1956 or 1957 Topps? Which would you choose?

[Exhibitman]

Take the ones you like best.

Me, I prefer the scope of the 1957 set. You lose Rizzuto and Jackie but you get the other two Robinsons and over 100 more cards.

[Mark70Z]

Love the 1957 set!

[jhowie]

1956 is a much nicer looking set. I love the simple design of the '57 set, but the pictures are terrible..... grainy, dark lighting, random poses in empty parks

[ALR-bishop]

That was another Berger innovation, Anthony. As a photographer yourself you should appreciate it

[Batter67up]

1956 Set is my favorite 50's set.

[RTK]

Originally Posted by jhowie

1956 is a much nicer looking set. I love the simple design of the '57 set, but the pictures are terrible..... grainy, dark lighting, random poses in empty parks

Printing technology aside, the compostion of the photos is pretty good. I especially like what's in the background, snippets of the old stadiums. They capture a moment in time of a long gone era.

[ALR-bishop]

Rick-- you and another poster made reference to the stadium shots and poses. I agree that that is a strong point for this set, despite the photos being "muddy" and the stadiums empty .

[PolarBear]

The stadiums were "empty" because the photos were taken during practice or pre-game. It's not like they would let some Topps photographer on the field during the game back in 1957.

And, while I agree the photography isn't up to modern standards, I think the 57 set gets a bad rap for "muddy" or "dull" pics in large part because of the Mantle card, which I think they purposely "muted" in order to wash out the bat boy in the background.

However, there's plenty of full color shots like this in the set too.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by jhowie

1956 is a much nicer looking set. I love the simple design of the '57 set, but the pictures are terrible..... grainy, dark lighting, random poses in empty parks

Overall I would say pick the set that you like the most, but have to agree with this comment. The pictures on a good deal of the '57 cards aren't great, and even for those that are - the print defect problem in this set as a whole (perhaps because of the real photography?) is awful in comparison to a lot of other sets from the 1950's. When collecting '57s anymore, I go for the pictures being registered and as clean as possible first without that "snow" over even things like centering. This is another set where there is a wide variety in quality between some cards that get the same technical grade because of the snow problem.