Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-60.240.118.7-20150105090527/@comment-1298029-20150505000534

I'd think about the Stones' variant looks as "alternate forms" rather than "containers". The Orb device was a container, basically a simple (relatively) metal lockbox; note that the Stone inside was in its "original", stone, form, not in any variant form. Also, the Orb could be discarded and replaced (which it was during the film), meaning it was not a part of the Stone itself in any way (so, not for example a "phantom" construct created by the Stone that was supposed to look like a box, but was really somehow extruded by the Stone; it was rather just a box).

The Tesseract object, on the other hand, was shown (in Thor's poolside vision) to physically collapse on itself, basically "transmuting" to stone form (I hope I'm remembering correctly). Likewise for the Aether; it "condensed" from a cloud of a gaseous, dust-like substance to a piece of crystal.

As for the Sceptre jewel (the original blue one), it appears to have been a simple physical container unrelated to the Stone inside. (I kinda think it was actually intentional camouflage, as the Sceptre glowed blue like the Tesseract, shot energy on occassion that looked like the Tesseract's discharges, etc. Maybe even Loki didn't know what he had (if he did, he could've pulled a Ronan on Thanos, after all, and even if not he could certainly have used the Stone to acquit himself better in NY, instead of just getting bitch-slapped by the Hulk).) I'm just not sure whether the bling now on Vision's (the Vision's?) forehead is the "primordial-form" Stone, or an "alternate form" that just looks a lot similar.