Tip of the Week: 1920s Lobby Cards

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Posted By: Hankron

Tip #4: DUSTY COUNTERFEITS

Again, this tip requires use of a microscope of 100x or so power. I should point out that I don’t own stock in a microscope manufacturer, so this is all on the up and up.

ELECTROSTATIC REPRINTS
A common and cheap way to make attractive counterfeits is with laser computer printers, Xeroxes and photocopiers. Especially when the collector has not handled the item before, the item can be deceptive, even in person. The is particularly true for non cardstock items, like food labels, playbills, currency and tobacco labels. Luckily, these types of counterfeits are easy to identify with a 100x power or so microscope.

Laser printers, Xeroxes and photocopiers all use a type of printing called ‘electrostatic’ printing (aka electrographic printing). Electrostatic printing is quickly identified with a microscope due to the unique pigment quality. The printed graphics are made up of many tiny dust-like grains of pigment that have been fused to the electostaticaly charged area (Anyone who owns a laser printer, likely knows how dusty the ink cartridges get. I sometimes literally clean my laser printer with the vacuum.). However, not all the grains make it to the intended area before being fused to the paper, so the finished printing is identified by the many stragglers outside the lines. Under the microscope it almost looks like it needs a good dusting.



Laser print showing the typical stray grains.



Some laser printers will produce this strange type of line pattern like in the above picture. The tiny stray grains will still appear.

Not only is electrostatic printing fairly modern, but it was never used for mass commercial printing, such as to make tobacco labels, currency or trading cards. It has not been until the last few years that laser printers could make super high quality images.

Of note: injet printers use a different technology and won’t have this dusty appearance under the microscope.