Topps Packaging/Production Timeline Help

[steve B]

May as well combine the answers as I see them to both questions.

west-

Topps process was much more involved at the design/proofing stage than the place I worked. We probably did one or two photographic proofs based on the customers originals. Some jobs there were no proofs at all*.
After that it was probably very similar. Original art was photographed, (Most likely the meaning of the "board X" markings in the sheet margins.
The negatives went to the stripping dept. which mounted them to an opaque paper called a mask, which made it a full plate size negative of sorts.
Then off to platemaking,
Then plates off to the pressroom.

Our place pretty much held the plates in the plate room until the pressroom needed them.
depending on the press, whoever was printing for Topps, Quebecor or anyone, probably would have made the next needed plate as required. So if say yellow was on the press for 3 days, the cyan plate would probably be made on day 3. If they were really adventurous they might have anticipated the overall need and made multiple plates. (If they were using multi- color presses, which seems likely and/or if they were using two presses at the same time they would have had to anyway. And the cost of a spare plate would be small compared to a production delay)

When Tassoni says “The film was sent to us,” Tassoni said. “All we had to do was strip it in.” To me that means they were sent negatives by Topps and their stripping department made the masks.
That really makes sense, especially if you consider the size of a sheet on the press. Shipping a bunch of negatives that big would have been a bit of a hassle.

Which leads into Dylans questions...

the backs would have only required two masks, one for the underlying color, and another for the black.
If one card didn't get a copyright notice, the correction would be to make a copyright notice negative, cut a window for it into the right spot on the mask and put that small negative in place. Probably with the red stripping tape, which would have been kept away from areas intended to print, like borders etc. Or the tape could have been trimmed once it was in place.

So what I think the sequence is -
1) Incorrect plate with no copyright
2) Correct plate with copyright
3? 2A?) The copyright ends up coming off the mask, leaving a nice rectangular hole, which since it's like the light part of the negative ends up as a printed area.
4) That problem is found, and the mask repaired.

Alternately-
A lot of the elements are sent as sort of clip art negatives. Including the copyright notices, and they're added individually.
except one gets forgotten, leaving the same sort of hole.
1) plate with the bar
2)Darn! can't send them out like that! Tape over that thing and make a new plate right away! = No bar, no copyright
3) Guys! it has to have a copyright! How long have we been printing them without it? Ummm….. Ok, I'll have stripping send you a new plate right away. = corrected version with copyright.

Theres some precedent for the secong maybe being right. The 81 fleer were probably done with clip art style borders, and regular scotch tape. You can see that tape in some of the pictures.

If the first is correct, there will possibly be two ever so slightly different correct versions.




*I did a drawing of the High School for the yearbook, and it came back from the yearbook company cut in half. The next school year the school dept wanted to do a print commemorating the remodeling of the school, and they had the place I had worked for do it (No surprise, they did a lot of printing for the town) I brought the original in and told them what was wanted, and they just said "no problem" Never got a proof of any kind.
The final prints were very nice, and they'd fixed some unevenness where the cut was. And on two different sorts of paper! Turns out they did it for free or almost, and used paper leftover from other jobs.

[jacksoncoupage]

Originally Posted by steve B

So what I think the sequence is -
1) Incorrect plate with no copyright
2) Correct plate with copyright
3? 2A?) The copyright ends up coming off the mask, leaving a nice rectangular hole, which since it's like the light part of the negative ends up as a printed area.
4) That problem is found, and the mask repaired.

Alternately-
A lot of the elements are sent as sort of clip art negatives. Including the copyright notices, and they're added individually.
except one gets forgotten, leaving the same sort of hole.
1) plate with the bar
2)Darn! can't send them out like that! Tape over that thing and make a new plate right away! = No bar, no copyright
3) Guys! it has to have a copyright! How long have we been printing them without it? Ummm….. Ok, I'll have stripping send you a new plate right away. = corrected version with copyright.

This is very helpful info and much appreciated. It seems a very likely explanation for the card from a production error perspective and it may be all that there is to it. Have you completely ruled out there being a non-production-error reason to add, cover and/or remove the copyright line? Do you think there is any chance that the removal of the copyright was the final version?

I am not certain I can rule out other possibilities for the changes yet. I find it very unusual that Oliva, the only "fabricated card" of the TBC subjset that required a new card to be mocked-up had these issues while the other TBC cards on the same sheet (in close proximity to the Oliva), did not. This may be nothing but hard to ignore that there could be some connection to it.

After reading George Vrechek's interview with Mike Jasperson, I sent Mike an email in hopes that he had any info on the card. I'm doubtful that he would recall the card in any way but a lead on the production proof of the card could be very helpful and worth following. I dp recall several years back when Topps Vault was very active on ebay, regularly looking for proofs of the Oliva and coming up empty.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by jacksoncoupage

This is very helpful info and much appreciated. It seems a very likely explanation for the card from a production error perspective and it may be all that there is to it. Have you completely ruled out there being a non-production-error reason to add, cover and/or remove the copyright line? Do you think there is any chance that the removal of the copyright was the final version?

I am not certain I can rule out other possibilities for the changes yet. I find it very unusual that Oliva, the only "fabricated card" of the TBC subjset that required a new card to be mocked-up had these issues while the other TBC cards on the same sheet (in close proximity to the Oliva), did not. This may be nothing but hard to ignore that there could be some connection to it.

After reading George Vrechek's interview with Mike Jasperson, I sent Mike an email in hopes that he had any info on the card. I'm doubtful that he would recall the card in any way but a lead on the production proof of the card could be very helpful and worth following. I dp recall several years back when Topps Vault was very active on ebay, regularly looking for proofs of the Oliva and coming up empty.

There are lots of things that might happen outside of a production error.

Like the copyright line could be wrong somehow, and need to be removed quickly. That could be done on the press by scratching/scraping a box where the copyright was on the plate. But that would be a short term measure, like if the stripping dept was only in on days and the problem was found and a correction demanded during second or third shift.
I figure both of those are very unlikely, since the demand for an immediate repair would probably have to come from Topps, and they would be closed as well. There would probably also be a few cards with the incorrect line. (How many times has any card co actually stopped all the copies of a card from getting out? )

As far as I know, the copyright back then was only about the card it was on. Not like today where a retired player sometimes has the permissions printed on the card back.
If the no copyright was last, why? The notice with the circled C is about a registered copyright. Even if they found out that particular one didn't go through all they would have had to do was stone off the circled C and keep printing. The created image was subject to copyright when it was created, even if it wasn't registered.
Of course, the whole copyright notice could be stoned off, it's pretty small so removing it would maybe take a couple minutes.
The only scenarios I can think of
1 )Topps didn't have permission to use the picture. Which is very unlike Topps. At least in the late 70's early 80's they contracted with photographers to take pictures and got whatever the photographer produced, or at least the bulk of it. I think the guy I met kept a few pics from each session he did, but he also collected cards.
They would have used a photo in their files that they already had the rights to.
2) Hmm... Maybe... Tony Oliva never signed a contract, so in a way the card wasn't actually licensed and maybe couldn't have a copyright? They removed the copyright notice instead of pulling the card. That would be pretty strange and I'd think it would have made the hobby press back then.
3) Topps messed up and never filed for a copyright.
All those would be really strange, considering how many layers of proofing and approvals Topps had. Bu then... stuff like the 79 Bump Wills still got through so maybe?

It might be worth trying to search the copyright database, if it never got a registered copyright you might find all the other cards except that one.

I'm thinking the production error is the most likely.

[steve B]

BTW, since Topps not copyrighting a card in it's main set in one of the huge production years would be a unique or nearly unique situation I'm almost hoping I'm wrong and it's one of the latter Ideas or something stranger.