Why do people say diamonds are not rarer than colored gemstones?

[PrecisionGem]

Also step cuts bring out by far the best color.

I wouldn't agree with this. On what basis do you think this? In my experience of cutting over 4000 stones, I don't find this to be true.

 

[Lexililac]

I wouldn't agree with this. On what basis do you think this? In my experience of cutting over 4000 stones, I don't find this to be true.

Your right, its not because of the step cut itself its because of enough deep (what mostly in step cuts gets improved). Color improves when the gem get enough deep / enough body. Of course that can be also improved by making a high crown. If a medium toned and medium saturated get cut in a standard round brilliant it will appear lighter as the same is cut in a asscher cut for example. If just brilliancy is maximized the gem has less deep and color looks lighter. Maybe in a since perspective it is still the same color/saturation but from a graduating/appearance point of view, as how I see the gem as in person, color appearance improve when the gem get enough body.

I did ones some cuts in medium tone purple spinel as well as in medium tone Aussie green sapphire to watch differences. That one for example would appear lighter with a flat crown for example.
.

 

[Nosean]

Yes there are physical constants. But in reality you have a endless variety of "exceptions". Just for example: Corundum after their physical constant is just a colorless transparent mineral. In nature thats a extremely rarity as many of the Al-atomes are exchanged through different atoms what absorbs the light differently and create color. So there is a endless variety of color, shapes, inclusions and so on. Imagine there would exist just white, perfectly clean sapphires in a single perfectly crystalized way. Wouldn't that be very boring? I not understand the point and effort to canalize, banalize, standardize that endless variety and beauty. It seems to me its trying to put nature in a narrow corset to label it afterwards as "perfectioned". I personally love and appreciate the endless variety and beauty of the nature itself and Iike to play free with color, shape, cuts ect. in that wide field of gems.

Excellent post.

I love so many of my gems with a not perfect cut or inclusion but they have a „personality„ . And often for example an unique color.

 

[Lexililac]

My point in the end is that if you have a rough pice there is not "the only one best cut" for it. Its about what potential you see in it and what you think you can bring out, reach, improve. If you say maximum brilliance is all what counts then it make sense to go for it. There is nothing bad about when you have a rough were that make sense. But if you want a specific pattern play, maximize color, go for a specific shape, put a silky appearance in the focus and and and... you will miss that all in just maximizing the brilliance. And thats what I mean with it that it would be a waste. Its about bring the full potential of beauty out of a rough and what is beauty? There it goes about taste. If you have a beautiful silky Kashmir sapphire you can get angry about the stupid silkiness witch works against brilliancy or you can bring that out well balanced in combination with the amazing color and you will get a dreamy beautiful gem. As Nosean said: a gem with a "personality"

 

[Seaglow]

Excellent post.

I love so many of my gems with a not perfect cut or inclusion but they have a „personality„ . And often for example an unique color.

I try to find gems that are good cuts, pleasant face up - i think they could be the best value for money. Anything less, I’d have them recut...some with exact dimensions - here at PS they are called precision cuts, in Bangkok they are the cuts for the American Market (best rare stones goes to Europe). Lol.

I’ve talked to cutters about this, it’s not so easy. The color zoning in sapphires like in blues, you need that color spot in a lot of cases. So there are times the culet won‘t be centered to ”catch” the color spot less you end up with a face up stone that is uneven with obvious zoning or a colorless center face up. I’ve also heard horror stories of rough and recuts of alex’ and pads, a cutter losing money because the alex’ lost the color-change and the pad lost the orange-pink-yellow mix of colors. Rubies are also tricky - roughs usually flat so there is very little precision cut here over a carat. And ofcourse, the cobalt blue spinels that crumbles when cut. I’ve had some cut by a local cutter....I can’t really say these local cutters aren’t skilled. It takes skill and lots of patience to cut melees IMHO (and melees that easily crumble at that). ”Precision” cutters often won’t be bothered to cut melees, not worth the time and quite an effort. Machine cuts for sapphires and rubies exists, but no one really does mechanized cuts over a carat for untreated and heat only corundums - since many corundum mines are uneconomical beyond artisanal mining (Most corundum mines yield only 5% of gem quality stones. The rest of the stones have to be treated for the mines to be economical - can’t imagine much so for rarer stones that really has no by-product).

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Your right, its not because of the step cut itself its because of enough deep (what mostly in step cuts gets improved). Color improves when the gem get enough deep / enough body. Of course that can be also improved by making a high crown. If a medium toned and medium saturated get cut in a standard round brilliant it will appear lighter as the same is cut in a asscher cut for example. If just brilliancy is maximized the gem has less deep and color looks lighter. Maybe in a since perspective it is still the same color/saturation but from a graduating/appearance point of view, as how I see the gem as in person, color appearance improve when the gem get enough body.

I did ones some cuts in medium tone purple spinel as well as in medium tone Aussie green sapphire to watch differences. That one for example would appear lighter with a flat crown for example.
.

From 1975 published in GIA's Gems & Gemology and seemingly totally ignored by both the colored gem and diamond industry.
This is The seminal work of the past century.
Bruce became a friend and had posted here especially on Rocky Talky many times.
He had the amazing ability to simplify complex things - often into one page.
If you cut gems and have not tried his solutions then please do yourself a favour.

срок регистрации доменного имени www.gemology.ru истек

Bruce died a couple of years ago. We met twice and I am proud to say we had great exchanges and he bacame a good friend.

 

[AV_]

Also step cuts bring out by far the best color.

I wouldn't agree with this. On what basis do you think this? In my experience of cutting over 4000 stones, I don't find this to be true.

@PrecisionGem,

Perhaps for textured or dark material - where brilliance is not achievable, yet large facets are still effective at the right angles & color stands on its own.

Thinking out loud & of this - www

 

[AV_]

... alluvial rough ruby ... There would be no problem to facet it in one piece.

I know people who would want it as is if polished on all sides to let the trapiche spokes show.

 

[PrecisionGem]

From 1975 published in GIA's Gems & Gemology and seemingly totally ignored by both the colored gem and diamond industry.
This is The seminal work of the past century.
Bruce became a friend and had posted here especially on Rocky Talky many times.
He had the amazing ability to simplify complex things - often into one page.
If you cut gems and have not tried his solutions then please do yourself a favour.

срок регистрации доменного имени www.gemology.ru истек

Bruce died a couple of years ago. We met twice and I am proud to say we had great exchanges and he bacame a good friend.

A lot has change in the past 45 years. Today we have 3d software where we can model the stone, enter the properties of the material and test out the design with raytracing before cutting.

Here's an example of on such ray trace.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

A lot has change in the past 45 years. Today we have 3d software where we can model the stone, enter the properties of the material and test out the design with raytracing before cutting.

Here's an example of on such ray trace.

Exactly.
This is what is used on all larger rough diamonds. I use and sell DiamCalc which also does colored gem materials.
I guess that is GemCad?
Do you scan rough and optimise Precision?
Do you measure absorption spectra?
Plot inclusions in 3D models?

 

[Kingmer]

Conspiracy theories about diamonds being over priced and not rare confuse me.
1. There are many more kilograms of each of Emerald, Sapphire and Ruby mined each year than diamonds.
2. The yield on coloured gems is far greater than the +50% loss on diamonds (because there are some standards with diamonds).
3. The technology, skill and costs of cutting a diamond are way higher than for colored gems.
4. Diamonds down to 0.15ct get graded at a big cost. Only a small proportion of gems come with a cert.
5. Treated diamonds are the exception. Natural gems are rare exceptions.
6. It costs 100's of millions to billions of dollars to prospect for and establish a diamond mine.

Don't get me wrong - I love gems of all sorts. I am not bashing gems. I am questioning the theory that diamonds are over priced and abundant.

Nonsense.

The quantity of fine emerald not requiring treatment mined each year would not fill a one gallon bucket.

Diamonds even in large sizes are way way more common.

That goes for true clean red/red rubies as well.

Hell natural untreated London blue topaz is far rarer than any diamond less than about 10cts.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Nonsense. The quantity of fine emerald not requiring treatment mined each year would not fill a one gallon bucket. D Flawless diamonds are rare too - so?
Diamonds even in large sizes are way way more common. That is only true for the past 10-15 years because demand for diamond led to XRF detection prior to each step in crushing.
And that is my point - but find a diamond as large as aqua, tourmaline, emerald???
That goes for true clean red/red rubies as well.

Hell natural untreated London blue topaz is far rarer than any diamond less than about 10cts. So?

So?
fact - there are more diamonds sold by dollar value than all the other gems combined.
Therefore - the world is full of fools who can not see.
OR
What they see they like?

Again - my point - if coloured gems are under valued it is because the gem industry treats them poorly and has no clue as to how to organise itself or market these beautiful products.
It has no standards, totally opaque, totally confusing.

Again - is there a way PriceScope can help address the marketing issues and make things more open and transparent (disclosure - I am a tiny minority share holder in PS).

 

[shelovesinclusions]

Again - my point - if coloured gems are under valued it is because the gem industry treats them poorly and has no clue as to how to organise itself or market these beautiful products.
It has no standards, totally opaque, totally confusing.

This has been my experience with the jade market. Outside of high value imperial, glass, or very nice lavenders- the pricing is all over the place. It seems to be less so in other colored stones, but with jades value can come down to the preferences of your particular dealer.

To an extent, standardization of basics is nice- and I think that's what you see with the bulk of colored gems (like those poorly cut emeralds). But there are additional factors with uncommon or exceptional colored stones in matching the right customer with their exact requirements & preferences allowing for a wild range of prices based on perceived desirability for one's client base (subsequently closing off the market to many). If you've browsed through the colored stones forums, you've seen teams of people collaborating to help a person find a stone. We're a picky bunch. What would we do if tech could replace our input?

From a logic/database creation standpoint- I'm uncertain the amount of parameters attached to colored stones allows for an efficient search. Especially color descriptor combinations are really high. For example, multicolour.com has a "Smart Search" which is great in concept but that is prohibitive in that entry of all desired characteristics leads to zero results, while a broader search can pull up many results one doesn't want to see. I wonder, too, what would be the incentive for individual dealers to participate in an aggregate search which includes competitors of varying market share? Would it ultimately drive up the pricing bar for colored stones? Has the pricescope tool allowed for an overall increase of diamond prices, or is it not widely enough utilized on the consumer end to say? The minutiae of colored gem traits may be daunting to quantify for a developer, but I'd love to beta test that sort of app.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

I wonder, too, what would be the incentive for individual dealers to participate in an aggregate search which includes competitors of varying market share? Would it ultimately drive up the pricing bar for colored stones? Has the pricescope tool allowed for an overall increase of diamond prices, or is it not widely enough utilized on the consumer end to say? The minutiae of colored gem traits may be daunting to quantify for a developer, but I'd love to beta test that sort of app.

Hi MissSarah,
We knock back diamond online sellers who are desperate to list on PS - because they have bad service ratings, they are listing diamonds that are already shown by better vendors with more service, they have lousy education, misleading gradinges etc.
If we could do this it would be worthwhile to a range of sellers.
For e.g. with diamonds - we have USACerted - a sole trader from his basement in Toronto - low cost but high service and loads of experiance - all the way thru to CBI and WhiteFlash with top of the market premium diamonds.

 

[Kingmer]

So?
fact - there are more diamonds sold by dollar value than all the other gems combined.
Therefore - the world is full of fools who can not see.
OR
What they see they like?

Again - my point - if coloured gems are under valued it is because the gem industry treats them poorly and has no clue as to how to organise itself or market these beautiful products.
It has no standards, totally opaque, totally confusing.

Again - is there a way PriceScope can help address the marketing issues and make things more open and transparent (disclosure - I am a tiny minority share holder in PS).

Once again, wrong, I have studied production, flawless D diamonds are like sand on a beach compared to flawless ideal green/blue, perfect saturation emeralds. I can walk into any jewelry store and have a 3 ct flawless D stone in a day or three at most. Most people will never lay hands on such a stone in Emerald. In fact such a stone is worth more than most jewelry stores and their contents combined.

And there in lies the rub, the whole issue that this conversation is missing. It has Nothing to do with marketing, the people who buy true quality don't need to be marketed too.

Diamonds are for the commons(excluding exotic colors and exceptional sizes). Of course diamonds "out sell" colored stones. Ma and Pa Kettle could not afford colored stones in the equivalent quality diamond (in terms of clarity) that they can get in at any jewelry store. In ancient times diamonds were rare, exotic and expensive, why? Because they were difficult to shape and miners (in India) often discarded them out of hand for rubies and sapphires that were present in the same alluvial gravel.

Diamonds brought "gems" to the masses by a clever marketing scheme. It exploited a market segment generally reserved for royalty or the ultra rich. Careful market manipulation to keep prices high and constant social pressure tha equates love with diamonds and you have what you have here.

The reason diamonds "outsell" colored stones is there simple is not the supply of quality colored stones to sell and there never has been. A miner in Peshawar will work all year to extract perhaps 2-3 quality emeralds (that will not be of the before mentioned quality)

Simple example,

In a year a single flawless 5.5 ct emerald comes up for sale at 500k/ct.

In that same year, hundreds of thousands of cts of diamonds are sold for 672 million.

Which is more rare? Which is more valuable? Which is the true jewel?

The problem is if this was accepted all those diamond sellers could not exist to pedal their wares that upon resale might recover .10 cents on the dollar. The emerald buyer however can expect significant appreciation, as if you look at the numbers such emeralds haven't depreciated since verifiable records have been kept, around 1730 or so.

 

[Cognition]

Maybe you need a bigger budget Cognition?
BTW
Eats roots and leaves - I used a full stop - I should have used a comma
""Many will have been held and repriced as the market changes over years and decades - or moving from dealer to dealer, including Pad's and really rare goods."'

bigger budget? I dont have specific budget for "my quest" for the perfect alex; unless ofc if the seller offer sth ridiculous like 1mil/ct, no one going to buy it. All alex that I have seen are not perfect. Usually they have one great colorway, but the other color is not so great. The best one I have seen was from a dealer in bangkok almost 10 years ago. Even that one does not have perfect purple colorway

 

[Nosean]

Best daylight color is along a axis - best incandescent light color along b axis.
But worst incandescent light color is along a axis too. It is a tricky material.

 

[arkieb1]

@Garry H (Cut Nut) - you clearly have missed the posts where numerous coloured stone vendors bitch and moan about us on IG, FB and other platforms. They verbally crucify many here because we are picky, because PSers send back stones, because they request more photos (and they don't have time to take them), because many of us dare say to people that turn up here don't buy that stone because those photos have been photoshopped and in real life it will be darker than those photos or that it has a window or it has a surface reaching inclusion and so on.

What you are suggesting is great in theory but in reality that's the reaction of some of the precision cutters that have a customer base on here, imagine how all the other vendors would react. It would take you years standardise the gemstone industry and even then I think vendors in a lot of countries like Asia, India, Africa and so on would try and get around any system....

And many customers simply want well priced gemstones IMHO, they care more about things like colour and price than they do the cutting.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

@Garry H (Cut Nut) - you clearly have missed the posts where numerous coloured stone vendors bitch and moan about us on IG, FB and other platforms. They verbally crucify many here because we are picky, because PSers send back stones, because they request more photos (and they don't have time to take them), because many of us dare say to people that turn up here don't buy that stone because those photos have been photoshopped and in real life it will be darker than those photos or that it has a window or it has a surface reaching inclusion and so on.

What you are suggesting is great in theory but in reality that's the reaction of some of the precision cutters that have a customer base on here, imagine how all the other vendors would react. It would take you years standardise the gemstone industry and even then I think vendors in a lot of countries like Asia, India, Africa and so on would try and get around any system....

And many customers simply want well priced gemstones IMHO, they care more about things like colour and price than they do the cutting.

You nailed it Arkieb. I think the colored gem industry is like the diamond industry pre GIA 4C's grading and Martin Rapaport.
But until someone does something structural, the vendors will maintain their cottage industry way of being.
Indian diamond manufacturers starting with Venus Jewel have actually shown exemplary behaviour. So it can be done. Their in house grading is both more accurate than GIA's and far more extensive, including for example lustre (transparency milkyness) and many features not covered by GIA. And making all filter searchable.
Many vendors have followed on and RapNet has added some of those features too. (GIA should be sued for false and misleading grading when it comes to transparency - sad when dealers declare it and GIA does not - so much for "we are the consumer protection org").

And BTW retailers all around the world dread dealing with PS diamond consumers too, my staff included.

 

[finerthings]

@Garry H (Cut Nut) The be all and end all of beautiful stones is not about precision cutting IMO with exact proportions. Otherwise all those wonderful vintage diamonds cut years ago would be boring and hold no value, when in fact they do, and they are fabulous. I find round diamonds to be boring, without personality, and not worth the money. Colored stones each have a personality and I love that they are all different; the focus is on the stone, not the precision cut, and the personality of the stone and how it glows is the goal.

 

[lilmosun]

Rarity aside, I am happy that the colored stones industry is pre-GIA 4C's in structure and they not commercially marketed/in demand to the same degree as diamonds...because I would not be able to afford them (on the other hand, I could make a killing selling what I have )

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

@Garry H (Cut Nut) The be all and end all of beautiful stones is not about precision cutting IMO with those exact proportions. Otherwise all those wonderful vintage diamonds cut years ago would be boring and hold no value, when in fact they do, and they are fabulous. I find round diamonds to be so boring, without personality, and not worth the money. Colored stones each have a personality and I love that they are all different; the focus is on the stone, not the precision cut, and the personality of the stone and how it glows is the goal.

To each their own.
But if we took a random collection of saw 10 old cuts (remembering that many of the worst ones already got recut) and compared them to new stones in the same old cut style but with modern polish quality and optimised for performance - I am willing to bet that 10 people ranging from no knowledge of diamonds to experts would choose the new stones.
Of course there would be no knowledge of which is new and which is old and the stones would be mixed.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Rarity aside, I am happy that the colored stones industry is pre-GIA 4C's in structure and they not commercially marketed/in demand to the same degree as diamonds...because I would not be able to afford them (on the other hand, I could make a killing selling what I have )

Pre RapNet and Rapaport price lists prices ranged much much higher than post.
I have seen diamonds from the 1970's and 1980's that never ever reached the price originally paid for them.

 

[deorwine]

Hi MissSarah,
We knock back diamond online sellers who are desperate to list on PS - because they have bad service ratings, they are listing diamonds that are already shown by better vendors with more service, they have lousy education, misleading gradinges etc.
If we could do this it would be worthwhile to a range of sellers.
For e.g. with diamonds - we have USACerted - a sole trader from his basement in Toronto - low cost but high service and loads of experiance - all the way thru to CBI and WhiteFlash with top of the market premium diamonds.

OK I am intrigued by this idea to be sure! I can usually describe what I want and it would be rather faster if I could just look up which dealers had what I wanted. Let's brainstorm a little just for fun, what categories would we have to have?

So I am thinking the GIA colored gem grading code is a good start:
-hue, with primary and modifier, e.g. "slightly purplish red / slpR"
-tone, (from colorless / extremely light to extremely dark/black)
-saturation values (grayish, slightly grayish, very slightly grayish, moderately strong, strong, vivid -- and the same for brown colors)

The key here would be that it would be something a vendor could do by eye but that a lab like GIA would be able to back up if there were discrepancies, yes? This is why I didn't say percentage red-green-blue, or Pantone color cards which is what gemfix does and which I also like, but I assume those would be hard to get a large number of vendors to buy in on.

For other categories I like the way Wildfish gems does it e.g. https://www.wildfishgems.com/inc/sdetail/unheated_ceylon_sapphire_1_00/1086/22120

-cutting grade (I like the brilliancy and depth as Ed has it)
-color zoning
-origin
-clarity
-fluorescence
-other optical effects?

and then of course the usual suspects like treatment, carat weight, shape.

Also maybe whether there is color shifting under different light sources, IDK how to handle that

Soooo... rather more than 4 C's, but I think it would be doable!

It would be interesting to see how the market changed if something like this got traction!

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

OK I am intrigued by this idea to be sure! I can usually describe what I want and it would be rather faster if I could just look up which dealers had what I wanted. Let's brainstorm a little just for fun, what categories would we have to have?

So I am thinking the GIA colored gem grading code is a good start:
-hue, with primary and modifier, e.g. "slightly purplish red / slpR"
-tone, (from colorless / extremely light to extremely dark/black)
-saturation values (grayish, slightly grayish, very slightly grayish, moderately strong, strong, vivid -- and the same for brown colors)

The key here would be that it would be something a vendor could do by eye but that a lab like GIA would be able to back up if there were discrepancies, yes? This is why I didn't say percentage red-green-blue, or Pantone color cards which is what gemfix does and which I also like, but I assume those would be hard to get a large number of vendors to buy in on.

For other categories I like the way Wildfish gems does it e.g. https://www.wildfishgems.com/inc/sdetail/unheated_ceylon_sapphire_1_00/1086/22120

-cutting grade (I like the brilliancy and depth as Ed has it)
-color zoning
-origin
-clarity
-fluorescence
-other optical effects?

and then of course the usual suspects like treatment, carat weight, shape.

Also maybe whether there is color shifting under different light sources, IDK how to handle that

Soooo... rather more than 4 C's, but I think it would be doable!

It would be interesting to see how the market changed if something like this got traction!

Great start Deorwine
Form some of you quote copied above:

Let's brainstorm a little just for fun, what categories would we have to have?

So I am thinking the GIA colored gem grading code is a good start:
-hue, with primary and modifier, e.g. "slightly purplish red / slpR"
-tone, (from colorless / extremely light to extremely dark/black)
-saturation values (grayish, slightly grayish, very slightly grayish, moderately strong, strong, vivid -- and the same for brown colors)
So I was one of the first to adopt that system and buy the plastic gem models - it is a great system. I tried to train my staff and local supliers - but to no avail. Sold the boxed kit for next to nothing 2 or 3 years ago.
But maybe its time could come?

The key here would be that it would be something a vendor could do by eye but that a lab like GIA would be able to back up if there were discrepancies, yes? This is why I didn't say percentage red-green-blue, or Pantone color cards which is what gemfix does and which I also like, but I assume those would be hard to get a large number of vendors to buy in on.
I would want to see other labs like GRS which grade way more colored gems than GIA take it up. Maybe you experts could list the main labs that should be contacted?
But even just relying on the vendors doing a good job - the people here will "keep the bastards honest" - that word might get deleted by Ella or the bot - but it is a famous Aussie lexicon from a respected politician.

Re your comments below - their photography is all over the shop. Again the standaridsation that has come from OctoNus/Lexus (Serg participates here and I was part of the development of the lighting for ViBox and DiBox) and Segoma aka James Allen associates have made information transfer between dealers and consumers.
we even have vendors now supplying proper inclusion videos (verticle stone between two pins) and the consumer varitey:


So no reason why colored gems can not be repesented in standardised formats - loads of meToo cheap products on the market from India.
For other categories I like the way Wildfish gems does it e.g. https://www.wildfishgems.com/inc/sdetail/unheated_ceylon_sapphire_1_00/1086/22120

-cutting grade (I like the brilliancy and depth as Ed has it)
-color zoning
-origin
-clarity
-fluorescence
-other optical effects?

and then of course the usual suspects like treatment, carat weight, shape.

Also maybe whether there is color shifting under different light sources, IDK how to handle that

Soooo... rather more than 4 C's, but I think it would be doable!

It would be interesting to see how the market changed if something like this got traction!

 

[PrecisionGem]

Great start Deorwine
Form some of you quote copied above:

Let's brainstorm a little just for fun, what categories would we have to have?

So I am thinking the GIA colored gem grading code is a good start:
-hue, with primary and modifier, e.g. "slightly purplish red / slpR"
-tone, (from colorless / extremely light to extremely dark/black)
-saturation values (grayish, slightly grayish, very slightly grayish, moderately strong, strong, vivid -- and the same for brown colors)
So I was one of the first to adopt that system and buy the plastic gem models - it is a great system. I tried to train my staff and local supliers - but to no avail. Sold the boxed kit for next to nothing 2 or 3 years ago.
But maybe its time could come?

The key here would be that it would be something a vendor could do by eye but that a lab like GIA would be able to back up if there were discrepancies, yes? This is why I didn't say percentage red-green-blue, or Pantone color cards which is what gemfix does and which I also like, but I assume those would be hard to get a large number of vendors to buy in on.
I would want to see other labs like GRS which grade way more colored gems than GIA take it up. Maybe you experts could list the main labs that should be contacted?
But even just relying on the vendors doing a good job - the people here will "keep the bastards honest" - that word might get deleted by Ella or the bot - but it is a famous Aussie lexicon from a respected politician.

Re your comments below - their photography is all over the shop. Again the standaridsation that has come from OctoNus/Lexus (Serg participates here and I was part of the development of the lighting for ViBox and DiBox) and Segoma aka James Allen associates have made information transfer between dealers and consumers.
we even have vendors now supplying proper inclusion videos (verticle stone between two pins) and the consumer varitey:


So no reason why colored gems can not be repesented in standardised formats - loads of meToo cheap products on the market from India.
For other categories I like the way Wildfish gems does it e.g. https://www.wildfishgems.com/inc/sdetail/unheated_ceylon_sapphire_1_00/1086/22120

-cutting grade (I like the brilliancy and depth as Ed has it)
-color zoning
-origin
-clarity
-fluorescence
-other optical effects?

and then of course the usual suspects like treatment, carat weight, shape.

Also maybe whether there is color shifting under different light sources, IDK how to handle that

Soooo... rather more than 4 C's, but I think it would be doable!

It would be interesting to see how the market changed if something like this got traction!

The prices would go up. Eventually you could force all the little guys out, and colored stones could be controlled by a few just like diamonds.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

The prices would go up. Eventually you could force all the little guys out, and colored stones could be controlled by a few just like diamonds.

You are so very wrong.
The vendors we have selling diamonds range from 1 person op's to large companies.
Most are small to very small operations.

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Because there is big B2B boards we do not allow thousands of sellers selling the exact same diamonds.
But the color market has no B2B's so we can have hundreds of honest sellers.
(we have booted some bodgy diamond dealers off PS and have very strict rules for new applicants)

 

[PieAreSquared]

disclosure - I am a tiny minority share holder in PS.

Wait... So you are an owner of PriceScope?
Thanks for mentioning that.

 

[voce]

@deorwine @Garry H (Cut Nut) I don't think it's a bad idea to try to push for more standardization in colored stone grading, but not even GIA uses the color scheme they themselves came up with on colored stone reports. Only AGL evaluates such things as depth and brilliancy in their grading reports, which is a part of the reason why AGL is considered a premier lab for colored stones. Before asking GRS to include such information, shouldn't these things be included by GIA first?

I remember reading in a newsletter Robert Genis put out, that labs generally offer less detailed reports because the colored gemstone vendors don't desire such information to be on the lab reports, and vendors are the customers of the labs, so labs to a degree have to cater to what their customers want. So before persuading labs to change things, shouldn't you rather convince colored stone vendors first? @deorwine and myself are only consumers here.

For every full AGL Grading Report that I've seen, I've seen 100 AGL Prestige (with Origin) reports, and for every AGL Prestige Report that I've seen, there are like 10 AGL Briefs. There is no market demand by colored stone vendors to spend extra money to provide additional information that might come across as unfavorable for them to sell their stones.

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

@deorwine @Garry H (Cut Nut) I don't think it's a bad idea to try to push for more standardization in colored stone grading, but not even GIA uses the color scheme they themselves came up with on colored stone reports. Only AGL evaluates such things as depth and brilliancy in their grading reports, which is a part of the reason why AGL is considered a premier lab for colored stones. Before asking GRS to include such information, shouldn't these things be included by GIA first?

I remember reading in a newsletter Robert Genis put out, that labs generally offer less detailed reports because the colored gemstone vendors don't desire such information to be on the lab reports, and vendors are the customers of the labs, so labs to a degree have to cater to what their customers want. So before persuading labs to change things, shouldn't you rather convince colored stone vendors first? @deorwine and myself are only consumers here.

For every full AGL Grading Report that I've seen, I've seen 100 AGL Prestige (with Origin) reports, and for every AGL Prestige Report that I've seen, there are like 10 AGL Briefs. There is no market demand by colored stone vendors to spend extra money to provide additional information that might come across as unfavorable for them to sell their stones.

GIA GTL (the grading division that makes half a billion profit a year) has so often in history done things totally differently to what the Education division teaches. That is not likely to change. And Debbie Hiss who launched and got behind the grading system now works for one of the larger man made diamond companies.
GIA has dropped it apparently:

What Happened to the GIA GemSet Color and Hue Wheel? - Gem Society

The GIA GemSet offered plastic color masters for color grading gems. It's no longer in production. Software alternatives exist but still face limitations.

www.gemsociety.org

It would be up to us if we want to change anything, and so far I have more detractors to the idea in this thread than supporters. As mentioned, I own a tiny portion of PriceScope and have a bit of sway.
Andrey is following this - but its a huge project if we were to have a crack at it. It would be great if there was say an advisory board (I will probably get my knuckles rapped for this).

Maybe someone would like to start a poll?