1964 Topps - Is There A Set With More Variability?

[G1911]

Originally Posted by akleinb611

This thread brings up something I noticed a very long time ago (in 1964, in fact), which is that it is almost possible to figure out which series a particular card belongs do, by looking closely at the card photo itself. Each series in 1964 has its own "look," and unfortunately, since I'm not conversant in photography terms, I may have trouble articulating what I mean by that.

I collected this set at the age of nine, and yes, I noticed that the first series featured mostly photos that were rich, well color balanced, lacked grain, and has a certain three dimensional quality. The second series seemed - flatter, somehow. The third series was shockingly grainy, really subpar in a number of ways I can't quite articulate. The fourth series seemed a bit better, if still falling short of the quality of the first. The fifth series was the most striking. It was as if Topps had noted the graininess of the third series and had completely overcompensated. The photos in the fifth series have an unnatural smoothness that made all the players look like they had been dipped in wax. And then the sixth and seventh, final series, were corrected again, and were almost as well balanced as the first series.

I may be better at explaining all this now, but even as a kid, I could see that each series looked strikingly different. This wouldn't have been the result of multiple printings, because each series looks the same within itself, just very different from one series to the next. This sounds like what the OP is saying. Has anyone else noticed this, and has anyone gotten hold of information about what was going on at Topps that year?

I've provided examples from the first, third and fifth series, but I have no idea if my impressions will be visible on the scans. Your thoughts?

I can't describe it any better than this, but I think this is true of a number of the old Topps sets and you are exactly right. The photos or borders or both look distinctly different in sharpness and clarity and after awhile you can predict which series a card was in. Oftentimes the first series and the high numbers have the 'best' photo quality, I think.