declanwmagee

Isn't that (theoretically) what PayPal is? Nooo... PayPal's just another bank, 'cept it's owned by eBay. Which is ultimately owned by the banks via venture capital I expect.

I have read about it, I think it's a fantasic concept, quite democratising, but haven't tried it. Why don't you be the first and let us know?

Yes, Great Britain is the island, as opposed to Less Britain, which is Brittany, contrary to popular opinion, NOT Ireland

I'll use it. Buying a (second hand!) Krause was on my "one day" list, but it ain't now. It's bookmarked.

That's the fellow, Mr Accumulator... I've never found one before, and I've looked at a darn sight more than 5, so I'm with you on that one. Then 6 turn up in the same Jiffy bag. I must do some number crunching of Mr Court's paper - I do have it, but I haven't given it the attention it deserves!

Now here's a thing. Ever since getting Mr Groom's excellent Bronze book I've been looking for a 1944 2+C* Penny. It's not in Freeman or Peck, but Gouby distinguishes them. Never found one though. On a hunch I bought a group of six 1944 pennies, described as UNC by an American seller (big stamp dealer by the looks of it). They're not UNC, of course, but they're decent enough. Now they've arrived, and blow me, all six are 2+C*. I wonder if, like the 1943/44 silver 3ds, the distribution of microvarieties was a regional thing? I suppose if the West Indies used British currency silver 3ds in the '40s, they probably used bronze pennies too.

We're under Great Britain! Apparently the UK is in the Eurozone, but GB isn't.

Good to look one coin up. I just tried to look down through a series I know well, and gave up after a couple - didn't have the patience!

I should, mate

The book you need for them is called British Silver Coins since 1816, by Peter Davies, and I believe one of our regulars here has a stock of them...

Have a look at the I of VICT, wasp I to a bead = small lettering I to a gap = large lettering

and an interesting thread...

Cracking start Forna. Wish I'd started with coins that good. Look out for the 1823 with a Roman I instead of a 1 in the date...

...so the scratch has sliced a corner off the middle serif, making it look like it was curving upwards.

No but I do have short lengths of hosepipe lining the holes in the floor so the cables won't chafe when the engine is running. So nothing can go wrong.

I'm desperately trying to grow out of PVC once and for all, and I can see the point of slabs for storage. Perhaps the only crime is putting a grade on the label?

ought to be a law against it... Self slabbing

Anyone who knew anything about electrickery would have a fit if they saw my setup here: Long extension cable buried in a trench I dug under the yard, plugged into a single 13A socket. Other end has two outlets, one goes to the outdoor freezer, the other holds a plug dangling through a hole I drilled in the bus floor. That plug goes to a 3-way, 2 empty, one to a 6-way. That 6 way: 1) fairy lights 2) laptop 3) printer 4) speakers 5) empty 6) to another 4-way that 4-way: 1) doubler driving halogen and daylight CFL 2) laptop 3) camera 4) long extension going back out through another hole in the floor on the other side of the bus - for outdoor power tools and charging up the bus batteries. Combined with the propane and the woodburner, EMP would be the least of my worries!

Cripes they're good, Nick. I'll have to get the manual out for my camera and look up that aperture business, and the centre weighted thing. I understood the others. Just the one light source?

I do use autofocus, Rob, (but not the setting that tries to look for a face), but I don't use flash. Daylight doesn't work for me either.

I have to say I'm not entirely happy with the CD case thing. It's a nice black for the purpose of taking the photo, but it's a very hard plastic and I live in fear that it's harder than bronze, and especially copper. So I place the coin carefully, and let the software do the rotation - never turn the coin on the plastic! I'll have to get hold of a small piece of black cloth - natural fibres, not nylon, or velvet or something like that to ease my worries. I remove the background in postprocessing and replace it with jet black anyway...like this: that's a tip from one of our prominent members but for the life of me I can't remember who, so no credit claimed!

Here's the setup I use for coin photography - the daylight bulb is at the top of the picture, the halogen is the black one pointing down but not directly at the coin (thanks John, for that tip!). Tripod cost me about £12 from a proper little camera shop in Ciren.

oh. and get everyone to stop walking up and down the bus and making it rock while you're trying to keep the camera steady on it's tripod.

Hi Sion I think the setup and lighting is more important than the camera. I use a Canon PowerShot A480, mounted on a little 8" tripod, pointing straight down, and two lights - a 6400K daylight bulb, and a yellower halogen angle poise. Position at 10 o'clock and 2 o'clock, but not so close as to cause glare on the coin. The idea is, the blue of the daylight bulb cancels out the yellow of the halogen. I raise the coin to the point where it fills the screen without using digital zoom. Move the lights as high as you can without the camera casting its own shadow on the coin. Lights too low and the light will rake across the surface of the coin and the shot will be unattractively grainy. Break the "No digital zoom" rule if you have to, just to get the lights higher, particularly with small coins. Threehalfpence have to be the most difficult coins to get right. Once you're happy with the lighting, set the camera up. Super Macro if you have it. I use ISO 100 (lower the better - too high and grainyness creeps back in). Exposure slightly up, just a fraction - the smallest increment over 0 you can get. Shutter timer to 2 sec. No flash. Then, get a piece of white printer paper and slide it over the coin so all you can see on the camera screen is white. Get the camera to recalibrate its white balance on that, then take the sheet away. I use a black background under the coin as it reduces stray light bouncing all over the shop. All set. Once you've taken the photos and imported them, take the time to crop and rotate, and maybe even remove the background. I replace it with a jet black one but that's just taste I think, not science. The results will probably be enormous files. I resize down to 1000x1000 pixels to deal with that, but I'm toying with the idea of increasing that to 1500x1500 maybe. Disk space is cheap. hope that helps!

The last thing they want is free-thinking independent people making their own way in the world as best they can. The whole purpose of the system is to make people more dependent on it, thus justifying a bigger and bigger system.