Mid-auction analysis - OMGs!, LOLs!, WTFs!, whatev....

[Zorba]

Cinema first for me too... That is why I'm not hung up on format (1sh, 1/2 sh, insert, Yugo, etc...).

Same here...I am all all over the place and have yet to discriminate by country or size. I just love this stuff.

[MoviePosterBid.com]

I'm into Cinema first, and posters are part of that.

totally so.. I am a cinema historian AND I collect posters

[crowzilla]

I'll pay $12.78!

whew!  I was just about to put it in the mail to Rich, thank goodness I saw your post first.

[MoviePosterBid.com]

whew!  I was just about to put it in the mail to Rich, thank goodness I saw your post first.

don't worry.. I didn't have my calculator handy to add $10 shipping, so I just wrote a check for $23.00 total.. so obviously I can buy Chris's rebid 23 times over

[CSM]

whew!  I was just about to put it in the mail to Rich, thank goodness I saw your post first.

Rich will understand

[CSM]

don't worry.. I didn't have my calculator handy to add $10 shipping, so I just wrote a check for $23.00 total

Pshh...what good is a cheque nowadays?

[Harry Caul]

Who spells check with a 'q'?  Damn Canadians... Get off my lawn! 

[agentprovocateur]

Over here... is there another way spelling for cheque!? The only other way I can think of is 'check' but that would be silly

[MoviePosterBid.com]

a dog was barqing when my car was self-parqing last night. the sky was darqening and the the gardener was still worqing. he cut his hand and his words were fuqing. Then a duq kwaqqed by leading it's chiqs to the nearby laqe. then I woke up and realized it was all faqe

[Charlie]

I guess it's a case of if your into Posters, or Cinema. Poster collectors aren't really into Cinema and it's history. So
Wouldn't be interested in other film Memorabilia. They may collect Cinema posters, but it's the posters that's more
important.

I'm into Cinema first, and posters are part of that. If it came to a choice of you can have the film, or the poster?
I would pick the film every time, which is probably why I have several thousand films....

Yeah, but if I wanted to see scenes from the movie, I would just watch it.  I don't see what a photo does to enhance the experience.  To me, the poster is what is suppose to get you excited about the film; it locks down on a piece of advertising what the film could be, is, and may be later...  If you are just into film, just watch movies no need to collect things.  Posters represent whole summed up experiences; stills little snip-its of what I've already seen. JMO  

[paul waines]

I do think you miss the point Completely Charlie.   In your way of thinking, why would you want the poster!!!... the poster is there to get you into the cinema. So after it's done it's job why would you want the poster, as you have seen the film, and don't need enticing in, so the poster is now useless.... 

[MoviePosterBid.com]

Charlie, the stills are every bit as much of advertising as the posters are maybe even more so.

for instance, when I went to theatres as a kid, they had a whole assortment of images displayed from billboards to small formats AND large displays of stills - sometimes in proper scene order - in the outside port cochere. Then the long corridors had them also, in various sizes from 8x10 to 14x20 or even larger.

The posters are idealized images of the film story, or today, mostly just portraits. The stills are 100% representative of what you see on-screen unlike any other piece of advertising.

Finally, when yu opened up newspapers to the movie section, I don't ever recall seeing a reproduction of a poster used for a review, or one of those "here is a photo of Dick Powell in Murder My Sweet at the Pantages Theatre through Friday". Only stills were used.

Stills are great and I have thousands of them

[agentprovocateur]

a dog was barqing when my car was self-parqing last night. the sky was darqening and the the gardener was still worqing. he cut his hand and his words were fuqing. Then a duq kwaqqed by leading it's chiqs to the nearby laqe. then I woke up and realized it was all faqe

Quality... I love some of the different language spellings, one of my favourites is 'ize' endings to words rather than 'ise (realize or realise?). In the UK there's some great pronunciation differences between parts of the country.

[eatbrie]

I don't collect stills because I don't trust them.  It's hard enough to authenticate a poster, I can't imagine doing the same for stills and various re-releases.  It is so easy to reprint something based on a negative.

T

[paul waines]

Like Rich, I think they are great, and have a few thousand myself. As you say T authenticating them is a nightmare, but it's like poster buying in the U.K, the more you see and handle the easier it gets, though the best of us can be caught out, it's all part of the learning curve...

[Harry Caul]

I don't collect stills because I don't trust them.  It's hard enough to authenticate a poster, I can't imagine doing the same for stills and various re-releases.  It is so easy to reprint something based on a negative.

T

That is a great point.  While I actually like stills and would happily buy them for movies I like, I don't currently own any.  I bought a back and they all turned out to later prints.  That definitely turned me off to buying from all but the most trustworthy sources...

[jayn_j]

I don't collect stills because I don't trust them.  It's hard enough to authenticate a poster, I can't imagine doing the same for stills and various re-releases.  It is so easy to reprint something based on a negative.

T

You should able to tell the difference in photographic papers the same way you do for poster paper based on age.  Older papers were printed on emulsion over a paper base.  In the late '70s, they switched to RC papers which are based on a synthetic plastic type base.

Not sure if there is a difference between originals and re-releases in many cases.  They tended to save the negatives and just print up another batch when needed.  I suspect that for many titles, they just reused the original set.  In addition, there were many reasons to create stills.

I think we tend to think of portrait stills of the stars, and those were heavily copied.  They did scene stills and I remember those on theater marquees, mixed in with the lobby cards.  I have some which are various wardrobe tests, makeup tests, blocking tests, etc.  I expect those were seldom duplicated as they were used for a single purpose and had no real publicity value.

[eatbrie]

Take a movie like Gone With the Wind, for instance.  How many times has it been re-released?  10?  20?  How do I know a set of stills is from '39, or '42, or '54?  Can someone really tell the difference?  Is there a technological way to differentiate one printing from the other with absolute certainty, or is it just a dealer's best guess?

T

[jayn_j]

Take a movie like Gone With the Wind, for instance.  How many times has it been re-released?  10?  20?  How do I know a set of stills is from '39, or '42, or '54?  Can someone really tell the difference?  Is there a technological way to differentiate one printing from the other with absolute certainty, or is it just a dealer's best guess?

T

The paper thing is only going to tell if it was printed post-1980.  As I said in the previous post, I think a lot of the re-releases just reused the original negatives, so there would be no detectable difference.  However, I also think the negatives were tightly controlled.  It is pretty easy to spot a print made from copying a print vs one made from an original negative. Since stills don't have a lot of value, I'm not sure if it makes a big difference if that particular print was made in 39 or 43, and I don't think there is any way to tell. 

If you had a print that you could guarantee was an original, you might be able to determine if another still came from the same run.  Setup is a manual process that involves manually cropping the negative.  Different runs would make different decisions on exposure and cropping.

[Harry Caul]

Take a movie like Gone With the Wind, for instance.  How many times has it been re-released?  10?  20?  How do I know a set of stills is from '39, or '42, or '54?  Can someone really tell the difference?  Is there a technological way to differentiate one printing from the other with absolute certainty, or is it just a dealer's best guess?

T

And better yet, how do you tell the difference with crappy eBay photos and clueless sellers?

[Charlie]

I do think you miss the point Completely Charlie.   In your way of thinking, why would you want the poster!!!... the poster is there to get you into the cinema. So after it's done it's job why would you want the poster, as you have seen the film, and don't need enticing in, so the poster is now useless.... 

I seem to miss the point a lot on this forum.  I want the poster because I committed emotionally to the logorama of the cinema experience.  Now know that I have only been on this earth a short time and have never seen a still hung in a theater...  Never a window card or insert.  I only remember standing outside looking at the posters and trying to decide what to watch.

I wonder if the line on understanding stills has anything to do with age?

[MoviePosterBid.com]

Take a movie like Gone With the Wind, for instance.  How many times has it been re-released?  10?  20?  How do I know a set of stills is from '39, or '42, or '54?  Can someone really tell the difference?  Is there a technological way to differentiate one printing from the other with absolute certainty, or is it just a dealer's best guess?

you can tell usually by various imprints in the bottom border area or by NSS or studio # if the film got a new printing each time it was re-issued.
However, I think if you ask most dealers, if a still is reprinted by the studio during the film's initial release, which back then could last a couple years in some cases like GWTW, then we actually consider them all first release stills, at least in my mind. This is not the same as Frankenstein 1931 stills and 1938 stills, which are different releases

[Zorba]

I wonder if the line on understanding stills has anything to do with age?

Probably has a bit to do with it. I think we are about the same age and while I dont really remember stills I do remember lobbies. At least I think I do. Maybe I am dreaming them?  

One of the things that I love about this is stuff is that it is what we make of it. Its all very personal. Whatever you make of it all is all that matters.

[holiday]

I seem to miss the point a lot on this forum.  I want the poster because I committed emotionally to the logorama of the cinema experience.  Now know that I have only been on this earth a short time and have never seen a still hung in a theater...  Never a window card or insert.  I only remember standing outside looking at the posters and trying to decide what to watch.

I wonder if the line on understanding stills has anything to do with age?

I buy them when I like the image.  I don't much care if it's repro or vintage as long as it's reflected in the price.

[110x75]

I wonder if the line on understanding stills has anything to do with age?

Or completist dementia...