Does anyone know anything about opals?

[anchor31]

Hey there!

My mother has told me today that she would like to receive an opal pendant as it''s her semi-precious birthstone. I already know who I want to work with since my FF and I had such an amazing experience working with this man for my engagement ring, but I know nothing about opals and I''ve been wondering if anyone here could give me a little help beforehand!

What makes a particular opal higher quality/more beautiful than another? How can you know? What should I look for? Is there any particulation information I should know about for those gemstones? I''m pretty clueless here...

Thank you for your help, as always!

 

[Richard Sherwood]

This website should get you started. There''s a lot of information packed in it.

http://www.opal.asn.au/index.htm

 

[Richard M.]

Date: 5/29/2006 10:52:09 PM
Author: Richard Sherwood
This website should get you started. There''s a lot of information packed in it.


http://www.opal.asn.au/index.htm

Indeed. I have the full Smallwood article as published in the "Australian Gemmologist" which contains a bit more information than this site. Overall the site is an excellent opal resource. Thanks for posting it.

I''m posting the image, Rich, to illustrate why I think the stone on the other thread is likely from Lightning Ridge (although all fields produce that type of dark opal). You can see three very different potch colors in this nobby: light gray, dark gray and black. When I start chasing the precious opal color in this rough at the grinding wheel, the color of the base for the stone will depend entirely on which one of the three potch colors underlies the best precious color.

I''ve seen many top-notch Lightning Ridge blacks that have only a thin layer of black potch sandwiched between the precious opal layer and a bottom layer of light gray. The final stone reflects only what the rough allows the cutter to accomplish (barring cheating with a doublet).

Some of the Mintabe "black" is very bright but the material usually occurs in thin veins that don''t allow the amount of doming shown on the subject stone.

Richard M.

 

[anchor31]

Thank you very much to both of you!

Richard M., the stone in your avatar is beautiful! I''m guessing that''s what a quality opal should look like? Are there any super important facts than I should absolutely know?