Start this Yuan Shikai dollar with an uncropped view
Every photograph must return to the same object. Save complete faces, low-angle surface images and damage details without using a collector name or a neighbouring coin to supply unreadable text.
Keep document dates away from the object's date field. Record hair, epaulette, legends and denticles only under the Yuan Shikai dollar number.
Add an overlapping edge sequence, weight, diameter, instrument and native unit. Retain original and converted readings side by side if both are needed.
Only object evidence is carried forward here; people, shops and transaction outcomes are not coin attributes.
Trace the circumference without altering it
While a holder remains closed, photograph every accessible rim section. Identify seams, filing, holes, solder or mounting traces and state what the enclosure conceals.
Use raking light to distinguish patina, worn relief, strike softness, wiping and artificially bright areas. Avoid cleaning a dark coin for presentation.
Match the portrait side to its own reverse
Transcribe the date, denomination and visible face legends before using weight or diameter as comparison evidence. The working type must lead the specification.
Take whole obverse and reverse images before close views of hair, shoulder, date lettering, grain wreath, inner denticles or variety markers.
Keep condition notes precise
If several dollars are present, number and photograph each before grouping their dates. Never let an attractive reverse or better edge replace the one belonging to this portrait.
Transcribe a slab label, grade and serial independently. The plastic-covered dollar still needs its visible features and limitations documented.
Treat provenance as a separate evidence stream
Old sleeves and family descriptions may remain with the object, but identification rests on its lettering, designs, strike, metal surface and edge.
A proposed signed, O, triangular-yuan or local variety remains provisional until its diagnostic detail is visible in context.
Reconcile the Yuan Shikai portrait, wreath and circumference
Set the portrait-side date and lettering beside the wreath-side denomination, ribbon and grain details. Each reading should point back to an uncropped face, not to an isolated character frame.
Lay the edge sequence clockwise from a named starting point, with weight, diameter, instrument displays and original units attached to the same coin number. Mark any hidden arc instead of completing it from a reference specimen.
Plot countermarks, holes, possible rim work and local wear where they interrupt the portrait, wreath or denticles. Holder wording and provenance papers remain dated attachments rather than substitutes for the metal.
Keep the first unedited image set even when later light makes a feature clearer. Add the new interpretation as a dated layer so the earlier surface and orientation record can still be checked.
Send the reviewer one sequence: portrait, wreath, circumference, measurements, then the exact disputed feature. That order makes the Yuan Shikai dollar, rather than its label, the source of the attribution.
