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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;SuperDave, post: 2795971, member: 1892&quot;]The funny thing about Proofs vs. highly lustrous coins is that the practice which smooths out the blinding reflectivity of luster - diffusion - does Proofs no good. This, I think, is because of the difference in the field surfaces at a microscopic level. Luster is caused by the granularity of the surfaces, tiny irregularities and graininess. This makes for a thousand little &quot;mirrors&quot; reflecting light back into the lens from the right angle - about 90 degrees from the direction of the lighting - causing the &quot;crisscross&quot; effect of bright and dark bands on the fields:</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]650469[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>Diffusion mellows this so you can get lesser contrast between the field surfaces which directly reflect and those which don&#039;t, which screw up the thinking of a camera&#039;s digital sensor more than it does your eyes or mine.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Proofs, on the other hand, have as nearly a perfectly smooth surface as the Mint could achieve. None of that microgranularity causing reflections - applied lighting simply bounces off in the exact physical direction one would expect of a mirror&#039;s reflection. There are far fewer places on the surface of a Proof which will mathematically reflect applied light directly back into the lens, noted (in part) by the &quot;spray&quot; of tiny spots of direct reflectivity behind the head on your &quot;better&quot; obverse image.</p><p><br /></p><p>And, having removed the diffusion, you also remove the tradeoff which diffusion costs the photographer - lesser contrast. So your second set of images have far greater contrast than the diffused set, and show the coin off to better effect.</p><p><br /></p><p>Lighting follows strict rules of physics. Unfortunately, those rules change for every composition and level of luster. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie1" alt=":)" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" />[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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