Please excuse my lack of familiarity; so are you saying that despite the Reddit photo’s probable enhancement, it’s still apparent that RIA has performed weathering and applied a coating subsequent to the auction’s listing photos? By weathering, do you mean some form of abrasive polishing? And would the coating be a permanent alteration?
No worries at all, we're all here to collaborate and..well, hopefully have fun in the process!..despite this roadbump-auction throwing us all off track =b
What I mean is there appears to be some new bluing, possibly cold or hot to the darker and polished looking areas, difficult to tell without time added added (cold tends to show after time on steel, which we haven't had nearly enough time to tell as of yet, plus the multiple re-touches that we've all variously noticed for sure, like the Flash Hider especially), whereas the rusted areas look a little too forced, but just in my opinion, not factual. Though as mentioned, could be just the photo filters used brightening up and illuminating what was already there.
Weathering is just a term we use towards making parts look aged, despite the technique used like real rust vs. painted rust etc.. It just has to look properly aged and look the part, so-to-speak.
But, even since the Pawn Stars version, the scope seemed to have an obvious coating of some sort, lacquer, poly, cerakote (could be a lot of things), in attempt to seal it...that doesn't work over rust so easily. Rust has to be neutralized first (if you want it to stay visible without rusting more, rather than removing it altogether). And even then, a coating doesn't always take, it tends to still continue rusting underneath clear coats of any sort. I'm sure most that have worked on a replica ANH Obi saber or any other replica with real rust weathering noticed that coating it is very, very difficult to maintain the same look over periods of time.
The goal to coat is to preserve in these cases, but it's not quite that simple to just slap it with a clear coating of some sort. Even Rustoleum claims as such, but after years of use..it's simply a joke. If anything, Loctite has the arena there I think..or just simply boiling water
Other than cerakote, most coatings can be removed if wanted without damage to an extent, but it depends on if the weathering is natural or painted on and on what material as well. In this case being steel and brass I'd assume it to be non-permanent coating-wise.
The problem with this one is the Scope seems to have been possibly retouched as well as coated, just like the Cradle of the mount...not so original, as far as my opinion goes. I see it as a somewhat unprofessional approach towards preserving the true, original parts of this half-prop.
Edit: I meant this towards the Original vs. PS/RIA variances..not towards the differences from PS to how it looks today..
-Carson