Non-sports card forum reader and webjon contributor Steve pointed out a recent acquisition posted by a fellow forum member. His Claire autograph didn’t look right to Steve, and it didn’t look right to me. In fact the card posted looks a lot like the one sold by eBay seller savecoupon that I posted about a bit over a year ago.

Sometimes it is difficult to post about questionable cards, for some reason there are a number of collectors who simply don’t want to believe that there are fake cards out there, so sometimes I hesitate to post cards unless I have solid proof that something is going on. . . I didn’t have any proof when I posted the savecoupon cards and I got flack about it, but sometimes all you have when you see a card is a hunch that it doesn’t look right.

Here is the Inkworks Lost Season 2Emilie De Ravin card posted:

What do you think? The first thing that popped out to me was that the signature was too uniform. There is no variation, feathering or anything. . . beyond that it was just a hunch a year ago, and it was just a hunch today. . . until I took a close look at Steve’s known good Emilie autoraph:

The first thing you’ll notice here is that the signature looks legitimate, there is depth, feathering, etc. Next check out the ‘Inkworks Authentic’ foil stamp. The stamp on the top card is a bit crude in comparison, but it seems to be in the right place (as opposed to other counterfeit cards we’ve seen), so at this point it is still a hunch.

Then I noticed that the fake card showed a whole lot less of the actresses arm, and a lot more of the leaf above her head — of course that could be due to an improperly cut card, but the irrefutable ‘a ha’ moment for this card is the way that the text for her name aligns with the background. It’s most noticeable in the word ‘RAVIN’ on the fake card the word ‘RAVIN’ is covering the dark areas in the background. In authentic card there is distance between where the background ends and the words begin. Check it out:

Obviously something isn’t quite right here, and you can’t blame this on a cutting or printing error.

The frightening thing is that in my opinion these counterfeits have to be an inside job. The only way that a counterfeiter could create fakes that have stuff aligned wrong and printing changes like in this card and the Maggie Grace card that have shown up are if they had access to the production of these cards in a way that collectors don’t. Let me put it another way. . . if a scammer who didn’t have inside access was going to copy these cards they would simply copy the cards, they wouldn’t change them, and they wouldn’t have the ability to change them. Now I’m certainly not implying that Inkworks had a hand in any of this, it could have been any number of people that were involved at some point in the production of these cards, perhaps someone who was able to get the pre-production printing templates.

I hope the buyer gets their money back. . .

Jon

A couple of webjon readers have pointed out this Angelina Jolie Tomb Raider autograph from Inkworks. It’s one of the most sought after cards in the industry, and a tough one too with only around 100 made. . . Most of the ones coming up for sale lately are very questionable, like this one eBay Item: 300583014214. . .

Here’s a scan:

And here is a scan of a card sold by questionable card seller savecoupon back in December:

Notice how the autographs are identical, line for line stroke for stroke? Could it be the same card? Not so much since the one sold last year has visible wear most noticeable under the words ‘Lara Croft’ at the edge of the card.

Thank you to the readers who have pointed this card out.

Jon