1876 S Seated Quarter

@MikeF I'm definitely not taking it personally. I have tried zooming on the smaller coins, and it does improve the focus and thus mage quality (as well as the lighting).

I have ordered a system from Ray (rmpsrpms), so hopefully after a bit of a learning curve, my images will improve.

VF-30 Details, cleaned.




Ray (rmpsrpms) is one of the coin photography experts on the CCF.

Yes, he shares a lot of information in the photography sub-forum, and has a link to his website in his signature. His coin photos are spectatcular.

I wanted to get a fixed setup for imaging my collection, as well as the items I will sell on ebay. My hope is that the setup I ordered (and following his procedures) will make the picture quality much better and consistent, and the process much less time consuming.

au details cleaned. those shields and other details don't look vf to me.

Not sure how the heck people are getting VF35. This coin is AU sharpness with almost no wear on the reverse. I don't think it was cleaned, either, perhaps dipped at one point.

The current and previous Numismatist magazine are running an excellent series about the quality control issues that resulted in these coins being struck so poorly when new, thanks to a combination of mismanagement, ignorance, and cronyism; workers who were upset about the way they, and their workmates, were being treated may have also deliberately sabotaged the production effort by putting absolutely zero effort into the minting and quality control processes. The result is that some of the mid 70s San Fran issues are also some of the poorest-quality issues in the entire Lib Seated coin series across their denominations.

Even from those photos I am coming in at AU on this coin.

This is the best I'm able to manage right now. I put it in the sun near the window, but the sun is pretty low these days. I can't quite get them entirely in focus. I think I need to look into getting new glasses.






Edit: What doesn't come through on these is that the dark areas are a bluish violet toning.

Better! No way does this coin get close to au with that obverse. Also there are way too many parallel hairlines for a straight grade.

xf-40 details best case scenario based on these pictures.