Schneeds

What possible reason would UPS have need of your social security number? I'm not giving that to anyone.

For reference, this one that shows up in Hoshi's database was listed for 1,000,000 originally and sold recently: https://eirakudo.shop/305191 It had been for sale quite a while. I nearly bought it half a dozen times, but the relative shortness kept making me hesitate. Lovely blade though.

I display the book as a part of my collection. Even people who don't care about swords are able to appreciate it for the level of quality.

Tametsugu can get awfully nice in and of itself. If the below one ever shows up in public for 3.5 I will be the owner

I tried to cheat, but it appears Jussi left his blade out of his own database

Aoi currently has this Hasebe wakizashi on consignment which aroused my curiosity: https://www.aoijapan.com/wakizashimumei-attributed-to-hasebe-kunishigenbthk-tokubetsu-hozon-token-consignment-sale/ A quality Hasebe is a long term goal of mine, so whenever up pops up I like to study it. This one was especially interesting as Kunishige himself was listed in the attribution. One of the things I like to do when looking into a blade is check @Jussi Ekholm's wonderful database to get an of how many others with same attribution and similarities are out there. In the case of Kunishige, I knew there were far more tanto and wakizashi than tachi/katana out there, but was curious how many would be attributed to him. Interestingly enough, there are no mumei wakizashi's in the database attributed directly to Kunishige, which would make this one fairly rare. My curiosity lead me to translate the attribution myself, however, and I'm pretty sure it's actually Hasebe Kuninobu. Still a great attribution, but less so. Also kind of inexcusable for Aoi unless they're interchangeable for purposes of attribution? (I believe that's the son of the first gen Kunishige). Anyway, for those of you well versed in Hasebe works, how do you think it compares or holds up?

That last composite image in the middle stack of the AOI Masamune photographs is very well done; I wish they had done that for the full blade and not just the kissaki and nakago, it probably would help sell the blade. Or maybe it wouldn't...

Well stated, Hoshi. That reminds me of a good friend of mine who was a long time avid hunter. He told me once there came a time when he put down the rifle in favor of a camera, and enjoys it even more.

This collector guide, written by member Rivkin, may be of help to you. https://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/files/file/125-nihonto-collecting-guide/

There are several considerations with respect to the lens: focal length, minimum focus distance, and optical quality. Ideally you want a fixed focal length lens (prime lenses will always have greater image quality than a zoom at comparable focal length), be in the ~100mm range or greater, and have a small minimum focus distance (just a few inches). The minimum focus distance will vary across the focal ranges on lenses so you have to pay attention to that as well. DXOmark and Lenstip are good resources for image quality comparisons.

Eric came here asking for thoughts on this sword. A number of experienced members chimed in with opinions and observations. And while some were delicately stated, and some not, I found myself learning from the things I had missed and overlooked none the less. Eric asked for thoughts, and to his credit, welcomed all of them. This is the way.

Thank you! Props to Hoshi and Michael!

Z-sey comes awfully close. Experienced people here can tell the difference, but new people? Their smiths are clearly skilled and talented. https://www.swordjp.com/product/tamahagane-katana-blade

Advice on the internet is free; you can take it or leave it. Personally, I like reading the variety of view points expressed here on the forum and I think it's almost always well intentioned. The advice given here is largely the same and in line with the advice I've read here over and over again, so I don't understand the controversy. On the other hand, baiting and mocking people for sharing their experience and views is counter productive and preventative of those people (especially new) coming here to learn and get into the hobby.