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New
GIA & AGS Cut grade systems
Recently Gemological Institute
of America (GIA) announced
that a Cut Grade could be seen on GIA certs later this year or early
in 2005.
It is likely GIA will release
the proportions (possibly as early as 17th April at the
Basel GemFest) so diamond polishers can begin producing stones that
will get a better cut grade. After +ten years of GIA research this
is good news for consumers and, in the long term, for the industry
as a whole. But it will come as a huge shock for many industry
dinosaurs.
Consumers will be happy if
the grade is simple grade like color (‘D’, ‘E’,
‘F’, etc) and clarity (‘FL’, ‘SI2’,
etc).
At Ideal-Scope we know that
there are many different sets of proportions that produce beautiful
diamonds. Garry Holloway was the first to develop the terms
BIC and FIC that describe more Brilliant or more Firey ideal cuts;
truly beautiful looking diamonds even though some have AGS10 proportions.
We will be happy when the leading authority vindicates our long
held position J.
As an Ideal-Scope owner or
user have you found any diamonds with very shallow crowns and deep
pavilions, or very steep crown angles and shallow pavilions, that
look great through the Ideal-Scope? Were you amazed at how beautiful
they look to your naked eye? It was this observation, 20 years ago
with a Firescope™, that started Garry’s interest in
diamond cut.
We have no doubt that a GIA
‘A’ grade diamond will:
¨
look great through an Ideal-Scope
¨
score well on the Holloway Cut Advisor
¨
score well on DiamCalc
More effective cut grading
by lab’s will give diamond cutters more incentive to produce
better looking diamonds. Removing the ‘smoke and mirrors,
will give people confidence to pay more for better cut diamonds.
The immediate impact on diamond
cutters? They will only send the better cut stones to GIA. At present
GIA often get the worst proportioned diamonds. Why? A GIA report
gives the least proportion cut quality information of any lab in
the world. This means the GIA will lose a lot of business unless
they can convince cutters that they will get better yields on many
pieces of rough diamond because (like our BIC – FIC’s)
the wider range of proportions results in increased yields.
Hopefully this long awaited
shot in the arm for the diamond industry will come sooner rather
than later.
Follow
this link to read the full details on this latest GIA presentation
by Peggy Jo Donahue (Professional Jeweller).
1st
International Diamond Cut Conference
April 23rd to April 26th, 2004 - Moscow,
Russia
Garry Holloway is a founding
organiser and underwriter
AGS
to discuss new cut grade system
The
American Gem Society has been studying diamond cut for several years.
Our goal is to develop practical, performance-based cut grading systems
for fancy shape diamonds, round
brilliants and round fancies.” Peter Yantzer
Few people are aware the AGS
are changing their Tolkowsky based grading system. Among the new
approach is an Ideal-Scope type colored reflection photographic
system.
Demand for conference attendance
has led to an early closing of registration. Major labs are well
represented, except for GIA, who are concerned about anti trust
collusion charges. However Sergey and I have been invited to attend
formal functions at Basel.
Follow this link to
learn all about the 1st International Diamond Cut Conference
2004 to be held in late April in Russia.
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Has it helped you appreciate
and buy better cut diamonds?
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don’t like about the Ideal-Scope?
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for future topics for this newsletter.
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Published by Ideal-Scope.
112-114 Canterbury Road
Canterbury 3126
Australia
Phone:
+613 9830 5600
Fax:
+613 9880 7193
info@ideal-scope.com
www.ideal-scope.com
Copyright 2004 Ideal-Scope.
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