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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:38 pm 
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wolf wrote:
Situation #2
Hi gemn00b I've got a blue sapphire here close as I can come is its a #30 on that Gemewizard program, can ya help out here I need a match for it for a pair of earrings?

Now gemn00b has a pretty good idea what I 'm looking for and yup he has 4 stones of the proper size and pretty near #30's on his Gemewizard.
He gets back to me and sends them to me I lookem over and say yup this one is close enough for government work .. send him back the other 3 and payem for the one I kept.

Result happy gemn00b .. happy me


This situation doesn't require any fancy Gemewizard for 430 usd. If you are only interested in "close enough", - use colour swatch http://www.resene.co.nz/swatches/resene ... colour.htm
or simmilar colour matching device. :)


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:39 pm 
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JB

And I understand all that. However the group on this forum is particularly well informed and educated, and I do not think you can assume the level of this audience to be the average level.

Now take many who do not have this level of education, in the USA, Europe, Asia or elsewhere. Take the buyers who do not know. Yes... my bad as a buyer, but that won't prevent a dispute. If all sales were based on a rational argumentation and exchange of ideas, we would never have a trade dispute.
Fred Ward would have never had the (in)famous law suit. Things, unfortunately do not go in a linear way.

Second: can you tell me how much more precise indicating a color range is through GEW, compared to simply emailing a few photos of what I want ? Where would you say lie the differences and weaknesses in the second approach compared to the first ? (Images compared to GEW)


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:50 pm 
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Perhaps I ran into a tree and missed the forest

If the gemewizard people could physically print on paper/plastic a color sampler like this , that corresponded to the actual colors they intended to be generated on our monitors, could they not have these available for a small printing and mailing charge, so we could purchase one and thus calibrate our monitors ( if we wished) to their colors?

It would be to everyone's benefit, not only for this online version of gemewizard, but also for their other programs. What am I missing?

Jim


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 Post subject: colorswatch
PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:52 pm 
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Color swatch: Dammmm that is cool. Yeah with that in your hand.. how much more do you need ?


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 2:55 pm 
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Hi Patrick:

Hmmm .... kk not sure how long you have been in the business, maybe you have been burnt so you're a little reluctant to trust. There are a number of people (some here on this forum) who have no qualms about sending me stones before they receive payment. Now granted gemn00b isn't one of them, don't honestly know wheather he would or not. Since he and I have never done business the question has never arisen.

*chuckle* would love to be able to send gemn00b a pic of the stone unfortunately I don't own a camera, but I can access gemewizard on the internet and so can gemn00b :)

a.vesselovski:

Unfortunately colour swatches fade ... just visit your nearby Home Depot grab a couple of colour swatches and leave them in the sun you'll see what I mean.

_________________
A Chinese proverb says "Gold is valuable, Jade is Priceless."


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 Post subject: prints
PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 3:01 pm 
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Desert: There are some severe problems with *printing*. It's actually proposed before, and you can standardize the print, ink, paper etc etc, but it's not a simple task. In one of my previous postings (page 1) I link to some photography website. There are articles in there, dealing exactly with that problem.

In fact there is a great book, published 2 years ago, with or by Si and Ann Frasier (I forgot the title). It dealt with structures and colors in stones and had beautiful imaginary. The person who published, was a former senior Apple executive, and wanted to have perfect images, which colors represented "real life" as much as possible. We had a meeting at their home where he spoke how he had produced the book. He actually spent a year trying to calibrate everything from real life, to images, to screen to ink, to paper etc etc. He did it. It was amazing to hear him talk about it.. but it cost him a year or more, ONLY to deal with color calibrations.

About calibrating your screen there are independent standards for how colors can be represented on your screen. GEW actually has to make use of the fact that your screen IS calibrated, so the colors on your screen, look like those on my screen. So what you need to do is to find an outside source that tells you how to "tune your colors".

There is software + sensor of third party vendors for that, that professional photographers use (as well). Read a review on this photo-website:

http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/revi ... r3pro.html

It's the best around at the moment. Does a really nice job.


Last edited by Patrick on Thu Jan 24, 2008 6:59 am, edited 3 times in total.

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 Post subject: trust
PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 3:04 pm 
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It's all about trust. That was one of my points. And then GEW is pretty.. well.. not very useful.

I trust a lot of people, until the opposite has been proven, so no worries, the people we work with are amazing. So far only good experiences for me.


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 3:46 pm 
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OK... I'm not entirely sure how *I* got dragged into this conversation, but (for the record) I would be inclined to send any member of this forum a stone on memo (ship it to them without requiring payment beforehand) assuming that I had done some business with them before or knew someone who had and would vouch for them. Wolf doesn't fall into the first category, but he does fall into the second. ;)

That being said (and fully realizing that I was just being used as a "for instance"), I can see some real value to the software model. It is easier to look at a series of colors on a screen and choose one that "matches" best than it is to take a proper photograph and manipulate it so that it "matches" the stone.

P.S. Unless I'm missing something, neither Canada nor San Francisco is on a separate continent from me. ;)


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 4:28 pm 
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desertgem wrote:
Perhaps I ran into a tree and missed the forest
If the gemewizard people could physically print on paper/plastic a color sampler like this , that corresponded to the actual colors they intended to be generated on our monitors, could they not have these available for a small printing and mailing charge, so we could purchase one and thus calibrate our monitors ( if we wished) to their colors?
It would be to everyone's benefit, not only for this online version of gemewizard, but also for their other programs. What am I missing?



- Printed colours ( on the paper) doesn't look like colours on the monitor. (Monitor - RGB, printed - CMYK.)

- Printed colours on the paper doesn't work for gemstones colour grading. Stones are transparent - paper is not. And it is impossible to train grader to match colour of the stone with colour of printed pallete.

- Solution is simple, "print" colours on the transparent plastic. And GIA did that. They make 324 transparent plastic colour "stones". The problem with that, - it's not enough. You need at least 1000 "grades" to cover an average inventory. But manufacturing of even small, 234 colour sets is so difficult, that GIA droped whole idea.

About 2-3 years I tried to make "a colour grading device", which was made from the few plastic discs (wheel of hues, tone and saturation) wrapped in the metal case. By positioning discs in the certain positions it was possible to get about 2400 grades. But market for such device is not there... unfortunately.


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 4:59 pm 
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wolf wrote:
*chuckle* would love to be able to send gemn00b a pic of the stone unfortunately I don't own a camera, but I can access gemewizard on the internet and so can gemn00b :)


Perhaps 430 USD will be better spend on the camera? Besides, gemewizard online version is not user friendly, slow and not very usefull. You can't search for the colour description, save your grade, and even can't link to your grade. Sorry, but as an application for colour grading gemsstones online and sharing this information with others, gemewizard online version is below any ratings.


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 5:12 pm 
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a.vesselovski wrote:
About 2-3 years I tried to make "a colour grading device", which was made from the few plastic discs (wheel of hues, tone and saturation) wrapped in the metal case. By positioning discs in the certain positions it was possible to get about 2400 grades. But market for such device is not there... unfortunately.


The market isn't there? We're talking about a system that attempts to "solve" a "problem" that an entire community agrees exists... sure sounds like your device might have a potential audience.


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 Post subject: color
PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 5:55 pm 
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I think that the folks at Pantone, Nikon, Canon, etc would find it hilarious to find Gemewizard provides no venue for calibrating color in their otherwise ambitious effort to describe the nuances of color in gemstones. Now, if they would do that then they might be really onto something. Good Luck!
jr


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 6:54 pm 
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If you go to the GemeWizard link that was provided in the original post of this thread, open the link and click on the "forum" link and then to the "General" topic category, you may find some answers.

The calibration limitations are discussed there, as well as corrective steps that may be taken as well as what GemeWizard is doing to negate the problem across the board.

And yes, you must take the program pretty seriously to go to the trouble of monitor calibrations as they suggest, but if you paid the original cost of the program, I'd assume you are a serious user and want to get the most from the software.

If it's not for you (generically) then there's always the verbal alpha numeric color descriptions which can be just as accurate as shooting at the side of the barn, or any other system that no one agrees on en masse.


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 Post subject: online version
PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 7:21 pm 
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JB: that is the same info as their FAQ sheet. It discusses the software I actually linked to in my first posting. I think I gave my opinion about their documentation. And no.. ripping other people's manuals and throwing it together does not even come close to the most basic requirements of the concept "documentation".

------------

I checked the online version. Kinda buggy in Firefox 2. It is kinda slow and all but it does seem to do the most important things. Email arrived 2 hours later. Probably server issues ? Agree with Vesselovski in his assessment.

I would like to see an "embed code", as well as a url. That's pretty standard for any type of widget these days.

I think it's a decent alpha version, but definitely not yet ready for prime time.


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 23, 2008 8:09 pm 
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As my final offering on this subject, from a slightly different angle;
There is far more damage done on a daily basis by slight of hand dealers, misfeasance and the just plain ignorant who either intentionally or unknowingly misrepresent the nature including color of their gemstones.

When someone at least makes an effort in an honest attempt to bring some uniformity into the equation, stakes are planted and fires are lit to exorcise the demons from the community.

If the gemological community as a whole expects everyone involved in the industry to hold a Doctorate in color sciences and comp. tech., Then there will be about a dozen gemstones dealers left in the world.

If I had a choice between a dealer that offered a gemstone described by the GemeWizard software or the same gemstone described by another dealer as AAA+ Peachy keeny ultra orange neon fluorescent Topaz, along with some photo shopped image, I would lend more credibility to the former.

Again, as already stated, the final decision would not be by description but by actual viewing. I just want to know that I'm dealing with someone who is trying to solve problems, not create them.


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