Black and silver prototype pins

[froggerway]

For comparison reasons, I'd really appreciate it if anyone who owns a black or silver prototype pin could post pictures of the backside here. Does anyone know specifically if the appearances can vary from one black to black or one silver to silver metal? Much help and pictures needed and appreciated, please.

 

[this_and_that]

I am not sure this information will be particularly helpful, but here it is…

Actual production run of Disney Auctions pins was not always done with a gold-finish. Sometimes a silver-finish was used and sometimes a black-finish was used. And occasionally the same color finish would not be used on every pin in a set. For example, this http://gallery.pinpics.com/cgi-bin/group.cgi?group=3721&pin=34700LE 100 5-pin set had one gold-finished pin, 2 black-finished pins, and two silver-finished pins.

The gold, silver, and black metal finishes are capable of becoming tarnished to varying degrees, with the silver-finished one sometimes tarnishing to the point where it is mistaken for a black-finish.

Any design on the back of the pin, including the copyright information, is actually in the base metal itself. The color-finish is electrostatically applied to the base metal, sometimes more than one coating of different color finishes.

Given the above, it is not surprising that the final pre-production versions of Disney Auctions pins, except for the top color of the metal-finish, look to be exactly the same on front as well as back. All of the pins I have in multiple color finishes, exclusive of any AP sets, are like this.

Now, this does not mean that all prototypes of the same pin with the same color finish look exactly the same on front as well as back because Disney may be making changes to the back of the pin as well as the front of the pin during its development. Note that this is just speculation on my part.

 

[froggerway]

Thanks for the information. I knew there were multiple metal-finishes of pins as far as gold, silver or black. But I don't think I've ever seen a silver or black finished pin, hence the request for pictures. I have a very specific pin that I think might be a black prototype. However, I have been informed that there is only one black prototype of this particular pin and that someone else owns it. So my thinking is either: A) my pin is a silver prototype and has tarnished badly or B) there are scrappers of an extremely low edition pin. The pin in question, however, is not a DA pin, but it is a pre-2005 pin. It may also be possible that there are, in fact, more than one black prototype of this pin and both mine and the other person's pin is legitimate, although they have ignored all of my communication requests.

 

[Jabberwocky]

I don't have any front and back pics to show you at the moment, but I can tell you that the "black" metal, at least as far as DA pins went (and I know that's not what you're looking for), was more of a pewter color in actuality than a deep black. Whereas the silver was brighter and shinier.

For comparison, here is an example of a "black" metal prototype pin:

And here is the silver metal version:

I don't have that particular pin but the colors seem pretty true to the metal colors I've seen. Sometimes it's hard to really tell if a pin is black metal or silver metal unless you have the other to compare it to!



EDIT: oh wait, how about these? Do these help?

Pin 25881: DLR - Villain Series (Old Hag) Black

Pin 25882: DLR - Villain Series (Old Hag) Silver

 

[froggerway]

Oh, wow, thanks Jabberwocky! The back of my pin does look a lot like the Old Hag black coloration. Darn, this doesn't look good for the scrapper suspicion. Gah, make the bad pin people stop!

 

[Jabberwocky]

Hence my paranoia thread. How can you tell anymore without knowing exact provenance?

That said, if it didn't cost you much (hopefully) maybe just wait and see if more turn up? If they do, you know yours is likely a fake. If they don't then maybe there was more than one (as has happened often with prototypes and artist proofs) or maybe the original owner got rid of theirs and never updated their owns. That happens too.

 

[froggerway]

It was the sudden appearance of a prototype listing that made me question their pin validity more than mine. I feel fairly confident that my pin is real as this other owner just recently added (past month) the pin to their list and I've had my pin in possession since 2007. But since obviously neither one of us bought this pin directly from Disney ourselves, anything still remains possible.

But, yeah, there is no way to tell true authenticity, but if you're correct it won't matter in another year or two when Disney phases out pins altogether. :sad:

 

[Jabberwocky]

But, yeah, there is no way to tell true authenticity, but if you're correct it won't matter in another year or two when Disney phases out pins altogether. :sad:

Well, I'm the doom and gloom-sayer, but while I do think pin trading will go the way of the dodo (as vinylmation seems to be going) but I don't believe Disney will ever phase out *selling* pins. They're wonderful souvenir items - portable & representative to the consumer and cheap to make for the seller. But I've said for years that I do believe pins have been following the exact lifespan of beanie babies - they just lasted longer. But really it's the same life cycle: starting out as a cute gift item, become a cult favorite, become a widespread collectible, spawn a secondary market of trading and buying, fakes hit the market, prices bubble thanks to resellers, interest fades, former collectible loses secondary value, becomes cute gift item again. Sound familiar?