome, the Roman Emperor featured on the obverse of a coin wanted to identify himself with the reverse's deity. The effect of this was to have the people see him as a god. Now you don't necessarily have to answer all the W's to make an informed conclusion concerning your coin, but you need most of them. The following is a portion of an article I wrote for the PAN publication, "The Clarion." To read the rest of the story, you'll have to get a copy of the October 2020 issue. See which W's you can pick out in the clip below. A sentence in the Declaration of Independence reads as follows, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." This concept of liberty, eloquently described in the Declaration of Independence, has been at the core of who we are as Americans ever since. At the minting of our first coins, the architects of our constitution had to find a way to illustrate the values set forth by the Declaration of Independence onto our national coinage. For this, they chose the Roman goddess Libertas. Libertas or Lady Liberty is the Roman goddess of liberty and personal freedom. A liberated slave in ancient Rome received a conical cap called a pileus to symbolize their emancipation. The pileus, however, has been confused and interchanged with a Phrygian cap. The Phrygian cap became associated with a form of government during the French Revolution. We adapted the Phrygian cap to represent liberty during the Revolutionary War. Consequently, Lady Liberty often appears on our classic coinage wearing a Phrygian or Liberty cap. The coin I have pictured is a proof 1863 United States quarter. The central device on the reverse of this quarter is our national bird, the bald eagle. The obverse features a seated image of Libertas or Lady Liberty as she has become known. The obverse of this quarter employs several symbols to communicate the message of Liberty. The rock on which Lady Liberty sits could represent the country in which we live (The United States of America) and her power to bestow liberty on the inhabitants thereof. The imagery of a liberty cap atop a liberty pole goes back to ancient Rome. A group of senators assassinated Julius Caesar in 44 BC. After his death, the assassins marched through the streets with their weapons held high. One of them lifted a pileus surmounted on the tip of a spear to symbolize that Rome was free and no longer under the rule of Julius Caesar. Incidentally, there is an ancient Roman coin with a pileus on the reverse and a downward pointing knife on each side to commemorate this event. The obverse features conspirator Marcus Brutus. Like the raising of the pileus at Julius Caesar's demise, so is the raising of liberty caps on poles all around the colonies after the American Revolution. The shield held by Lady Liberty's right hand has 13 vertical bars and one horizontal bar. The vertical bars represent the 13 original states holding up one horizontal bar representing the federal government. Engraved on a scroll emblazoned across the shield are the letters LIBERTY to show Lady Liberty's willingness to defend it. Finally, by looking over her shoulder, Lady Liberty demonstrates her preparedness to meet any threats she encounters. Today liberty appears on our regularly circulating coins in name only. In place of a representative image, try to think of the contributions to our freedom made by presidents Lincoln, Jefferson, Roosevelt, Washington, and Kennedy whenever you pull their images out of your pocket. If you carry an Eisenhower dollar as a pocket piece, go ahead and pull that out also. Gary The following is a link to the Ancient Roman coin I referenced: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Brutusides.jpg

Nice photos! Especially, the double-eagle!

I've been watching the Wilhelmina side of the 10 Gulden for a couple of weeks now if only to gage the value of the coins in my set, especially the 1898 at MS-66.

Over the last few weeks, I haven’t had much time to write blogs. This is because I’ve been working on my photography skills and, in particular, axial photography. I have learned a lot, and now I have several excellent examples of coins photographed using axial photography. The first thing I did was to craft a holder for my glass reflector. Then I reinforced the edges of the glass with electrical tape to prevent the glass from accidentally shattering. For the holder, I used a cardboard box top sliced at 45 degrees towards the light source to hold the glass pane. The holder cost me nothing to make. However, it did cost my wife a glass pane from one of her pictures. Next, I made a diffuser for my light source cut from the side of a plastic milk jug. To prevent side light from illuminating the coin, I used a single-use pair of sunglasses from my eye doctor when she opened my iris. Conveniently, the sunglasses roll up like a tube. Finally, I used a lens hood I already owned to prevent side lighting from interfering with the camera lens. Folks, this is an excellent example of professional photography on the cheap! My set-up picture shows a portion of the light shine through the glass onto the back of the holder. The images of the camera’s viewfinder show the reflected light from the glass illuminating the surface of the coins. Since there is less light to work with, the film speed is ISO 400. The aperture is f4, and the shutter speed is 1/125. If this is done correctly, the area of the picture around the coin will be mostly dark. All you want to see in the viewfinder is the coin! Since plastic holders have reflective properties of their own, they can be challenging to work with. Therefore, axial photography works best on raw coins. Notice the haze and a hot spot in the viewfinder picture showing a 2011 French proof coin mounted in an NGC holder. This is light reflected from the surface of the holder interfering with light reflected from the coin. The 2004 and 2017 raw quarters only show light reflected from the quarters. Incidentally, the quarters are from my change dish. I have spent a lot of time learning to edit the photographs of certified coins to remove the interference from unwanted light. To reduce the effect of unwanted light, I have found the milk jug diffuser to be helpful. However, the quarters needed very few edits because of limited or no interference from unwanted light. I am also posting a raw 1856 Belgian 5 centime coin commemorating the 25th-anniversary reign of Leopold I, King of the Belgians. The coin is struck in bronze to illustrate the use of axial photography on heavily toned bronze coins. I hope this blog sheds a little light on axial photography. I always say that the proof is in the pudding. For your viewing pleasure, I am posting several pictures using axial photography. The 2011 French 10 euro proof coin commemorates the author of Les Miserables, Victor Hugo. The reverse inscription is roughly translated, “Cossette looked up, she saw the man coming to her with this doll as she saw the sun coming.” The reverse of this coin was incredibly hard to photograph because of its surface characteristics. The obverse, however, makes for a pleasing picture. Notice the mirror fields on axial photographs resemble the in-the-hand look of proof coins. Photos of proof mirrors typically show black when taken by direct light. The reverse of this coin has a frosty flat field showing black contrasted by the mirror of Victor Hugo’s image etched into the design. Other pieces for your viewing pleasure are a 1937 Spanish peseta and a 2019 Great Britain five-pound coin featuring Una and the Lion. Enjoy, Gary.

I've always known you have an excellent eye for quality and this submission is phenomenal! I suppose a pretty hefty dose of patience goes hand in hand with the good eye seeing that you're not intimidated into buying lower quality pieces.

It’s been a while since I posted about a submission I dreaded to send but finally mailed to NGC in June. As of August, NGC posted the grades of the last two coins of a nine-coin submission. This submission may have been the best I have ever sent. I divided the submission into four parts. The first is the WORLD-MODERN tier with three coins, followed by the WORLD-ECONOMY tier with two coins. Next is a single medal under the TOKEN-WORLD-VALUE tier, and finally, a three medal TOKEN-EARLY-BIRD tier to round out the submission. There was a twist in the WORLD-ECONOMY tier that I had not anticipated. The coin in question is a 1937 Spanish Second Republic peseta that I hoped would grade MS-63. Before NGC finalized the grade, they recommended that NCS should conserve the coin. The invoice they sent me was puzzling because they listed the grade of the coin at MS-64. However, because of my grading credits, I agreed to have this coin conserved that I originally purchased for only $8.00. Now, I would not have usually sent such an inexpensive coin in for grading, let alone conservation. However, this coin fits nicely into my Spanish peseta custom set. After conservation, the 1937 peseta received a final grade of MS-64+. The top-pop coin in the NGC census is MS-65. Considering the before and after pictures, I’m glad I gave my approval for NGC to conserve it. Now, an otherwise dull coin has come back to me, revealing spectacular luster. The other coin in my two-coin WORLD-ECONOMY tier is an 1869 Spanish 50-centime coin for my Spanish Provisional Government registry set. This coin is next to impossible to acquire in mint state condition. Good examples of raw circulated coins are also hard to come by on E-Bay. My hope for this coin was to have it graded VF-20. However, I knew this coin could go either way between F-15 and VF-20. I was thrilled when NGC graded the coin VF-20. I had been eyeing an MS-64 German medal for my seated imagery custom set on E-Bay for several years. However, in all those years, the seller never came down on his high asking price. Later, I bought a raw medal for approximately 40% less than the E-Bay medal in my watch list. After holding this piece for a couple of years, I finally sent it in to have it graded under the TOKEN-WORLD-VALUE tier. This medal came back to me graded at MS-65. My WORLD-MODERN submission features two coins for my Inspirational Ladies custom set and one for my Spanish peseta custom set. I had hoped for the 2001 Spanish 2000 peseta coin that I purchased to grade MS-65. Instead, I was delighted to get a top-pop grade of MS-68 for this beautifully toned coin. Late last year, I purchased a 2019 Great Britain “Una and the Lion” silver five-pound coin. Since I purchased this coin, the value of the coin has skyrocketed. Naturally, I had hoped for a PF-70 grade but realistically expected a PF-69. Unfortunately, I ended up with the expected PF-69 grade. Notwithstanding, this coin today is worth at least twice as much as what I paid for it. The last coin in this tier is a 1998 German 10-mark coin that received an expected grade of MS-64. Both these coins are currently residing in my Inspirational Ladies custom set. Rounding out my total submission is a three medal TOKEN-EARLY-BIRD tier. A while back, I lost an E-Bay auction for an “American Bar Association” medal for my Laura Gardin Fraser custom set. The biding had gone over $500 when I gave up. Shortly after that, I found another medal listed on E-Bay for a Buy-It-Now price of less than $100. The only caveat was that the seller thought the medal was a fake. I thought otherwise and quickly snapped it up. I was hoping for an MS-62 grade but figuratively did cartwheels when I got a fully authentic MS-64 grade. The other two medals are the silver “Society of Medalists #1” medal by Laura Gardin Fraser and the “Edmond H. Harriman Memorial Medal” by James Earle Fraser. Both of these medals I would have liked graded MS-67, but the “Society of Medalists” medal returned with a grade of MS-66. Incidentally, the “Society of Medalists” medal is a silver restrike of the bronze medal using the original dies, and it has a reported mintage of 125. Both these medals are now part of my Laura Gardin Fraser custom set. Overall, I couldn’t be happier, especially since there are no “details graded” coins and medals in the entire submission. Gary

I always tell people to do what they have to when it comes to COVID-19. Sorry about your cruise. It looks like my daughter's Icelandic wedding in October will be cancelled. Its kind of hard catching a flight out of the country if our planes can't land anywhere outside the US. As for registered mail, I have never had a problem with it except that it can be slower because of the extra security. Finally, you have a mighty fine looking set there and I'm happy to hear that Sam is making great progress!

In a recent blog post, I mused over having to fill out one of those dreaded NGC submission forms. As with most things I procrastinate over, I eventually got around to it. I have also written about The American Bar Association medallion I bought from a seller on E-Bay who thought it was a fake. Well, today is the moment of truth. That medallion finally made it to NGC, and the grade was released today. If you remember, I wrote in my blog post on April 4, 2020, that I purchased an American Bar Association medal from an E-Bay seller who thought it was a fake. Of course, I thought otherwise. Because the item was offered for hundreds of dollars less than I could otherwise purchase it, I decided to take a chance and buy it. At that, I finally sent it to NGC for authentication and grading. If you’re like me, you are constantly checking on the status of your submissions. After the status changes to grading/quality control, the wait for finalized/imaged/shipped is almost unbearable. Then your status changes and NGC releases the grades. Now unless NGC is in the practice of encapsulating fakes, my medallion is authenticated with a grade of MS-64! I trusted my gut on this, and after hoping for a grade of MS-62, its time for “happy dance!” Presently, other of my coins and medals are waiting on grading. For now, I’m sitting on the edge of my seat, anticipating more good news. Below is the write up of this medallion for my Laura Gardin Fraser custom set. Every year since 1929, The American Bar Association awards this medallion designed by Laura Gardin Fraser for "Exceptionally distinguished service by a lawyer or lawyers to the cause of American jurisprudence." This medallion is an unawarded 75mm example of the ABA medallion struck in gilded bronze. From the reverse picture, it appears as if the gilt did not uniformly take. This medallion is also struck in two sizes 100mm and 75mm, of which the 100mm is scarcer. It's struck in bronze, 24k and 14k gold, and gilt bronze. The obverse features a bust of Chief Justice John Marshall (chief justice of the supreme court between 1801-1835). The motto "TO THE END IT MAY BE A GOVERNMENT OF LAWS AND NOT OF MEN" is contained in the Massachusetts Bill of Rights and written by John Adams. The reverse features a seated image of Justitia holding a scale in her right hand and a downward pointing sheathed sword with her left. Laura Gardin Fraser's monogram appears below Justitia. Gary

I got that Saturn V rocket for myself one year on my birthday. I had a blast putting it together! It's now on display on a bookshelf. ...And yes, adults also love Lego's.

Time and again you show that you have a very good eye for premium quality coins! There may not be another Iceland collection on the face of the earth better than yours! Congratulations! Gary

Ben must be a chip of the old block!

At least my daughter wants to keep my Laura Gardin Fraser set intact