A repository of knowledge about mineral specimens http://www.mindat.org/msgboard-63.html Thu, 20 Jun 2013 04:45:25 +0000 Phorum 5.2.15a http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,293071,293089#msg-293089 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,293071,293089#msg-293089 Nice to hear from you. Ill look forward to seeing the photo(s). Let me know when you get them uploaded.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Sun, 05 May 2013 04:12:30 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,293071,293071#msg-293071 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,293071,293071#msg-293071
Am attempting to get into mineral photography for the pupose of making my own collection catalog complete.

Noticed you had some great Kuiu Island photos of fluorite but little about Zarembo Island, Alaska, which I understand must be collected at low tide. Mine is a small handheld with several botryoidal crstals on it-will get you a pic in due time.

KC Dalby]]> KC Dalby Best Minerals - General Sat, 04 May 2013 21:43:25 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,292535,292535#msg-292535 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,292535,292535#msg-292535
Hemimorphite

Rudolf]]> Rudolf Hasler Best Minerals - General Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:38:54 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280162#msg-280162 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280162#msg-280162
Rock: see Managers' Forum]]> Uwe Kolitsch Best Minerals - General Mon, 24 Dec 2012 16:54:41 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280154#msg-280154 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280154#msg-280154 D Mike Reinke Best Minerals - General Mon, 24 Dec 2012 16:16:09 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280151#msg-280151 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280151#msg-280151 Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Mon, 24 Dec 2012 15:44:28 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280146#msg-280146 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280146#msg-280146 Such a link already exists for the wulfenite page. I'll check/add links for titanite etc.]]> Uwe Kolitsch Best Minerals - General Mon, 24 Dec 2012 15:03:56 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280110#msg-280110 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,280110#msg-280110 you are right but the problem I mean is that the Best Minerals articles first have to be found before you can add them to your favorites. Many mindat users do not know yet about the existence of these articles as there is no link in the mindat home page. You have to scroll right to the bottom of the message board to find them. So they only can be discovered coincidentally.

Rudolf]]> Rudolf Hasler Best Minerals - General Mon, 24 Dec 2012 08:32:46 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279136#msg-279136 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279136#msg-279136 Debbie Woolf Best Minerals - General Fri, 14 Dec 2012 11:09:47 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279069#msg-279069 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279069#msg-279069 Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 20:10:47 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279048#msg-279048 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279048#msg-279048 Rudolf Hasler Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 18:11:45 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279045#msg-279045 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279045#msg-279045 Thanks]]> Harold Moritz Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 17:40:12 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279041#msg-279041 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279041#msg-279041
I think you just confirmed Rudolf's point. The "Best Minerals" section is a collection of articles on various minerals, such as the one on titanite, wulfenite and beryl just to name a few. They are located at the bottom of the message board under the Best Minerals heading.

A list of the first draft articles can be found here

:)-D

Olav]]> Olav Revheim Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 17:04:31 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279035#msg-279035 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279035#msg-279035 Harold Moritz Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 16:33:45 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279026#msg-279026 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279026#msg-279026
:)-D

Olav]]> Olav Revheim Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:27:05 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279022#msg-279022 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,279022,279022#msg-279022 I have noticed that most of my friends have difficulties in finding the Best Minerals articles.
Why not fixing a link on the left side of the mindat home page that everyone can see?
I remember when I coincidentally found Rock's Best Minerals Wulfenite article in March this year.
This phantastic article actually was the reason for me to become a member of mindat instantly.

Rudolf]]> Rudolf Hasler Best Minerals - General Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:55:11 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,274995,274995#msg-274995 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,274995,274995#msg-274995 This list is under construction.

Below are references for works sited in the Best Minerals Articles.

Handbook of Mineralogy v.1 = Anthony, Bideaux, Bladh and Nichols (1990) Handbook of Mineralogy, v. I; Elements, Sulfides, Sulphosalts.

Oxford 2nt = The Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition 1989, Claredon Press, Oxford]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Sat, 27 Oct 2012 11:19:58 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,265058#msg-265058 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,265058#msg-265058 Are you sure you are working less than the permitted 60 hours a week on Mindat?]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Tue, 03 Jul 2012 11:55:20 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,265052#msg-265052 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,265052#msg-265052
Actinolite
Anthophyllite
Arfvedsonite
Cummingtonite
Edenite
Gedrite
Glaucophane
Grunerite
Hastingsite
Hornblende
Kaersutite
Katophorite
Pargasite
Richterite
Riebeckite
Tschermakite
Tremolite
Winchite

I plan to include the reminding, even more obscure amphiboles, in a set of group/subgroup articles like the one started:

Amphibole-group

As IMA now has agreed upon and approved a new standard for amphibole nomenclature, I will not do any more work on the ampiboles until this standard has been published. After this has been published I plan to revisit the above articles to align them with the new nomenclature, and to expand the group article.

In the mean time, I will continue to work on the corundum articles.

Olav]]> Olav Revheim Best Minerals - General Tue, 03 Jul 2012 11:43:52 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,263199,263199#msg-263199 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,263199,263199#msg-263199 A guide to the lay-out for the Best Minerals articles for creating an article and preparing the layout.

The intention behind this text is to show that anyone with some interest and general geology and mineralogy knowledge can write Best mineral articles based on a structured search for information even with very little or no specific knowledge of the mineral or the locality in advance.

I am starting by reviewing all photos for the specific mineral in the database, selecting those I think may be relevant for the “Best Minerals” article. I create a “under construction” article in the “Best Minerals” message board listing all the localities and photos I think will be relevant, following Harjo’s guidelines and advice for the layout to the best of my patience and abilities. This will create a number of information “blocks”, or localities to be included in the article. The screen shot below illustrates one of these initial “blocks”.

© Olav Revheim

In order to prepare the text for these blocks, I use the following method:
1- Search for and store information from various sources
2- Skim through information and check for relevance- delete non-relevant information
3- Read the reminding documentation and paste the most relevant sections into a word document.
4- If necessary, contact photo uploaders, Mindat experts or paper authors directly for more specific information.
5- Prepare a “cut and paste” draft text
6- Write the text and update the best mineral article block with a text entry.
7- Move on to the next block.
8- When all blocks are filled, writing the article introduction is very much straight forward.

Normally, I will have little or no knowledge of the locality and the occurrence of the mineral from a locality, I have used riebeckite from Quincy, Massachusetts as an example. If I am lucky, someone with a detailed knowledge on the locality will step forward and share information in a post in the forum, if not, I start looking for information.

The best place to start is the photo caption and the locality description on Mindat, including the detailed mineral report. This will sometimes provide valuable information on the mineral and the locality, either directly or by listing references. In this specific case not much appeared. See locality page and Detailed mineral report

Then there is the internet. The wealth of information available amazes me. There are some default sources I check out first. Rruff.info is one of them. I look up riebeckite and find at the bottom of the page a list of references, often available as a downloadable pdf. Rruff.info also has a searchable archive of older volumes of the Mineralogical magazine. Needless to say, the archive is bookmarked as a favorite in my web browser. Quite often, something will appear from there.

rruff.info riebeckite references	© Olav Revheim

Mineralogial Magazine archive	© Olav Revheim

General searches will also be helpful. I often start with a wide search, such as “riebeckite Massachusetts”. I am in particular looking for pdf’s, google books, archive.org or similar sites where full documents can be read or downloaded. Many sites presents only the abstracts, but these may occationaly be helpful. In this case the general search was helpful, but for more remote localities with less information published even more general searches exemplified with “Quincy geology”, “Massachusetts amphibole”, “ petrology, Massachusetts” etc. may be necessary.

Internet search results, Cape Ann granite	© Olav Revheim

After browsing through the information gathered by general searches, more detailed searches my reveal addition information. In this case I used searches like “granite new England history” and “Cape Ann granite riebeckite” gave even more information.
For this Quincy granite riebeckite block I downloaded 14 documents and links representing articles, books, thesis’, papers etc. ranging in content from petrology, analysis of riebeckites, early 20th century field observations, a guidebook and an online book on the history of the New England granite industry. All very interesting reading.

Web information formats:

pdf's	© Olav Revheim

online book	© Olav Revheim

google books	© Olav Revheim

From this information I prepare a “cut and paste” word document with bits and pieces from different sources. These cut and paste text blocks of 1-2 pages forms the draft text for the article entry. At this stage I will have a good overview of the locality, and can easily identify if I there are some issues that need clarification. For the New England riebeckites, I’ve had a very pleasant e-mail correspondence with Van King to discuss the occurrence of riebeckite, arfvedsonite and other amphiboles in these granites.
I then write the text entry, and add to the article, I try to include information on

• How the mineral occurs and how large crystals that has been found
• Some geological/petrological background and associated minerals
• The significance of the locality
• Any site descriptions as relevant
• Any use of the material
• Any good stories that may be available

I tend to include more text on the significant occurences, may be as much as 20 lines of text, and less, may be only a couple of lines on the less significant or really obscure/remote localities.
The final result can be found here: riebeckite series article.]]> Olav Revheim Best Minerals - General Sun, 10 Jun 2012 10:21:13 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,258648,258648#msg-258648 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,258648,258648#msg-258648

Can you help make this a better article	©

Can you help make this a better article	©

Can you help make this a better article	©

Can you help make this a better article	©

Can you help make this a better article	©

]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Sat, 21 Apr 2012 08:36:23 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,235492#msg-235492 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,235492#msg-235492 Ill look forward to your work. I have begun to think I should do some more work on Quartz and Calcite. Will you be in Denver? I have been thinking that I should start with the calcite and quartz from countries where there are not many collectors and hope that while those are under construction that it will attract the interest of some knowledgeable collector in countries, like Germany and France where there are a lot of collectors, and that my work on the other countries will be encourage to do the quartz and calcites from their countries. If no one steps up by the time I finish the countries where there are not many collectors, well, then Ill start to work on them.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Wed, 14 Sep 2011 04:39:46 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,235470#msg-235470 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,235470#msg-235470 Bill Dameron Best Minerals - General Tue, 13 Sep 2011 21:39:23 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,221873#msg-221873 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,221873#msg-221873 OK, Ill keep an eye on them and chip in if I think I can add something.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Thu, 28 Apr 2011 11:16:54 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,221796#msg-221796 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,221796#msg-221796 Finishing all the Beryl articles will be quite a task, so if any of you guys want to dig into them with me, you're more then welcome ;-)

Cheers,

Harjo]]> Harjo Neutkens Best Minerals - General Wed, 27 Apr 2011 18:43:04 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,216859#msg-216859 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,216859#msg-216859 I think you're doing a great job on the Barytes!]]> Harjo Neutkens Best Minerals - General Sun, 13 Mar 2011 21:18:32 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215689#msg-215689 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215689#msg-215689 Bill]]> Bill Dameron Best Minerals - General Wed, 02 Mar 2011 16:13:26 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215354#msg-215354 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215354#msg-215354 Tweaking the code strings will come back quickly once you get into it. I can also look over your stuff and do some tweaking if need be. The most important part is selecting the images and writing up the text, or at least for those localities where you know something. I would strongly suggest that you learn to use the selection tool that David devised for us. It saves a lot of time. If you need help in learning this, rattle my cage.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Mon, 28 Feb 2011 01:57:34 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215150#msg-215150 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,215150#msg-215150 I found it easier to do the entire thing offline in Word and then just copy it over. I"ll have to go relearn the coding, but I have notes. The height parameter is what I use on my barite website and makes for consistency.
Bill]]> Bill Dameron Best Minerals - General Sat, 26 Feb 2011 16:27:38 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,204203#msg-204203 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,63,136874,204203#msg-204203 Thats right, go pick out all the juicy ones and leave the black ugly ones for me. Just kidding. Probably better you do them than I, you have more of an artists touch. Its hard for me to learn that artistic stuff. But sometimes wish you would pick out and show more examples of things. Collectors will come here to see how their things stack up against the best or to see how something they are considering buying may stack up against the best and the more examples that they can compare their specimen against the more they can learn and profit. If we picture a specimens that we are pretty sure is the best known, we should be sure to say so. David is a minimalist in such things, and I am perhaps at the other end and will show pictures of 20 good ones if we have them in the gallery. Every author will be different in this regard, but I would hope that just the extra work of including and tweaking the photos would not deter the authors from being generous with their selection of pictures.
YOB]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals - General Tue, 30 Nov 2010 20:45:08 +0000