Movie Prop Collecting with Jason DeBord's Original Prop Blog Film & TV Prop, Costume, Hollywood Memorablia Pop Culture Resource

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Star Trek: The Original Series Props – Auction House Archive, Part 1

As noted in recent articles, there are many Star Trek “Original Series” (1966-1969) era prop replicas that have been traded in the marketplace as authentic, fooling experts, dealers, and auction houses, as well as collectors.

As a result, there are profound challenges in authenticating the iconic, high value props from this classic television series, especially the Tricorder, Communicator, and Phaser. The current ’state of the marketplace’ poses a significant potential risk for Star Trek collectors who could inadvertently buy an inauthentic piece.

The most productive manner in which collectors can help other collectors to mitigate this risk is by talking to one another, sharing information, and spreading awareness of the ’state of the marketplace’ for these types of props and underscoring the importance of formal and thorough authentication.

I thought it would be productive to catalog and archive information relevant to these props. [Read more…]

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eBay Live Auction Format Being Retired at End of 2008

eBay Vice President Jim Ambach announced today that eBay is discontinuing its Live Auction format services at the end of the year, citing an effort to improve “buying and selling experiences”. The “Live Auction” format differs from eBay’s traditional business model of scheduled, “online-only” auctions, and typically (as it relates to original props, wardrobe, and memorabilia auctions from movies and television) provides collectors the ability to bid on items auctioned “live” over the Internet, in real time, in lieu of being present at the actual auction event with people bidding in person, with the auctioneer recognizing “floor” bids, telephone bids, absentee bids, and online bids. [Read more…]

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Original Superman Costume Auction House Reference Archive Part 3: Guernsey’s, Heritage, American Memorabilia, R&R Auctions

This is a continuation of researching past public auction house events to collect and share information about Superman costumes offered for sale historically. These are limited to costumes offered for sale in the marketplace that were attributed to use by Christopher Reeve in the Superman films of the 70s and 80s, with the exception of a few “Superboy” costumes to serve as a reference and point of comparison in appearance and sources, etc.

With this focus, I began with Profiles in History (see “…Part 1“), continued with Christie’s and Bonhams (see “…Part 2“), and include pieces offered by Guernsey’s, Heritage Auction Galleries, American Memorabilia, and R&R Auctions with today’s article. [Read more…]

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Original Superman Costume Auction House Reference Archive Part 2: Christie’s, Sotheby’s, Bonhams

This is a continuation of researching past public auction house events to collect and share information about Superman costumes offered for sale historically. These are limited to costumes offered for sale in the marketplace that were attributed to use by Christopher Reeve in the Superman films of the 70s and 80s, with the exception of a few “Superboy” costumes to serve as a reference and point of comparison in appearance and sources, etc.

With this focus, I began with Profiles in History and with this article (see “…Part 1“), will continue with Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Bonhams. While the Profiles in History article included fairly high resolution scans of the actual pages from the auction catalog, some of these are lower resolution and photo-only, depending on the source. [Read more…]

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Original Superman Costume Auction House Reference Archive Part 1: Profiles in History

As noted in the previous Superman costume related article, I am in the process of researching past public auction house events to collect and share information about Superman costumes offered for sale historically. These will be limited to costumes offered for sale in the marketplace that were attributed to use by Christopher Reeve in the Superman films of the 70s and 80s, with the exception of a few “Superboy” costumes to serve as a reference and point of comparison in appearance and sources, etc.

With this focus, I am beginning with Profiles in History as I have a full set of the auction catalogs, save for just one event, so it was easy enough for me to scan these with optimum quality and include all descriptions. [Read more…]

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Profiles in History, Star Wares Featured on CBS News Sunday Morning

I missed the broadcast, but if I can find the video on the Internet, I’ll post an update with the link.

In any event, Bill Geist of CBS visited both Profiles in History and StarWares in covering movie props and costumes, given that tonight is the Academy Awards.

While I can only speak to the print version of the story, it is somewhat typical of mainstream media coverage of the hobby – focused on price and value with no mention of the importance of authentication.

The print version of the story appears in it’s entirety at CBSNews.com (LINK): [Read more…]