Photograde - Coin Community Forum

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Author	Replies: 4 / Views: 2,820
johnstac Valued Member United States 327 Posts	Posted 07/23/2010 10:27 pm I often use the online Photograde site to help grade coins. The only problem is that some of the differences between grades are tough to see even in the photos, for example AU50, AU53, AU55, etc. In doing a search on this site, I found that many recommend a book called, "Photograde: Official Photographic Grading Guide for United States coins, 19th Edition, 2005. Is this book more helpful than the PCGS Photograde images? I am hoping for more text to help out with close grades. Thanks. Report this Post to the Staff

carmykle Pillar of the Community United States 2448 Posts	Posted 07/24/2010 09:29 am I've been told by a lot of "Old Timers" that there is no substitute for the experience of looking at the coin. I know that's frustrating because I too would like to see and read a quantitative and qualitative source for grading. Unfortunately it's all subjective. What you would call MS63, I might grade at AU58 because of one small detail. As some put it, the coin could be a "slider"; you've heard of people jokingly referring to AU63. Well that's the problem with grading. Take a stance on a coin and then ask for opinions in this forum. Most are happy to give an opinion, but most won't give up information on their special ability because they have it from looking at coins; hundreds or thousands of them. Report this Post to the Staff
mattbrowning7 Valued Member United States 321 Posts	Posted 07/25/2010 02:35 am Carmykle is right. you just gotta get out there and look at coins. lots of them. but books are very helpful guidelines. My suggestion is to pick up as many books as you can on grading. Ruddy's Photograde, ANA Standards, PCGS's Official Guide to coin grading and Counterfeit Detection, etc. My theory is that once I read a wide range of grading perspectives coupled with studying a whole bunch of coins, I will have a strong understanding of how to grade and eventually I hope to be able to predict what certain companies will grade based on what I've learned about their standards. Report this Post to the Staff
wheatguy Pillar of the Community United States 1534 Posts	Posted 07/26/2010 1:04 pm Try becoming a member of Heritage. There is no cost to join and they have an enormous archive of coins they have previously sold. There are tons of coins in all grades there, and can help hone your grading skills. Also, I agree with the two posts above. There is no magic solution to grading, experience is the best teacher. Report this Post to the Staff
johnstac Valued Member United States 327 Posts	Posted 07/26/2010 5:25 pm Carmykle, very good info. I think grading is very very subjective. When looking at morgans on the PCGS photograde section of their site, I sometimes get confused. I see an XF45 with great hair detail along the bangs, then the next better condition, an AU50 has flatter bangs and less detail. Then the next better grade, an AU53, the well detailed bangs are back! I'm thinking to myself, there has to be more to grading than just photos. I think some text would help a lot, and then ideally I think looking at morgan after morgan after morgan in your hand would be the most beneficial. But that is only provided that an expert would be willing to sit down with you and help in my judgements would be also important. I just bought a Lincoln Cent for over $100 at MS63+. The seller indicates that there are some features that could make it MS64. The difference between MS63 and MS64 on this particular coin is several hundred dollars. This is a situation where education is so very important. I think the most a person can do, it educate themselves and specifically educate themselves in the series they collect the most of. I'm not sure any one person could learn every grading aspect for every US Coin series. Aside from books like Photograde, I have bought books specific to particular series; Lincoln in this case. Even still, I wish I had the opportunity to look at coin after coin with someone that could help educate me. It's still a lot of fun nonetheless! Report this Post to the Staff
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