Original negatives- underrated? Show yours

[Forever Young]

As many of you know, I am an original photo collector. That will never change as it is my hobby passion.
That said, I have recently been facinsted in original negatives(glass, acetate and slides/from camera etc. ). Perhaps it is because they are part of the photo process. They are the closest link to the photographer other than the camera. They also give me the ability to make the highest quality prints that no one else has. They are true 1 of 1s.
Anyone else find them undervalued /interesting?

The knock is that they are hard to display. I think they would actually be neat displayed with a corresponding original print.

Attached is a Burke Ruth I own. I would love to hear other's thoughts and see other examples.

[Forever Young]

I actually have an original type 1 example of this one.

[prewarsports]

Negatives are awesome and it like you said, the closest thing to holding a piece of history you can get as it was handled and touched by the photographer and was right there next to the player on the field at one point. There is nothing else in the hobby like holding an original glass plate negative.

The downside is they are very tough to display so it takes a special person to appreciate them for what they are. It would not surprise me if they made a major jump in price, but it also would not surprise me if they never really took off considering the limitations of display.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by prewarsports

Negatives are awesome and it like you said, the closest thing to holding a piece of history you can get as it was handled and touched by the photographer and was right there next to the player on the field at one point. There is nothing else in the hobby like holding an original glass plate negative.

The downside is they are very tough to display so it takes a special person to appreciate them for what they are. It would not surprise me if they made a major jump in price, but it also would not surprise me if they never really took off considering the limitations of display.

So again, display is the only limitation? Perhaps we need to come up with something?! A display with a high Res print is cleRly the way. The key is not to damage the negative.

[btcarfagno]

That's the tough part. Exposure to normal light in a room would damage the negative over time. Would need to come up with a way to display the photo plus the negative while not damaging the negative.

Here are a few that I still have:

Ruth taking batting practice on opening day at Yankee Stadium in 1923



Ruth signing for a fan



1912 Giants on field before first game of World Series



Shot of crowd during Merkle replay game 1908



Tom C

[steve B]

Some stuff on the care of glass plate negatives. Film negatives will differ a bit and are a bit more complex

http://www.webjunction.org/documents...Negatives.html

Steve B

[horzverti]

I love the fact that original negs are truly 1 of 1.

I think there is, or will be, a solid market for vintage original negs. We may see that they will become quite sought after and their prices will reflect their desirability. Although they can be fragile, prone to deterioration and can be tough to adequately display; they will still find buyers. Collectors buy many items just to stash away. Collectors don't display every photo or card they own. Negs can be acquired and then stored away just like everything else. I think that they are now collectibles in their own right and not just a means to produce photos.

I haven't heard any updates recently, but the collection of original Conlon negs (glass plates only) was slated to be sold off sometime this summer by the receivers of the Rogers' holdings. I am sure the sale has been pushed back considering I haven't heard any push leading up to the sale.

Here are a few of my original Conlons 4 x 5s on acetate safety film. He switched to acetate from glass in the 1930s. Note the company name on the envelope he stored one in.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by horzverti

I love the fact that original negs are truly 1 of 1.

I think there is, or will be, a solid market for vintage original negs. We may see that they will become quite sought after and their prices will reflect their desirability. Although they can be fragile, prone to deterioration and can be tough to adequately display; they will still find buyers. Collectors buy many items just to stash away. Collectors don't display every photo or card they own. Negs can be acquired and then stored away just like everything else. I think that they are now collectibles in their own right and not just a means to produce photos.

I haven't heard any updates recently, but the collection of original Conlon negs (glass plates only) was slated to be sold off sometime this summer by the receivers of the Rogers' holdings. I am sure the sale has been pushed back considering I haven't heard any push leading up to the sale.

Here are a few of my original Conlons 4 x 5s on acetate safety film. He switched to acetate from glass in the 1930s. Note the company name on the envelope he stored one in.

I can't see what they say.

[horzverti]

The white one is a The Evening Telegram mailing envelope cut in half. It seems Charlie had so many negs, he ran out of his supply of the tan, cardboard-ish storage envelopes. So he used his employer's envelopes. Cool connection between Conlon and his newspaper employer.
I don't have the negs readily available to re-photograph right now. I'll see if I can add a larger or more tightly cropped picture later.

[horzverti]

Found one

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by horzverti

Found one

Very very cool curt! Any Ruth or gehrig?

[horzverti]

Never heard of those guys. I do have a sweet Fred Haney though.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by horzverti

Never heard of those guys. I do have a sweet Fred Haney though.

Haha.. Love it. I love how his hand writing is all over the sleeves. Thank you for Sharing! Also.. Word "on the street" is that heritage is auctioning them off in their August auction. ������ hopefully I will be able to afford 1 or several.

[Lordstan]

1939 Gehrig's (Acetate)






1934 Gehrig by Burke(Acetate)


1949 Jackie (Glass)

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by Forever Young

Anyone else find them undervalued /interesting?

ABSOLUTELY!!!! And to be honest, I hope they stay that way, because it's that many more that I can pick up on a limited budget

As others have said, I really don't care about displayability personally, though I can see how that would be a deterrent to some. If I displayed every photo or negative that I have, I'd have to cover the house inside and out (and I'm sure my boys would promptly destroy them as they have the rest of my house).

One thing I do like about them is how well they store away, since I am admittedly a bit of a hoarder (well, except glass plates, I guess). I also love the detailed images that they produce if you've got the right scanner. The 1/1 aspect is neat too, though my favorites are the ones of guys where that may well be the 1/1 image of that obscure player in ANY medium.

But seriously, who really wants to collect negatives? Everyone should just lot up what they have and sell them off cheap, or better yet, just throw them out. Just be sure to let me know which dumpster they're going in

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by Lordstan

1939 Gehrig's (Acetate)






1934 Gehrig by Burke(Acetate)


1949 Jackie (Glass)

Those top Gehrig's are really neat Mark. Very nice!

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by thecatspajamas

ABSOLUTELY!!!! And to be honest, I hope they stay that way, because it's that many more that I can pick up on a limited budget

As others have said, I really don't care about displayability personally, though I can see how that would be a deterrent to some. If I displayed every photo or negative that I have, I'd have to cover the house inside and out (and I'm sure my boys would promptly destroy them as they have the rest of my house).

One thing I do like about them is how well they store away, since I am admittedly a bit of a hoarder (well, except glass plates, I guess). I also love the detailed images that they produce if you've got the right scanner. The 1/1 aspect is neat too, though my favorites are the ones of guys where that may well be the 1/1 image of that obscure player in ANY medium.

But seriously, who really wants to collect negatives? Everyone should just lot up what they have and sell them off cheap, or better yet, just throw them out. Just be sure to let me know which dumpster they're going in

Please post some of the favorites in your collection!

[horzverti]

Here is my one Gehrig negative. I am not sure of the year or who took the shot. It is not near the caliber of Mark's Gehrigs, but I like it. I used the xray photo booth mode on my iPad to make a positive image. Some clarity seems to have been lost in translation. Lance, I still haven't bought a new scanner which would accommodate these.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by horzverti

Here is my one Gehrig negative. I am not sure of the year or who took the shot. It is not near the caliber of Mark's Gehrigs, but I like it. I used the xray photo booth mode on my iPad to make a positive image. Some clarity seems to have been lost in translation. Lance, I still haven't bought a new scanner which would accommodate these.

That's actually a shot I have seen many times I believe in original photos. Very nice

[Lordstan]

Curt,
I own an original of that photo. It's from 1938 from Lou's 2000th consecutive game.
Nice job.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by Lordstan

Curt,
I own an original of that photo. It's from 1938 from Lou's 2000th consecutive game.
Nice job.

Thought so.. I owned that photo at one time. Cool photo and negstive. They should be together

[horzverti]

Great photo Mark! Thanks for defining the moment. Now I know. This is one of those items that I always wanted to post here on Net 54 and ask for more info. I am happy I put that image up today.

[Darner]

Top: Al Simmons and son c. 1940
Bottom: Chuck Klein c. 1936-37

[ruth-gehrig]

In storage, unfortunately about 2 hours away, I have a 1927 Yankees team photo negative. Would love to get a high quality photo printed from it!

[D. Bergin]

I love original negs. Don't always know what to do with them, but think they are cool as hell.

[Bumpus Jones]

The only one I own...

[D. Bergin]

Great shot! So much going on. The flooded field, the players warming up on the tiny stretch of unflooded outfield grass, the factories in the background, the 3 guys sitting in an otherwise empty stadium, the signage.

Love that image.

[Bumpus Jones]

Thanks, Dave. I'm kind of fond of it myself

[SAllen2556]

I sold all my baseball ones last year through Hunt. I scanned each one and felt that the actual negatives didn't have great value to me personally, especially since they were largely no-named players. But I love having the scans of them and cleaning them up in photoshop.

I still have a couple hundred left of weird stuff like of U of Michigan sports like tennis, golf, track and field, and soccer; boxer Jackie Fields, women amateur golfers, and a bunch of Detroit area people who made the newspaper for one reason or another. Don't really think there's much interest in them, but I continue to hold out hope. You do have to be very careful with them and they do degrade over time if not stored properly.


Bobby Jones



This is how they degrade over time:


Player's wives


Ann Pennington - old Zigfried Follies actress





Joe Judge

[horzverti]

Here are a few more original Conlon negatives:

1938 John Riddle Boston Braves
1938 Steve O'Neil Cleveland Indians
1938 Earle Brucker Philadelphia Athletics
1940 Mickey Witek NY Giants
1940-42 Taffy Wright Chicago White Sox (same batting practice session)
1939 Taffy Wright Washington Senators
1939 Earl Averill Detroit Tigers

Most of the portraits were used in the following year's Reach or Spalding guide (depending on the league).

[horzverti]

Here is the 1939 Conlon negative of Jack Kramer of the St. Louis Browns. I also attached photos of the 1940 Reach guide to show how Conlon's work was used in the guides.

Charles Conlon really was a significant part of the game for nearly 40 years of the first half of the 20th century. So much of baseball's visual history was recorded through his lens. It is too bad that during his lifetime he didn't receive the proper credit for the legend that he is.

[Forever Young]

My goodness,

One lot.. all the marbles.. one big ball of wax.. the whole sha-bang....

I sure hope someone with integrity wins this with the intention of keeping it all together and accepts the role of curator. They can also make money as they will get rights to the imagery through the 50% share of licensing.

THIS is the most important lot of baseball history for me personally and I sure wish I could afford to own/care for it.

Any guesses on how much it will go for? I am guessing 2-3 million but think it is worth more. Unfortunately, it has to be rushed to auction because of the circumstances. That will benefit the winner. If I had the money, it would be mine... all mine.. moo hoo hoo hahaha!

http://sports.ha.com/itm/baseball/th...ription-071515

[btcarfagno]

I almost fainted when I saw that. The Cobb slide photo original negative? That is likely the most famous photo in the history of the sport.

I think that your ideas seem to also be the desire of the auction house as well, as they are not splitting it up to maximize profit. Unless that is a stipulation of the sale perhaps.

Absolutely amazing.

Tom C

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by btcarfagno

I almost fainted when I saw that. The Cobb slide photo original negative? That is likely the most famous photo in the history of the sport.

I think that your ideas seem to also be the desire of the auction house as well, as they are not splitting it up to maximize profit. Unless that is a stipulation of the sale perhaps.

Absolutely amazing.

Tom C

Yes.. .at first I was disappointed(for selfish reasons) as I wanted to own as many as I could afford and really wanted to own a Ruth AND Gehrig for my collection.
After the initial disappointment, I was relieved as it really does all need to stay together for historical purpose and cataloguing. Conlon is the backbone of baseball photography\imagry.
I would hate to see it split up like the Burke negatives. All of that Burke history lost/scattered and sold for peanuts/blown out. The burke negatives really could have helped grow the hobby as they were all numbered.. collectible. Almost like a baseball card set imo. Had great potential.
The former owner of these two archives really messed things up. Thank goodness these Conlons stayed in tact!!

[D. Bergin]

Wow, just wow.

That's gotta rank as the most significant single sports auction lot ever.

[Forever Young]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Wow, just wow.

That's gotta rank as the most significant single sports auction lot ever.

Yes Dave.. I AGREE 100 percent.

[pherbener]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Wow, just wow.

That's gotta rank as the most significant single sports auction lot ever.

^^^^^^^ This

What an incredible group of images! I often look at items and wish I had unlimited funds but this is amazing!

[Michael B]

I would have to agree that original negatives are underrated. I have been purchasing them for years. My archives includes about 25 glass plate negatives, about 150 4x5 acetates, a half dozen or so 2x2's, several hundred 35 mm. I also have several magic lantern slides and about 3,000 transparencies/slides from 1956 to 1996. All of mine are Olympic related. They go along with my 8-10,000 original images of all sizes. Here are a few slides and negatives.

1964 Olympic baseball team on their way to Tokyo. The team includes future major leaguers Al Closter, Dick Joyce, Chuck Dobson, Jim HIbbs, Ken Suarez, Shaun Fitzmaurice, Mike Epstein and Gary Sutherland

1956 Olympic boxing team at the trials - silver medalist and Boxing HOFer Jose Torres is 3rd from the right.

1984 Women's Olympic marathon - all of the U.S.women are in this image. Joan Benoit, the gold medalist is on the left in the white cap.

Steve Alford in high school - NCAA Champ and Olympic gold medal in basketball.

Horace Ashenfelter on right and other athlete in the Olympic Village Melbourne, Australia 1956. He won a gold medal in 1952

Bobby Joe Morrow in 1956. He won 3 gold medals at the Olympics. SI Sportsman of the Year in 1956 and also appeared on the cover of Life magazine.

Bill Russell in the Olympic Village in 1956. His face is in the shadows and I am asking one of my photoshop people to lighten the face.

[mybestbretts]

I don't know enough about how to prevent deterioration to know how to preserve negatives over the long haul. I have old negatives that have become brittle over time.
The only thing I don't like is so many are being bought and pictures reproduced and sold on ebay for little or nothing.

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by mybestbretts

The only thing I don't like is so many are being bought and pictures reproduced and sold on ebay for little or nothing.

I think you will find that most of those selling for little or nothing are not actually purchasing negatives to reproduce, but rather grabbing images off the net to do so. It's easy to sell for next to nothing when you don't have any skin in the game.

I have actually had a couple of instances where I was selling some slides on eBay and another individual was selling prints of the images before my auction had even ended! In that particular case, a mention of copyright law and attorneys was enough to end his selling of those images. Normally I wouldn't care, as I don't sell reprints, so there's not that ongoing competition. In this case though, the buyer asked me to look into it.

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by Forever Young

Yes.. .at first I was disappointed(for selfish reasons) as I wanted to own as many as I could afford and really wanted to own a Ruth AND Gehrig for my collection.
After the initial disappointment, I was relieved as it really does all need to stay together for historical purpose and cataloguing. Conlon is the backbone of baseball photography\imagry.
I would hate to see it split up like the Burke negatives. All of that Burke history lost/scattered and sold for peanuts/blown out. The burke negatives really could have helped grow the hobby as they were all numbered.. collectible. Almost like a baseball card set imo. Had great potential.
The former owner of these two archives really messed things up. Thank goodness these Conlons stayed in tact!!

My sentiments exactly! While the break-up of the Burke/Brace archive enabled me to pick up a lot of their original negatives and further my research, it sickens me how that while deal went down and that the original concentration of visual history is now scattered to the winds. The fact that Mary Brace got screwed over in the deal too is an added downer.

Hopefully whoever winds up with the Conlon archive will make the images publicly viewable and enjoyable in process of making them profitable, as Rogers did for a time when he had the Conlon archive online. Unfortunately he never did the same thing with the Burke/Brace archive, so we'll probably never know what/who all was in there.

[btcarfagno]

Originally Posted by thecatspajamas

My sentiments exactly! While the break-up of the Burke/Brace archive enabled me to pick up a lot of their original negatives and further my research, it sickens me how that while deal went down and that the original concentration of visual history is now scattered to the winds. The fact that Mary Brace got screwed over in the deal too is an added downer.

Hopefully whoever winds up with the Conlon archive will make the images publicly viewable and enjoyable in process of making them profitable, as Rogers did for a time when he had the Conlon archive online. Unfortunately he never did the same thing with the Burke/Brace archive, so we'll probably never know what/who all was in there.

Wasn't there a master list for the Burke Brace stuff? I seem to remember an auction lot with thousands of them, and I think I had a full listing of what was in there.

Tom C

[thecatspajamas]

Originally Posted by btcarfagno

Wasn't there a master list for the Burke Brace stuff? I seem to remember an auction lot with thousands of them, and I think I had a full listing of what was in there.

Tom C

There was a large lot of negatives that was listed several years ago that I believe was from the estate of Jim Rowe. It might have had a complete listing, but I can't recall. You've got my curiosity up now though as I hadn't considered that before.

Other than that, there are the one-sheet "catalogs" that Burke produced, but which only cover his years of activity. I have one, and have photos of another that Ben was kind enough to provide, that list the major leaguer players and team combinations that were active and who Burke photographed. They don't cover George Brace's decades of activity though, or the minor leaguers and older "old time player" photos that they reshot and reproduced. Some of the Brace era players were listed on the bracephoto website when it was active, but not all.

Presumably (hopefully) Rogers had all of the negatives scanned before selling them, but if so, the complete "catalog" of images was never made available to the public (to my knowledge), and the archive of scans may or may not be housed on one of the hard drives that he broke back into his offices to retrieve. I'm not sure if those hard drives were ever produced during the trials, or what their status is now. I'm sure that whoever wins the Conlon collection would love to not have to re-scan all of those negatives!

[bgar3]

In the early 1990's there was a large group of original glass plate negatives, possibly even more than one lot. A friend of mine purchased them all, I think. They were all identified, in glassine envelopes, and stored in original wooden crates. Not sure of the exact number, but I believe there were several hundred, including multiples of all the major stars, circa 1910 to 20. I am not sure of the date, but it is possible it was the Leland auction that featured Harry Stevens' collection. If someone has a run of older Leland's catalogues they might be able to get greater details. We believed at the time, they included the work of all the motor photographers. My friend is a very private collector, but I will try to find out more details. I do not believe they were very expensive at all.

[GKreindler]

I have the Lelands catalog for the Harry M. Stevens collection, but I'm pretty sure the negatives offered therein are from Francis Burke, rather than George (though I'll double check today). It's a shame that he was replaced when they found the latter, as his work was absolutely stellar. I really think his work was on par with people like Bain and Conlon, though we'll never know whether it approached the same breadth.

And, I hate to say it, but whomever wins the Conlon negatives, well, I hope they actually do decide to have them rescanned. I know, I know, it's a monumental undertaking and seems pointless. However, I'm absolutely convinced that JR's people really screwed the pooch when they did just that. I'd say a lot of the scans turned out nicely, but there are so many that had piss-poor retouching done to them, and as a result, really detract from the overall image.

One of the harshest victims was Paul Waner:







Yeeeeeaaahhh. I'm sorry, but the original negatives do NOT look like this. Perhaps there are imperfections here and there, but by I can't see why they were altered this drastically in Photoshop. And believe me, there are a LOT more where that came from (though Waner's are probably the worst).

Excuse me while I go have some nightmares.

[Lordstan]

Holy crap. Who the heck did that? Were they blind?
I did notice when looking at the Conlon collection online, I found many were not very clear. Certainly not what I expected.

Originally Posted by GKreindler

I have the Lelands catalog for the Harry M. Stevens collection, but I'm pretty sure the negatives offered therein are from Francis Burke, rather than George (though I'll double check today). It's a shame that he was replaced when they found the latter, as his work was absolutely stellar. I really think his work was on par with people like Bain and Conlon, though we'll never know whether it approached the same breadth.

And, I hate to say it, but whomever wins the Conlon negatives, well, I hope they actually do decide to have them rescanned. I know, I know, it's a monumental undertaking and seems pointless. However, I'm absolutely convinced that JR's people really screwed the pooch when they did just that. I'd say a lot of the scans turned out nicely, but there are so many that had piss-poor retouching done to them, and as a result, really detract from the overall image.

One of the harshest victims was Paul Waner:







Yeeeeeaaahhh. I'm sorry, but the original negatives do NOT look like this. Perhaps there are imperfections here and there, but by I can't see why they were altered this drastically in Photoshop. And believe me, there are a LOT more where that came from (though Waner's are probably the worst).

Excuse me while I go have some nightmares.

[thecatspajamas]

Yikes! Okay, forget what I said, and I'll join you in hoping the Conlons get rescanned!

[GKreindler]

It's pretty ridiculous. The fact that Getty hasn't done anything about it, while typical, is just as sad.

[thecatspajamas]

Yeah, I can imagine they pretty much just index the images with whatever info they have, dump them on a server, and start licensing and selling prints. Minimal effort for maximum catalog depth.

Wonder if Getty's deal for adding the images was with Rogers, or The Sporting News? And how that impacts the licensing deal offered with the collection being auctioned?

[GKreindler]

Well, that's kinda the weird thing. See, legally speaking, I'm not sure that JR ever got the full rights to sell his reproductions. I'm sure everything was worked out with the Sporting News, so with the IP of Charles Conlon's images, he was probably fine. However, he would run into the same issues that I do with selling reproductions: he'd probably have to pay whomever represents some of the estates of those bigger players. CMG is under contract with plenty of them, like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Bob Feller, Christy Mathewson, Burleigh Grimes, Dizzy Dean, Eddie Collins and a bunch more.

Now, I could be completely wrong in this - and if I am, I apologize to whomever would call me out on it - but I don't think JR approached CMG when he had up that Conlon site from which he was selling his prints. Had CMG (or somebody) known about it, his company could have received a nasty cease and desist pretty fast.

Let's also not forget that Roger's archive probably should have been under some sort of licensing contract with MLB because of the teams depicted in those negatives.

And again, I could be wrong on all of this, as I never bought any of those official prints from them, but I don't think arrangements like that were made. Whomever wins, though they could do exactly what Rogers did with trying to cash in on those prints, they're probably still doing so at a big risk. That is, unless there's some language in the contracts that indemnify them from any wrong doing...which could also be the case.

Just some food for thought.