I took this photo of the same 1878 8tf Morgan I have been posting on. With the light coming from the right side, I increased contrast after seeing something strange, then darkened for more clarity. What is this?
Here are more angles and adjusted lighting. Now I think I see part of the Wreath on the forehead, from a straight on shot you cannot see the wild lips, only from a picture taken at an angle. Also, the way I take the photos gives away every imperfection on the coin, so believe me these pics are honest. I just want to know whats going on with this coin!
Post a pic of the entire coin, obv & rev, instead of just selected areas. Often that makes it much easier to see what if anything happened.
Here it is, the thing that has me going picture crazy is that there are so many different VAM features on this one coin. Most of them when a pic is taken at an angle, or different lighting.
That's better Looks like an ordinary clashed die Morgan to me. Don't ask me which VAM - I have no idea. I decided many years ago to never even try to figure that out. Ya see, to me it's pointless since ALL Morgans are VAMS.
I need to understand the (clashing) process . I mean you have the Head with line marks that continue on the surface of the coin off the face with no alteration. Are the line marks on the face part of a Die Clash? Why does this Morgan show all the characteristics of a Hot Lips VAM, yet it seems to be normal from looking straight on? It appears to at least have the Feathers from the arrows imprinted on the cheek. And much more! Even though there are many VAMS out there, how common is it to have soooo many on one coin? How can this coin be Graded as a VAM 20 when it has the same features as many other VAMS?
First of all a VAM is not a grade - it is a variety; and with each and every die pair there is a new VAM. How you can have so many one coin simply depends on what happened to that particular die pair. First of all, there is a die clash on this coin, perhaps even more than one. But whatever it was that happened, it was unique to this die pair as it is with all VAMS. But that doesn't mean that you can't one or several different diagnostics similar to more than one VAM. All it would take would be a similar set circumstances occuring to different die pairs. This one may be new, an as yet undiscovered VAM. There are literally thousands of them out there. But then again - it may be one that is well known. That I can't tell you since I don't study them.
GDJMSP- I do thank you for taking the time to look. Becky and nesvt have looked at my other post about this coin and think its a VAM 20. But some of this is new since then. If you know anyone who can take a look at this, please have them give me some input. Thanks
