Hey all, Since started this hobby some 12 years ago when my dad and I went to Colorado, I have had one main book, photograde by James Ruddy (picked up at denvor mint) and of course the red book. Well since I mostly deal in mint state coins now, this book no longer serves a purpose because it only goes to AU not to mention the thing is 10 year old. Now not being in this for business this book served amazingly well with cleaning, preservation, mint procedure, grading of all us coins, history, etc. So now I'm looking for a new all encompassing book. Not being in business I don't need die variety, ect, just a basic updated book. Being able to grade ms coins now would be a definite plus. And again history, storage, ect again is nice....all encompassing. Also one that covers all us coins, as I've turned into a type guy. I've seen some suggest grade/counterfeit/PCGS book? So are there any suggestions for a good updated all encompassing coin book?
Buy the ANA Grading Guide and look for the first edition of the PCGS grading and counterfeit detection guide.
ANA grading standars guide, and look at PCGS photo grade: http://www.pcgs.com/photograde/ The photograde site should give you an idea at what one of the major grading services uses in determining grade when slabbing coins.
Quick questions. I'm at a bookstore with the gf. You mention ana grading, I found one. But it's spiraled then in a hard cover and the black and white pages, no? Also there's grading coins by photographs David peers, again spiral but with color images. Thoughts?
Black and white pages and photos in the ANA book.....yes. It's the reading part more that the photography. Where to look for the first points of wear and so on.....
Here is a FREE link to 'How to Grade U.S. Coins' by James L. Halperin... This book has color pictures and explains the high-points of coins like no other book I have read: http://www.coingrading.com/intro1.html Good Luck :smile
Honestly, trying to learn how to grade by looking at 1 picture of a coin in that grade is worse than worthless, it is downright harmful. Yeah I know now you're going to ask why. It's simple, look a 100 pictures of a coin all the same date and mint and all the same grade, by the same grading company. I can pretty much guarantee you that 75 or more of those 100 pictures will look different than all the others. So how can you possibly learn how to grade by looking at 1 picture ? You can't. What you have to do is get the books, read and study the text and ignore the pictures. That gives you the basic rules (criteria) for grading. Then you need to look at literally thousands and thousands of coins, in hand. That gives you the basic experience you need to learn how to grade. And that's just for 1 coin. The same thing must be repeated for each different coin type.
Sounds very difficult, but I'm sure it's all perfectly true. Much easier to be an naïvely confident in NGC & PCGS to do all this hard work for me. Now with CAC, I can even double-down on my naivety. Good thing I don't have too much money for coins, or else I might get myself into some real trouble.
That's what I'm using to try to learn more about the "art of grading." I like the descriptions that are provided and also the information regarding wear pattens and the areas where wear can most dramatically impact the grading. The pictures are interesting but only when taken in the context of the other information. By themselves, they're not all that helpful.
