It's sad when this is better then anything the US mint has put out.

Saw this link on Facebook. I really like the designs. They'll be super expensive and probably poorly done but the artwork is really moving.
http://news.coinupdate.com/great-war-remembrance-coin-series-designed-by-joel-iskowitz/

 

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I agree that the artwork itself is beautiful.

As an aside, please read the second paragraph of post #6 from the following thread: https://www.cointalk.com/threads/is-it-worth-more-then-a-dollar.313548/#post-3034346.

 

Now that's what our coins should look like.

 

I'm 15 and I've made better designs than the US mint rubbish. Also that is a beautiful design, it would make a great commemorative coin.

 

The utilitarian need will outweigh any artistic need. Many countries just have basic info and a numeral denomination. If you only have to strike 5,000 or such, you can be artistic; to strike 100,000+ per die, you have to make the design for survival.

 

I don't think that does anything to excuse the recent commemorative designs.

 

Exactly. Plenty of countries make beautiful detailed coins for collectors that blow away the design detail/quality the US commemoratives have sunk too

 

On a side note, the more detailed any 'new beautiful' coins may possibly be , if the quantity is in the millions, there will be "tons" (as they say) of new varieties and MDD 'errors' which will be considered by thousands of our Youtube friends to be worth thousands of dollars..............and most know the rest I am sure

 

Wow they are beautiful

 

Beautiful designs.

The problem is that when the Mint engravers get their hands on that design it will turn out looking like the rest of our US coins.
Particularly if it were a business strike.
And a commemorative would look only marginally better.
The main part of the reason is that the dies made for striking them just cannot accommodate that much detail.

 

I agree. This is the only place I could find selling them. And their photos don't look very nice.
https://www.bradford.co.uk/100yearsbge.html

 

If the Bradford Exchange can do this, why can’t the US Mint? I understand that dies have to last, but the Mint also doesn’t have to put out jillions of the coins unless they want to.

Frankly, this design makes me embarrassed that I paid good money for one of our WWI silver dollars.

On a related note, is it yours truly just not paying attention — or has there been a marked slowdown of the garbage coming out of the Mint this year?

 

"Dies have to last" is a not really a reason for NCLT. Let's assume that each die costs $1000 to make (NWT charges range from $150-$1500 per). Even if they only last 5000 strikes, that works out to $0.40 per coin. I'd happily pay $1 more per coin if it improves the artistry of the coin.

I see at least 2-3 potential problems. The first is that the machinery the mint uses may not be up to the task. We know they had to buy new machines for the Ultra High Relief 2009 gold and the 5 oz. hockey pucks, but I have no idea how on the age or specs of what they use to strike standard sized "stuff."

Inertia, ennui, and leadership at the mint may be a bigger problem. Commemorative coins are a sideline for them, and there's may not be enough personal and professional awards to drive improvement. It's a lot easier to quantify technical quality and consistency than artistry. While I'd rather have an MS-67 coin with an attractive design than a boring MS-70 coin, management may be emphasizing the latter over the former. I wonder if anyone at the Mint even cares about the dismal sales figures put up by series like the Boys Town coins.

But even before a single die is cast (well, carved), the design process stinks. The U.S. hasn't had an official chief engraver since 2010. Designs need approval by not one, but 2 committees, and they are apparently approved on the basis of enlarged drawings and flat concept art rather than minted prototypes. Nor, given the size difference, was the same design ever going to look good on a quarter and a 5 oz hockey puck.

 

The artist renditions are lovely, now lets see the actual production pieces.

And the arguments about die life don't hold water when you are taking about Commemorative coins because the mintage aren't that high.

 

How does one elect a Chief Engraver ?

 

Not elected, the chief engraver is a presidential appointment position.

 

I'm afraid that hasn't been correct for more than 20 years. Congress abolished the presidential appointment in 1996. John Mercanti was given the title in 2001 by the Mint Director Edmund Moy without being appointed directly by the President nor confirmed by the Senate.

 

Thanks I was unaware that Congress abolished the appointment.

 

Sorry, but I don't find those designs very good at all, at least as far as a minted product. They indeed are beautiful as drawings, with highly detailed shadows and highlights. In such a drawing, all the details show as the artist intended, but when minted into a coin the highlights and shadows are dependent on how the coin is lit. It is this reason that the photos of the coins don't look so hot...they are not lit exactly as the artist intended with original design drawings. I think this is an indication that the artist is very good in a 2D medium, but perhaps not so much as a sculptor. Coins are sculptures, albeit low-relief ones, and need to be treated as such. Too much fine detail is present in these coins, and it does not translate well from the 2D medium to 3D.