1948 Leaf Musial - advice/thoughts on the dizzying number of color options??

[yanks87]

I have been working on this project for a while. I’m writing a manuscript about the history of the 1949 Leaf sets. The print color variations are rampant through the set, in talking with my Great Uncle who worked as a printer during the late 40’s, his opinion was that the inks that were purchased were “whatever was available.” So the CMYK 4 color process used whatever they could get from their ink distributors, without a color standard applied to it, hence the difference in colors.

The Red hat variation represents a physical plate change, making it a true variation. It is in-line with the Peterson variation that is widely recognized. I am currently trying to get PSA and others to recognize this variation that affects most of the 49 cards in the 1st issue set.

I took the images of the 2 version of this card into photoshop and isolated the cyan and black channels, you can clearly see how the black printing plate had been changed to allow for the red to show through. Another indicator of the later printings is the pinkish magenta ink, which is only present on the cards whose plates had been altered to improve the color of the hats. I’ll have more info coming soon on this topic.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by yanks87

I have been working on this project for a while. I’m writing a manuscript about the history of the 1949 Leaf sets. The print color variations are rampant through the set, in talking with my Great Uncle who worked as a printer during the late 40’s, his opinion was that the inks that were purchased were “whatever was available.” So the CMYK 4 color process used whatever they could get from their ink distributors, without a color standard applied to it, hence the difference in colors.

The Red hat variation represents a physical plate change, making it a true variation. It is in-line with the Peterson variation that is widely recognized. I am currently trying to get PSA and others to recognize this variation that affects most of the 49 cards in the 1st issue set.

I took the images of the 2 version of this card into photoshop and isolated the cyan and black channels, you can clearly see how the black printing plate had been changed to allow for the red to show through. Another indicator of the later printings is the pinkish magenta ink, which is only present on the cards whose plates had been altered to improve the color of the hats. I’ll have more info coming soon on this topic.

That's pretty much accurate. I think the ones using magenta rather than red (the red hat version for Musial) are earlier rather than later. But it's a coin toss considering how many changes they made.

I've been working on a similar project, a virtual master set using saved images. Most cards have a clear variation besides color, for Musial, not only red hat/black hat but with the line of blue at the end of the bat or not.
Many differences are partly tied to the color differences

For a few I haven't found the difference yet, and for a few I've found not only three basic types, but a very few transitional types where for example the black layer that goes along with a particular yellow layer goes with a different yellow layer than usual.

The normal red with whatever variety are fairly common.
The Magenta ones are a bit tougher.
The transitional types are not at all common.

I think those represent a transition from one print run/set of plates to another.

I mostly pick up commons, but haven't noted much price difference based on color between any versions that aren't recognized variations.

[rjackson44]

pretty card i own this havent seen it in yrs ,,but i own a ton of football and boxing ,,colrs all over the place.great sets enjoy octavio