Use of MyGemewizard

[Double E]

Downloaded this some time ago, didn’t really play with it until recently. How common are people using it to buy gems or communicate with their seller?

It’s much more convenient if both buyers and sellers are on the same page regarding the desired colour of gem. That’s a good thing and the levels of tone and saturation is easily understood.

However, with only 31 different hues available in the app, is that really accurate enough for the mentioned communication purpose? I am confused here, provided I don’t really know if there are more advanced version with more hues to choose from.

This app is sometimes mentioned in PS, can someone experienced with it shed some light on it?

 

[PrecisionGem]

You need to select one of the 31 hues then another screen comes up with that hue and various saturations and tones.

 

[LilAlex]

I have the app and liked it (one appraisal I saw was modeled on this) -- but almost no one else seems to use this nomenclature. And there is a ton of subjectivity in hue and tone and saturation...

It's like coin and stamp and card grading: there are objective criteria but buyers and sellers interpret them differently, which is why there are third-party graders for those things.

 

[PrecisionGem]

I think the nomenclature is pretty typical in the trade. The expanded color charts simplify matching tone and saturation of your gem. I find it a really useful tool.

Here's a few examples

 

[VividRed]

I think the nomenclature is pretty typical in the trade. The expanded color charts simplify matching tone and saturation of your gem. I find it a really useful tool.

Here's a few examples

But how do you factor in lighting conditions? Is there a standard that people in the trade use? I have always wondered.

it seems to me that the accuracy of vendor pictures has always been a challenge with gems, even with the best intentions.

 

[PrecisionGem]

Full spectrum light color balanced for daylight, or daylight. Normally when buying either rough or cut stones, I try to see the gems in a variety of lighting conditions. If I'm indoors at a gem show, or traveling in the bush to buy material I bring my own portable lighting. I have a flashlight (torch) with two ends, one with incandescent, and the other end has LED daylight.

 

[Double E]

I think the subjectivity of saturation and tone is still fine and pretty practical and straight forward to use,as it's relative and various conditions (or intensity) are available in a range of degrees. But the hues, what I don't get it is how the limited 31 hues are able to represent one's desired shade as closely as possible. Or what you guys mean is these available hues are already good enough to communicate for the colour you are hunting?

What I mean is that I definitely know say chartreuse is when yellow meets green, but there is still much leeway in between right?

 

[Double E]

And as we also talked about lightings, a little gem torch (I actually don't know how we call one particularly used for gem) could be really useful. I hope to get one so that I can play with it next time visiting gem show.

The one Gene mentioned that he uses looks a little bit minimal to me, as my impression is something with follows: incandescent, LED day light. Would there be even fluorescent lights? I am pretty inexperienced really.

Also how about the indoor ambient daylight, this is also one of the conditions we often look at our stones, could we mimic such lighting in a shop / fair? And how?

 

[PrecisionGem]

This is one of the dual light color flashlights. (Pretty much everyone outside of the USA calls flashlights "torches" I think.)



Each end produces a different light source as shown below lighting up a rough piece of amethyst. This first image is with the daylight LED.



This is with the incandescent end of the light.



These types of lights are used for rough mainly. For a cut gem, it's best to not shine a light directly on the gem, but to view it at a normal distance and move into different lighting environments.

 

[PrecisionGem]

As far as the GemEwizard goes, the 31 hues match what the GIA color set is, as do the scales for tone and saturation.

The full program which is called Gem E Price requires you to be a member of the trade and has a yearly subscription of $300. This prices the stone based on the input of the color, clarity and treatment as shown in the example below.
It will also translate the color to a few other systems such as Munsell, RGB etc.
The GIA color definition is the most used in the trade however, which is based on the 31 hues.

 

[PrecisionGem]

I purchased about 10 years ago another system called Gemdialog. It uses a book of very well printed color pages on acetate along with some filters to add saturation modifiers to the colors. These filters are laid over the color swatches. A price guide in another book comes along with this system. I'm not sure if this is still available as the creator of it died a few years ago. This system was pretty expensive, I think I paid $450 for the books.

Here's a sample of a page from that book. With the filter overlays above the color page. You can see here that all the green are the same hue, just various tones.

 

[VividRed]

I purchased about 10 years ago another system called Gemdialog. It uses a book of very well printed color pages on acetate along with some filters to add saturation modifiers to the colors. These filters are laid over the color swatches. A price guide in another book comes along with this system. I'm not sure if this is still available as the creator of it died a few years ago. This system was pretty expensive, I think I paid $450 for the books.

Here's a sample of a page from that book. With the filter overlays above the color page. You can see here that all the green are the same hue, just various tones.

That’s very interesting, thank you for sharing!

AGL created a new system called ColorCodex - it does a similar thing but with possibly more hues. It costs around 2’000$ US so while I would love to try it, I am put off by the price, considering I am not in the trade and only collect gems for pleasure.

Have you, or anyone here, tried this system?

here is the link to the ColorCodex page: https://www.color-codex.com/about-1

 

[PrecisionGem]

That’s very interesting, thank you for sharing!

AGL created a new system called ColorCodex - it does a similar thing but with possibly more hues. It costs around 2’000$ US so while I would love to try it, I am put off by the price, considering I am not in the trade and only collect gems for pleasure.

Have you, or anyone here, tried this system?

here is the link to the ColorCodex page: https://www.color-codex.com/about-1

I have not seen that system yet. Looks interesting but kind of expensive. Not sure that it's a product of AGL, looks like it may be from a company in Japan.

Gemworld Interenational, the company that prints "The Guide", maybe the most widely used price guide as a similar tool out that is again printed pages with overlays called the World of Color. This one is around $500,

Years ago GIA had a neat system that was a bunch of little plastic paddles of various colors that you matched to your stone. They stopped making it a while back, but every now and then you see one for sale used, but the price is much higher than when they were new.