The Future of Type I Photos

prewarsports · #1 05-08-2024, 01:21 PM

I will add a couple thoughts with quite a bit of experience. When I started RMY Auctions in 2013, everyone thought that photographs would never be a stand-alone hobby, but just things to throw into major auctions at the end. Now everyone has a photo division, but all they are doing is recycling many of the same images that have been sold and resold numerous times, because nothing new is really hitting the market. Photos were not worth much ten years ago and newspapers were calling to try and dump their photographs. We would go into basements and haul out dusty boxes of photographs just so that newspapers could clear out space in warehouses. Everything was "fresh to the market." In ten years the ENTIRE landscape has shifted. Newspapers and archives not only are holding onto their images, but treating them like gold and re-evaluating them as substantial assets, getting appraisals in the tens of millions of dollars. Most of the newspapers in the country are now part of large groups under a corporate entity. Rather than sell, most are being donated to museums for HUGE tax write offs, or scanned and organized in secure facilities. "The good old days" of ten years ago are a distant memory and we will never go back there again. Very few new archives will ever hit the market.

Bicem · #2 05-08-2024, 01:46 PM

Great insight Rhys.

I collected postcards when no one really cared about them and they could be had for a fraction of what cards were going for. I feel like I'm currently at the exact same place with significant photographs.

Ruth final Yankees game...

Aquarian Sports Cards · #3 05-08-2024, 01:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by prewarsports

I will add a couple thoughts with quite a bit of experience. When I started RMY Auctions in 2013, everyone thought that photographs would never be a stand-alone hobby, but just things to throw into major auctions at the end. Now everyone has a photo division, but all they are doing is recycling many of the same images that have been sold and resold numerous times, because nothing new is really hitting the market. Photos were not worth much ten years ago and newspapers were calling to try and dump their photographs. We would go into basements and haul out dusty boxes of photographs just so that newspapers could clear out space in warehouses. Everything was "fresh to the market." In ten years the ENTIRE landscape has shifted. Newspapers and archives not only are holding onto their images, but treating them like gold and re-evaluating them as substantial assets, getting appraisals in the tens of millions of dollars. Most of the newspapers in the country are now part of large groups under a corporate entity. Rather than sell, most are being donated to museums for HUGE tax write offs, or scanned and organized in secure facilities. "The good old days" of ten years ago are a distant memory and we will never go back there again. Very few new archives will ever hit the market.

Oh I don't know, something new pops up every now and then

aljurgela · #4 05-08-2024, 02:03 PM

From his native island

Bicem · #5 05-08-2024, 02:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aljurgela

From his native island

Didn't know Beckett used PSA's type system.

Lucas00 · #6 05-08-2024, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bicem

Didn't know Beckett used PSA's type system.

I think it was probably very early on they used it. And then psa said woa woa no more of that. I'm under the impression PSA has it trademarked. Who knows.

Exhibitman · #7 05-08-2024, 02:22 PM

I didn't know Beckett graded photos.

I got my first-ever PSA slabbed photo a few months ago. Heavy and bulky. Not a fan of the slabs. I wish CGC had stuck with its early effort:

They were thin, light, and came three-hole punched for storage in oversized binders.

GregMitch34 · #8 05-08-2024, 02:48 PM

This is the Mays I got a few day ago. As many have said, it's nice (vital?) to "have a story" and this one is Willie's first return to NYC with the launch of the Mets. I've never seen this exact image before, although a couple with different angles on perhaps the same meetup. And, as others have said, picture quality also key.

https://www.net54baseball.com/attach...1&d=1715197703

hcv123 · #9 05-08-2024, 04:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aljurgela

From his native island

Great photo!

BeanTown · #10 05-08-2024, 04:36 PM

Completely agree with the comparison to postcards years ago. How can you not like unique poses and photos that have paazaaa� Attitude is good right?

prewarsports · #11 05-08-2024, 05:13 PM

There is still a lot of good stuff out there in private collections, like the stuff Hunt's is selling for the Mathewson family. I was mostly referring to archives. I remember pulling a D-Day folder from a midwest archive in 2015 and there were three "Jaws of Death" photographs in there. Now they are $30,000-$100,000 each but at the time I remember thinking, "cool those are worth about $1000 each and we found three." The thrill of wondering what is in the next folder or box and getting to do that from 2013-2020 was awesome and I miss it, but the prices have gotten too high. I am now getting most of our for RMY, which is still 95% "fresh to the market", from people who bought archives decades ago and not the institutions themselves, and they all keep up on current market trends.

I will add one more insight that people can take for what it is. Either the top end of the sports photo market is overpriced (mostly card images and early Babe Ruth) or the non-sports market is underpriced (which is what I believe). Time will tell. In the entire photo industry NOTHING outside "art photography" is worth more than sports photography. I was told once by an old time collector "never buy who is in the photo, only buy who took the photo." The right Mickey Mantle photo from 1951 is worth more than any subject driven image beside the famous Billy the Kid tintype. This is a bit odd. I talk to people all the time who only see sports photos in relation to baseball cards and do not realize how the values are inflated in regard to literally every other aspect of photography in the world. You could dream up a scenario where the greatest image of anyone outside of sports is put on a shelf (say Edison in his lab inventing the modern light bulb or the Titanic hitting the iceberg from a hidden camera on deck) and there would be hundreds of images from the genre of sports worth much much more.

It will be interesting to see how the next ten years play out.

Snapolit1 · #12 05-08-2024, 05:41 PM

Here�s a story.

Lordstan · #13 05-08-2024, 05:13 PM

While I agree photos may be undervalued in comparison to cards to a degree, I think it's really not a fair comparison per se. Rare does not mean expensive. Just because there is only one copy of something, doesn't mean someone wants it or will want to pay a lot for it. This is true for every type of collecting that exists.

The reason cards are proportionally more expensive is because more people collect them, hence more demand. Even though there is more supply, the demand still outpaces it. As photos grow in popularity, you will see prices increase simply because the demand side will go up. I agree with those that pointed out that the registry is probably the single biggest thing that made graded cards the rage they are now. When I started collecting and dealing in 1978, people were perfectly happy arguing about whether a card was Ex, Ex-Mt, NrMt, or Mint. Beauty was often in the eye of the beholder.

Since grading became the standard, more non passionate collectors(ie: "Investors") got involved because cards became a commodity. As long as you had a slab, it was easy to buy-sell-trade with minimal effort or knowledge needed. All you needed to know is that you owned the highest grade available and could brag about it to friends, etc as a focus of prestige. Most of the people back in the 70-80s and earlier, the hobby was more about joy and passion, than showing off to people outside the hobby. Most of my friends and acquaintances had no knowledge or interest in the hobby, so showing off a cool t206 card with a rare back had no impact at all. Now, we have so many new to the hobby people with more money than knowledge. What is really sad, is that it does not seem many have any interest in gaining the knowledge as long as they can buy slab with a really high number on it.
No other part of the hobby can really match cards that way. Autos, photos, etc are all collectibles that really are not uniform. They require more research and knowledge in order to buy/sell. As Loren has expressed, this knowledge gap leads probably a fair amount of people to be hesitant about jumping in. Autos are a bit ahead of photos as slabbing for them started much earlier.
Photos, of all types will likely increase in value over time. Just like in cards, the more desirable it is, the faster and higher it will likely go.

My standard advice every time I am asked about collecting is the same. Buy what you like. Buy what gives you shivers up your arm when you hold it. Buy what makes you smile every time you look at it. If you buy with an eye towards investment/monetary potential, you will win some and lose some. If you buy what you love regardless of price, you will never lose.

I buy Gehrig items, because I enjoy them. I have a very eclectic collection of other stuff that is rare and much of it is worthless in the marketplace. Do I wish I had bought more cobbs, ruths, etc? Yes and no. I had a blast collecting what I did, so while there is a small part of me that wished i would have bought more ruth, Cobb, Wagner, Matty, etc cards, I am ok with the choices I made. I got to spend around 14yrs with my dad going to 35-40 card shows a year, hanging with a ton of cool, and some very unique, people, talking sports all the time, all while collecting some really cool stuff.

Every post needs a photo, so here are two of my favorites, both from 1927

Exhibitman · #14 05-08-2024, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by prewarsports

"The good old days" of ten years ago are a distant memory and we will never go back there again. Very few new archives will ever hit the market.

So true. You got in early and smart, Rhys. Did you have any idea what gold you were mining at the time?

One qualifier: there are lots of private 'archives' out there. For example, sports writers in the analog days had files of photos that they got from their jobs and those files come up for sale in flea markets, paper fairs, antique shows, etc. Most of it is dross but one can run across a vein of gold now and then. This 1969 Simpson premium came out of one such archive last month:

This Ali photo came from one I found at an antique show years ago:

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