#ICYMI – Carson of 3DJoes has shared a rather concerning PSA regarding the “waffle print” that used to be the telltale sign of an authentic, vintage card. Here’s the scoop –
WARNING! WAFFLE PRINT PSA:
In the good old days of mint on card (MOC) collecting, the silver bullet tell was whether or not the bubble was adhered to the card back using a heat press which resulted in a “waffle print.”
The eBay auction I’m sharing here is not evil, in that it clearly shows “reproduction packaging” on both of the card backs, and the seller even describes how he replaced the O-rings before putting these figures on these repro cardbacks.
What it does show us is that waffle prints are no longer a reliable tell. Beggars Canyon Toys (BCT) got a heat press years ago and will use it for his customers. I’m not condemning him for doing so, and I do not know if these specific repro “MOC” figures even came from him.
But I do want to inform you all that this technology is out there and you need to look for additional tells when hunting for MOC figures.
Some additional tells I look for:
1. The sheen of the paper: repros are on more glossy paper stock typically, and it’s not “toothy” or textured like vintage stock.
2. The clarity of the image: repros are most-often made using lower resolution assets, and inferior digital printing technology.
3. Imperfect hole punches: they don’t seem to punch all the way through, and they certainly don’t look like vintage gang tabs.
4. The lack of a curvature around the edge of the cards on the back: vintage cardbacks were die-cut, and the machine pushed front to back of the card, leaving a curve on the backside.
There are so many other tells. But the more tells we share, the more the devious scam artists out there will work to overcome them. They do this for one reason: to make fraudulent reproductions that they can sell for more than they are reasonably worth.
Many thanks as always go to Carson for keeping his eye on the community. Caveat Emptor.
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