Here's the P03 "Shokk" prototype from the Creators Edition Master Series (Skybox, 1994-1995) (aka Creator's Master Series). It was given out at the 11th Annual Diamond Retailer's Seminar in 1994. It bears a show stamp in the lower right corner on the back. It's been a cheap promo for years, and even these days, you can find it for around $10 but you have to watch for it. It's usually offered for more.

That's a great looking card, although I can't recall seeing "Shokk". It reminded me very much of Billy Tucci's "Shi". The only reason I knew about "Shi" was because Tucci is a New York artist and in the 90's I went to two card stores that knew him personally. He would give them signed "Shi" cards and I picked up a lot of those because the cards were nice looking, if pretty much focused on the same thing. "Shi" did have promos and at least one pack inserted autograph card.

Tucci did do some stuff for Marvel and DC and has/had Crusade Comics. He still seems to be working, not sure at what right now. When you see the cards that artists and writers put out in the 90's again, it begs comparison to today's manufacturing of smaller title cards.

Most of those 90's cards by artists and on small press titles are not rare and are not in demand. It takes a prototype maybe to have any value. There was a time when these sets seemed to be easy to make and distribute. Now that structure is gone, but we have Kickstarter, and it looks like that is really where this type of card has gone in another format and with a different level of rarity. Maybe I'm overthinking it, but it seems like the parallels are there, only you have to be committed to join a project. These old cards were just ready made for you to find on any show table or in any display case. They are still all over eBay and they still look good.

Yeah, the 90's was a great time for artist-driven cards. A company could take a chance. Comic Images even did Masterpiece, Dali, and Maxfield Parrish sets. These days, Monsterwax and RRParks are probably the only ones that would do it again with a non-Marvel theme.

Here's one most of the longtime promo collectors have...a special version of the P0 "Warstrike" promo for the Ultraverse card set (Skybox, 1993). It was given out at the Sixth Annual Capital City sales conference in 1993. There's a rather faint show stamp in the background on the back. It distinguishes it from the other two variants of the P0: one P0 has a yellow "U" (Ultraverse) logo in the background on the back; the other one has a "HWDC" logo - an apparent Heroes World Distribution Company promo. The P0 with the "U" logo is the common one and the P0 with the "HWDC" logo is at least as rare as the Capital City one.

I didn't see this Capital City one when it was first available but an Ebay seller had a few of them in the early 2000's and I got one then. I haven't really been watching the Ultraverse promos but this one seems to come up for sale only occasionally. It tends not to be that expensive - usually offered in the $10-20 range.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

Here's the P1

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
Wow, I always wondered where that Skybox Simpsons Series II P1 card (known to Simpson card collectors as "Comin' At Ya!") came from, and now I do, specifically, thanks!

Simpsons promos were on fire that convention season. At the Diamond Retailers (Capital City competitor) Summit in Baltimore, another Simpsons Series II promo, the P4 "Dupe Dipkin Stats on Back" card was issued in limited numbers. Long considered a rare card, it has sold for hundreds of dollars.

Pretty unusual that in this 4 card promo set, P1 and P4 can have triple digit value, but the two in between, P2 and P3, were voluminously distributed, and might sell for a buck each on a good day.

In 1992, John Goodman made a movie where he portrayed Babe Ruth. There's a fairly common card of it that came from Topps Magazine. Here's a much more scarce one, apparently issued locally by theaters.

Nice card. I think I've seen that before but didn't know what it was or maybe someone mentioned it? Something familiar about it.

This is the P01 promo, "Book," for the Ultraverse Master Series set (Skybox, 1994). It was originally available only in the same promo pack as the Simpsons II P1. The pack was given out at the Capital City Retailer Conference and this P01 bears the show stamp at the back on the upper left corner.

It's a rare card these days but it's hard to place a dollar value on it today because it doesn't seem to have much of a recent sales history. Maybe 10 years ago, it was a $5-10 card. Most longtime promo collectors have it already and the new kids are more interested in buying rare Marvel or Star Wars promos rather than some of the comparatively obscure stuff collectors chased in the 90's.

Here's a view of a number of the cards from the 50-card "Triumphs and Horrors of the Gulf War" promo set (Manning, 1991). It was one of a variety of "Desert Storm" sets that were made in the early 90's. Even people who didn't collect cards picked up at least one of them back then. There was a regular 50-card boxed factory set with blue borders. I don't know the print run for the regular set but you can find it at flea markets for a dollar each.

The promos have gold foil borders (and the box was sealed with a special gold foil sticker) with a print run of 500 sets. That was a low print run at the time and sets sold for as much as $100 as reported in PCE2008. Some promos have gone up in value while many are about the same price but this one has plummeted to a range of $8-10. Part of it is that many collectors sold their sets around 2008 and then there hasn't been a big demand since. These still appeal to history card collectors but they might not spring for the $10 set when they can get the same thing minus the gold foil for a buck. A few of the cards on the top and/or bottom often have bumped corners rom rattling around in the box so that's a turn-off for some card collectors who have to have mint everything. The good news is that for those happy to pick up an example of something uncommon can usually find it for sale without much hunting.

This is a C1 "Doomsday" promo for the DC Master Series card set (Skybox, 1994) with the Capital City stamp in color on the back. There were three other Doomsday variants with the same art on the front: a P1 (general distribution); a D1 which says "Diamond 11th Annual Seminar" on the back and was only available at that show plus an H1 with the Heroes World logo on the back.

You received this card in the same pack as that Simpsons II P1 with one of the blank-backed Skybox release schedule cards on top (the one with "Home Improvement" at the top of the schedule), a Lion King S1, a random base card from Seaquest DSV, an unnumbered USA Basketball: NBA Update card, a Ultraverse Edition: Skybox Master Series P01 "Book" with Capital City stamp on the back, and a P01 promo, "Dr. Phobic," for the Creator's Edition Skybox Master Series set (Skybox, 1994).

You can find the P1 for a couple of bucks if you hunt around. The show variants are generally available for about $10-12 each but watch for lots in which you can get other cards for not much more.

Last year, I posted a scan of the front and back of one of the Pink Panther singles from the 16-card lenticular set (UAP, 1996) that was inserted one per box of Dr. Oetker ice cream in Germany in 1996. A German collector told me it was a rather short promotion so it was difficult to build a set especially with it being as large as 16 cards. You could get 5-6 different ones but then start getting duplicates. He wondered how many sets were out there. I have one. Greta had one and I know of one other. I'm sure there are more but you hardly ever saw cards on Ebay after the promotion.

The lenticular motion is unusual. It's not a regular motion card like Kodak made. It occurs only within "clouds" of action and it has an almost liquid fluidity. I haven't heard anyone familiar with various lenticular techniques explain it.

I think I first read about the set in NSU in its "Finders Keepers" column.

Here's one from the Marilyn Monroe Private Collection (1994). It's Proto 1 from the subset of prototypes that have a pink outer border and green inner bordering on the front and gold foil bordering a pink foil photo on the back. This one has been said to be rarer than the others in the subset (Proto 2 - Proto 5) but I haven't heard why that is (damaged during printing/cutting or fewer distributed for some reason?). Back in the 90's, I was able to get all five for one price and I think it was less than $40 - a great price for the time. I haven't seen this card for sale for a few years at least.

It's difficult to find near-complete subsets or singles for a good price these days. Longtime collectors are still chasing a few singles from a couple of the even lesser-seen subsets (unnumbered cards with light brown borders on the front and blue with white borders on the back; cards with red and blue borders on the front with red and orange backs). I think I've seen just one card each from those two subsets.

I wonder why they did all those Marilyn promos in various colors, perhaps it just looked a bit of fun but it drove collectors nuts.

I think they just wanted to test different colors. I think most companies just throw those out but it looks like all the ones they made were given out. I wonder about the rarer colors. Maybe there were fewer printed.

I should add that over the past couple of years the black-bordered ones have been the easiest to find.

quote:

Originally posted by wolfie:
I wonder why they did all those Marilyn promos in various colors, perhaps it just looked a bit of fun but it drove collectors nuts.

Here's the Star Trek: Voyager Season 1, Series 2 promo #0. PCE2008 valued it at $75. I don't know of any recent sales but I think one went in the $100-150 range several years ago. Not sure on that. Maybe someone knows for sure. I do know that sellers are trying to get $180-200 for one without any takers.

Here's something I haven't seen for sale in a while. It's a 2-card "sample" sheet/panel/strip promoting the "Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars" set (Jasinski, 1991). PCE2008 lists two different ones: one with the #54 and 60 card; one with #62 and 68. I haven't seen a 2-card piece with other numbers. There were several different stamped singles.

And here's the 2-card piece with #62 and 68. This one is different in that it's stamped just once across where the borders of the cards would be while the other one carries a stamp on each card.

Here's a rare card from a 5-card set promoting comic book artist signing events at "Heroes Aren't Hard to Find" comic book stores in 1993. They were not easy to find in the 90's and almost impossible to track down now. I've seen this one for sale exactly twice in past 25 years. I found one in the late 90's but gave it to my brother who's a big Batman fan. I recently bought this one for myself.

Just last week, I posted an image of the Batman/Grendel Heroes Aren't Hard to Find promo, and last year, I posed a scan of the Heroes Convention Cerberus card also by Heroes Aren't Hard to Find. PCE2008 listed the Cerberus card separately from the other five since those promoted comic artist signing events are Heroes Aren't Hard to Find comic book stores while the Cerberus card was a show promo.

However, a friend sent me a scan to post on Card Talk that shows all the HAHTF promos. Rather than edit to show just the cards I haven't shown before, I'll just post it as-is. The Elfquest is an in-demand card with the Mr. T card being easier to track down but the true rarities are the two Hellstorm cards. I don't think I saw either one before a few days ago.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

Jess

Looking at your previous post regarding the Batman/Grendel Heroes Aren't Hard to Find promo, your scan shows a lot of red in the image on the back whereas the latest scan shows orange instead of the red. Is this a fault at your end or on the original scan. I mention it in case people think it's a variant.

regards

John