The practice of juicing photos of toned coins on E-Bay in order to make the colors appear more vivid has become so commonplace that it is almost accepted in the marketplace. I have taken great pride in cataloging my collection and attempting to take photographs that are high quality, aesthetically pleasing, and represent the actual appearance of the coin. I just completed re-imaging most of my higher end coins and was stunned when I compared my new photos to those taken by the E-Bay sellers from whom I purchased the coins. I would like to show everyone a few examples from some of the biggest rainbow toned coin sellers on E-Bay. I will not divulge the names of the sellers and I ask those of you who recognize the seller's photo style not to publicly post their E-Bay name. We can easily discuss our opinions of their photos and the problem of photo juicing in a general sense without making it personal. For each coin shown, I would like to know whether you think the seller intentionally altered (juiced) the colors of the image in an attempt to increase financial gain or whether you think the difference between my photo and the sellers is a result of camera, lighting, and angle. Too make this easy, just use the term JUICED for every photo that you think was altered. For reference, my photos will always be on the bottom. Okay, here we go! Coin#1) 1944-D Jefferson Nickel NGC MS67 "T" (Appalachian) Coin#2) 1961-D Roosevelt Dime NGC MS65 FT Coin#3) 1958-D Franklin Half Dollar NGC MS67* The top photo was taken by Heritage. I know that Heritage does not intentionally juice photos but wanted to point out that the actual coin does not appear red at all. The middle photo is from the E-Bay seller. My photo on the bottom is a very accurate representation of the actual appearance of the coin. Coin#4) 1880-S Morgan Dollar NGC MS64* Coin#5) 1880-S Morgan Dollar NGC MS65 This coin is very deeply toned over semi-prooflike surfaces. It is extraordinarily difficult to photograph. This is the best photo that I could take and if you look closely, you can see the reflection of my entire camera in the coin. Keep that in mind when you decide. Coin#6) 1999 SAE PCI MS67 "Blast White" LOL Now it is time for you opinions regarding these photos. Please answer by listing the coin number and either the word JUICED or NO. For example, if you believe every seller's image is altered, your list would look like this. JUICED JUICED JUICED JUICED JUICED JUICED As always, commentary is welcome!
good thread. im not really into numis., and are well aware that pictures of coins are highly variable. Never knew that they were doing this.
Here are my thoughts with small commentary: 1) Juiced 2) Juiced 3) More Juice than I can drink on a Sunday morning 4) No, very accurate, just lighted a little bit 5) No, also accurate, and probably just lightened a bit as well 6) Juiced
First off, by your definition, I believe they are all juiced. "...intentionally altered (juiced) the colors of the image in an attempt to increase financial gain." I am positive that each picture was purposely taken to bring out the colors. They're goal is to sell colorful coins. They would be fools to take pictures that did anything that flattened or deadened the colors. Just setting my camera on "vivid" or a hyped "custom" as opposed to "neutral" would accomplish most the differences you are seeing. All that being said, I played with the pix using GIMP. Just using the saturation, here is the number I had to use to turn the seller's pix into an approximation of your pix. Granted, this is an approximation, but it is better than a SWAG. 1. -30 2. -30 3. -50 4. -40 5. -30 6. -70 My opinion would be that #3 and #6 went too far for sure. I will let you draw your own conclusions for the rest.
Coin #2, photo #1 and Coin #3, photo #2 were the only ones that seemed excessively juiced to my eye. That said, some saturation and/or contrast enhancement is likely present in a few more photos (coin 1 and coin 6), but not enough for me to scream JUICED!
