tenaflyviper: 18 Various Kinds of Opals When most people think of an opal, they might think o
tenaflyviper: 18 Various Kinds of Opals When most people think of an opal, they might think of a milky-colored stone containing a rainbow of stripes or flecks inside it. What many people don’t know is that they are incredibly diverse in appearance, and are not actually minerals. Opals are a solid, amorphous form of silica, and are classified as “mineraloids”. Like other mineraloids, such as amber, pearl, and obsidian, they lack structural order, or “crystallinity”. From the top: Black Opals Cat’s Eye Opals Dendritic Opals Flamingo Opals Peruvian Pink Opals Zebra Opals Leopard Opals Yowah Nut and Koroit Opals (both have the same characteristics - they merely come from two different areas). Brown Opals Ethiopian Honeycomb Opals Green Opals (Serbian, Tanzanian, and Brazilian) Peruvian Blue Opals Matrix Opals Landscape Opals (Andean and Australian) Mexican Fire Opals Crystal Opals Australian Boulder Opals Ethiopian Ribbon Opals (Side note - the image backgrounds are transparent, except for the matrix/landscape picture, which seems hellbent on being an asshat, no matter how many times I try to fix it) -- source link