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#530062 - 11/16/09 02:31 PM
My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
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SwissLady
Curious
Registered: 11/05/09
Posts: 24
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Last week I went to a local jewelry store with a friend to look at some diamond studs. And, yes, she knows about online shopping -- or I wouldn't be a true friend!!- but she has a gift certificate to use at this store.
I was wearing an AGS 0 ideal cut diamond ring that I bought online from one of the well-known independent online diamond vendors, so the quality is top-notch. I looked down at my ring while I was in the store and my diamond was black! The diamond was throwing off flashes of colored fire, but the body of it was black. I have noticed this before under other lighting, including other jewelry stores. I have read that all ideal cut stones do this and it's to be expected.
This store sells AGS 0 stones and none of their AGS 0's looked black inside the jewelry cases. I held my hand up near the cases and my diamond was still black.
This is pretty disturbing to go into a jewelry store and expect that your stone will look better than the typical diamonds they sell, and instead it looks worse! And when I asked the staff about it, they looked at me like there was something wrong with my stone. None of them said, oh, it's because all ideal cuts do that.
Is this because my stone is on my hand when I'm looking at it and the stones in the case are farther away from my eye? If I would have put my ring inside the case with their diamonds, would my diamond have looked the same as theirs? In other words, is the lighting inside the case different than the lighting in the store?
Has this happened to anyone else?
And for you ladies who wear antique cut diamonds or sims, do your diamonds do this in jewelry stores?
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#530066 - 11/16/09 02:37 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: SwissLady]
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Blingaholic
BTD Crown Jewel
Registered: 03/25/07
Posts: 15895
Loc: VA
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i have a princess cut diamond that does this in dim restaurant lighting. it will give off sparkles of color flashes, but there'll be an awful dark brown color to the stone. and my stone isn't even AGS 0 or anything 
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#530073 - 11/16/09 02:47 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: Blingaholic]
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gemcat
The Pink Orchid
Registered: 04/17/05
Posts: 3593
Loc: San Antonio, TX
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I don't anything close to an AGS, but my antique cuts seem to look better in lower lighting such as restaurants. In jewelry stores and such, they still sparkle. When you say your stone looks black, do you mean there are areas with no light, or that the stone itself is black? I'm trying to understand just what you are seeing.
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#530084 - 11/16/09 03:13 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: MrsGotRocks]
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SwissLady
Curious
Registered: 11/05/09
Posts: 24
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Thank you Blingaholic, gemcat, and MrsGotRocks.
Blingaholic, it's interesting that you've noticed this in a princess cut. And restaurants are another lighting condition where my stone looks black, but with flashes of fire.
Gemcat, the color is hard to describe, it's really black all over, like an intense dark black color, but it still looks like a crystal, not densely black. Black like dark glass. But not dead black, there is a lot of colored fire.
MrsGotRocks, that thread was helpful. I've seen similar threads on Pricescope, but the consensus in those threads, if I remember right, is that the spotlighting is so bright our eyes can't pick up the amount of light being returned from the stone, so we only see the flashes and the rest of the stone is dark. This makes sense when you think about nail salons and other places that have spotlighting, and it makes sense that a well-cut sim like an asha would do this, too. But like you say, it would be interesting to see if the lighting in the case is somehow different than what's in the store. I wonder how I can ask the SA to put my ring in the case without me looking too weird?!!?? Maybe if I tell her it's for research purposes!
By the way, just to hijack my own thread for a minute, there is no way that I could tell the difference between these beautiful asha's and a "real" diamond. After looking at the photos on this site, I have to say I'm blown away by the beauty of these sims. No wonder some other forums don't want them mentioned! Now maybe I can get that 2+ emerald cut stone set in a Harry Winston replica setting I've always wanted  There's just no way I could ever justify buying the real thing, even if I had the money.
Edited by SwissLady (11/16/09 03:15 PM)
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#530087 - 11/16/09 03:18 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: Alexgem7777]
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SwissLady
Curious
Registered: 11/05/09
Posts: 24
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Could your head have been obstructing the light in the way you were viewing it?
Yes, my head could have been blocking the light from an overhead spotlight. That's interesting. I wonder what my ring would have looked like if I would have taken it off, put it on the case and walked away and looked at it from a distance. That I might be able to pull off without looking too weird.
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#530088 - 11/16/09 03:18 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: SwissLady]
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Dana ♥
Afficionado
Registered: 04/07/09
Posts: 692
Loc: GA
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my diamonds, and my sims, look *awful* compared to what's in the cases at my jeweler's.
that's because there's better lighting inside the cases, to show off the stones to their best potential - different types of lighting for different stones.
Signity, Diamonique, Asha, real diamonds - they all look plasticky and overly glassy in there. but strangely my LY Winfields stones look just as good as they always do!
i think it is deliberate, so that no matter how good (or not) your stones are, what they're selling will always look better.
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#530090 - 11/16/09 03:36 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: Dana ♥]
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SwissLady
Curious
Registered: 11/05/09
Posts: 24
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my diamonds, and my sims, look *awful* compared to what's in the cases at my jeweler's.
that's because there's better lighting inside the cases, to show off the stones to their best potential - different types of lighting for different stones.
Signity, Diamonique, Asha, real diamonds - they all look plasticky and overly glassy in there. but strangely my LY Winfields stones look just as good as they always do!
i think it is deliberate, so that no matter how good (or not) your stones are, what they're selling will always look better.
It is weird how their stuff always looks better in the case, even when I know what I'm looking at is included and poorly cut. Interesting, though, how people responding to this thread have noticed this "darkness" in all sorts of cuts, and both real and simulated diamonds. Maybe it is a combination of the lighting in the case and my head blocking the diamond. I could also ask my friend to wear my ring into the store and then look at it from a distance at different angles.
Now I'm curious about the Winfield's stones and why they'd be different!
Edited by SwissLady (11/16/09 03:37 PM)
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#530120 - 11/16/09 06:19 PM
Re: My AGS Ideal Cut and Jewelry Store Lights
[Re: SwissLady]
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Dana ♥
Afficionado
Registered: 04/07/09
Posts: 692
Loc: GA
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not all Winfields stones (at least, of the ones i've owned) just the LY ones!
the CW ones - both cooked and not cooked - looked icky in the Jewelers. but the 8mm LY OMC i've got? looked just as good in the store as in the sunlight outside and in the diffused, indirect lighting in our house!
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