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[D. Bergin]

Originally Posted by cyseymour

Personally, I really don't like the idea of changing the scanner settings. A photograph is a work of art - the photographer is the artist and entitled to fix it however they wish. But a scan is really something that is a matter of record in the sense that it is representing something else, which itself is a work of art (or memorabilia). It's a subtle difference, but it's a major difference. Auctioneers aren't artists whom ought to be figuring their own interpretation of a card.

Sometimes cards do look better in real life than in a scan, but if an auction house is having that issue, they really ought to replace their scanner. Scanners these days do extraordinary work at capturing an image, especially with the new technology available. Anyone with a strong knowledge of technology will realize that there is no need to adjust the scanner settings at all.

Look at Just Collect, for instance. They have very nice scans of their OJ's on ebay right now, and you can tell that the hue is not adjusted, because if you look at the sgc flips, they show as a rich, dark green that they are in real life. That's one barometer for telling that the scanner settings have not been adjusted to enhance the image of the card. In some other auction houses, those very same flips would show up a light, bright green.

So it doesn't really have to do with any attempt realism - it has to do with enhancing an image to make a bidder believe that the card is brighter, cleaner, and more attractive than it is in real life in order to proffer a better price on the card.

Are you saying it's best to just use the standard factory setting on every scan you make?

If so, I disagree pretty strongly.

Maybe you have some super-intuitive scanner in your possession but most don't. Most scanners I have ever owned, and I have owned many, need to be tweaked in the professional setting in order to reflect what type of item you are scanning whether it be a real photo, lithograph, printed photo, old paper stock, new paper stock. They are all scanned somewhat differently in order to look as close to the approximation they look in real life.

A scanner will play all kinds of havoc with off white's, just depending on where you crop it sometimes, and you have to adjust to either remove or keep the brightness factor the automatic settings apply.