How to Tell

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Posted By: brock

Hello
I bought a vintage photo off of ebay a couple of days ago. And i got it in the mail today and i now believe it is a reprint or someone made it. So the question im asking is how to tell if a photo is made up or if its real. The photo is of a baseball most likey from the 1880's to 1910's. The photo does smell like coffee which would led me thinking someone made it. But the photo dont have the small dots which means a reprint and it only has some fine lines on the players faces. So was a scam one that a person made. Thanks

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Posted By: Shawn

Brock,

I do not think I would base the authenticity of the photo on its odor. As for the dots, I think typically if it has the dots than it is likely a reprint or a more recent photo. People can make fakes that look very similar to the real deal though... Can you post a scan of the photo? The paper stock that is used can sometimes be a clue also.

Shawn

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Posted By: brock

Here are the photos from the auction. I would have taken better ones but i cant find 4 good batteries in my house.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

Commonly, older photo paper is toned like yours. Modern photo paper is usually a very bright white as they bleach the paper during manufacture. So the pic of the back would suggest it wasn't made just recently. Good guess is that its an old later generation photo, meaning it's not original or made the year the image was shot, but was made a fair number of years ago.

Newspapers, magazines and news services (ala Associated Press) often reprinted photos over the years, so old later generation photos of famous teams, Presidents and actors are not uncommon on the market. For example, on Ty Cobb's death in 1961, AP may have reprinted some old playing-days images so newspapers could have images of Cobb for their obituaries. The result would be a 1961 photo showing Cobb in the 1910s. As the AP photo likely had a dated caption on the photo, it's not hard to identify the photo's age. This 1961 artifact will have some value, as it's an official AP release and is an interesting obituary/historical item, but not near the value of the 1910s original.

If you get a black light, a large percentage of modern photo paper fluoresces very brightly and is quickly identified. Even if a recent reprint has fake toning applied, the fluorescence is still very bright.

Also, if your photo is 8x10 (obviously yours is trimmed), that would suggest a later date than when the image was shot. While the size could be found in the the early days, the 8x10 photo is largely a modern convention/standard. I've seen many 8x10 later generation/reprint photos of Ty Cobb, Christy Mathewson, etc photos, especially with white borders. This includes the above mentioned AP and UPI later generation photos.