Help Defining "Type 1 " Photo ; is this one ?

[D. Bergin]

Originally Posted by steve B

The lack of clarity/contrast must be from the scan then?

It doesn't seem sharp enough to be from the original negative. Copy negative is more likely.

Based on the lack of clarity of the tag, i'd say it's from the scan.

I also think there's way more photo's from copy negs out there, then many people realize..........and I don't think there's anything wrong with that, or should have much to do with value, as long as it's of the era, and the photo appears to be professionally done.

One of the biggest flaws in the type system is the use of the phase "developed from the original negative". Most vintage publicity photos are from larger format copy negs, so the graphic artist of the time period can work the photo into it's final presented format. A print from a skillfully cropped and produced copy neg should be almost impossible to tell from the original that came out of the camera.

Whether that Greenberg press photo is technically a "Type 1" or not, I'd guess they'd give it a "Type 1" designation, because that's a can or worms they likely do not want to open up.

[horzverti]

This is a Type 1 photo. The back is dated...twice. Once in the slug and once in the stamp. The ink handwriting also includes a third date, but I wouldn't consider this as a factor to determine type because this could have been added later.

It was also cropped from the original neg. You can see some writing in the upper left edge. That writing was probably wax pen on the orig neg. Most photos are cropped at least a bit.

Mike, you can feel confident that this is an original, Type 1 photo.

[Exhibitman]

Great point, Dave. Original negs were valuable; the owners did not want to degrade them by using them to make hundreds of prints, so they routinely created copies and used them. That's why I've always paid the most attention to the markings and slugs, which are hard to fake convincingly, and silvering on certain types of photos (which is nearly impossible to fake). I suppose we'll see some forged stamps and slugs eventually for extremely valuable photos but at least up to now it hasn't been cost-effective to do so.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

Based on the lack of clarity of the tag, i'd say it's from the scan.

I also think there's way more photo's from copy negs out there, then many people realize..........and I don't think there's anything wrong with that, or should have much to do with value, as long as it's of the era, and the photo appears to be professionally done.

One of the biggest flaws in the type system is the use of the phase "developed from the original negative". Most vintage publicity photos are from larger format copy negs, so the graphic artist of the time period can work the photo into it's final presented format. A print from a skillfully cropped and produced copy neg should be almost impossible to tell from the original that came out of the camera.

Whether that Greenberg press photo is technically a "Type 1" or not, I'd guess they'd give it a "Type 1" designation, because that's a can or worms they likely do not want to open up.

That all makes sense to me, except the "original negative" part. If they're not willing or able to go there, why put it in the description at all?

It's true that a print from a well done copy negative is really hard to tell from a print from an original negative. They really should make that distinction some other way.

The difference between a print from the original negative near when it was taken and a much later print from the same negative is pretty crazy, especially if the modern print from the original negative might be better.
For art photographs the original print could also be printed years after the picture was taken. http://anseladams.com/shop-online/