The Gray Areas

Still busy, but making progress, enough to take a moment and finish one controversy before I start another. So here’s that other thing I bought recently that you may or may not recognize, from that same seller I bought a couple of other “questionable” models from, and who very well may block me from bidding on items in the future after talking about this:

This Merrylegs was sold as a “Custom” and I suppose technically she is, but in the same way that a lot of Marney Test Colors from the 1980s were: being something painted (or touched up) at the factory using factory paint by someone who wasn’t directly employed by the factory. 

She was advertised on eBay as such because she has the dated signature of her painter, D’arry Frank:

D’arry was a good friend of Marney’s and sometimes accompanied her to the factory in Chicago to also paint things. Even though these models now exist in a kind of “gray area”, the powers-that-were at Breyer at the time gave them the same consideration – and sometimes, moreso – as the Tests and Variations created by the hourly or contracted employees.

The rationale for that being that hobbyists are going to try and paint things that they – and other hobbyists – wanted to buy.

Yes, this is a rather long-winded way of saying that she’s a Vintage Test Color, however we choose to define them. And even if I accepted the original explanation, it would still be a win for me, because I have wanted a custom by D’arry since the mid-1980s anyway!

The real question now is whose collection is this, really? This was clearly someone who knew what they were doing. And a seller (or assistant) who doesn’t quite.

(Still doesn’t make up for the Performance Horse, but water over the bridge, yadda-yadda…)

Experiments vs. Customs

There’s another Test Piece Purchase Raffle up and I think she’s adorable, but you know I have a thing for Roans:

Being an older piece with a less sophisticated paint job and not mint, they really lay on the sales patter:

This lovely test is vintage late 1990’s, and features tape mask sabino markings, fine splatter roaning and a darker shaded head. She has four extensive stockings on her feathered legs, and a pretty blaze face. She is a beloved older sample in our archive room, and it is time for her to find a new loving home so we can make room for new test pieces! There are a few dark marks on her white legs and face, which can be seen when you zoom in on the images. We've decided not to attempt to touch up older test runs as we've found that this can alter their character and uniqueness.

Guys, seriously, you had me at “tape mask”. Behold, one of my own beloved Test Color treasures:

I think they (Marney?) used at least a half roll of masking tape on this boy! That took some serious effort and dedication, for what they knew was going to be a less-than-stellar result.

In all seriousness though, this is what an average Vintage Test Color – and the bulk of my Tests, in particular – look like. The BreyerFest auctions have accustomed many to the notion of a Test Color as a Factory Custom when they are, first and foremost, Factory Experiments. Experiments are not always beautiful, and do not always succeed.

As an historian, I find Experiments much more interesting than Customs. Judging from the commentary I’ve seen, it looks like a lot of hobbyists aren’t feeling the same way towards this little Clydesdale baby, who is pretty nice for a late 1990’s Test.

Based on what’s happened with all of the other previous Test Color Purchase Raffles, however, I don’t see that lack of enthusiasm translating into better odds for someone like me. I want her because I want her, not because of what I could get as a result of her.

But the laws of probability, alas, do not take that into account.

I’ll live. I have plenty of other Vintage Tests to keep me company.

American Pharaoh, et al

I did pretty well this year, sales-wise, but I won’t know how well until I finish unpacking and inventorying. So far I’ve only made it through the miscellaneous stuff (china, ephemera, bodies); the Traditional Plastics I’m saving for a burst of energy sometime next week.

I did better than anticipated, actually, though I think some of that was me being a hotel homebody. I simply didn’t get the chance to wander or shop much. (Something I definitely want to rectify next year.)

As has been mentioned in the comment section here and elsewhere, the American Pharoah model was announced while most of us were away: it IS going to be on the Ruffian mold. Interesting.

The paint job, however, is somewhat different from the auction piece, and has a modified tail. So it is still unique – or nearly so – just very similar to the production item.

That’s one of the reasons why I am so apprehensive about dropping a large wad on any given auction piece; there’s always a chance it could go into production later, as-is, and then you’ll find yourself endlessly explaining that no, really, it is a Test Color! 

Though I actually prefer models like that – and have several in my collection. Why wouldn’t I? They are historical artifacts of the production process!

I also happen to have several because they tend to be cheap, or go for cheaper later on: many hobbyists, especially some of the newer ones, operate under the notion that the only good and/or worthy Test Colors are unique, and nothing else. Even a similar paintjob on a completely different mold is seen as suspect nowadays.

That seems so silly to me. That’s the purpose of a Test Color: to test things. Anything else falls closer to the category of Factory Custom. Factory Customs may be pretty, and generate a lot of money for charity, but they don’t “mean” much else.

Anyway, the flier for the American Pharaoh release is posted in multiple places on the Internet, but I’m not going to link to it, mostly because many of those posts also come with comment sections that consist mostly of people ranting about the repurposing of a old mold.

Sigh. The Internet seems to make everyone an expert at everything, doesn’t it?

There have been many technical advances that have allowed for more complex and detailed molds to be produced. Regardless, injection mold making is not cheap, it’s not easy, and it’s not quick: if it were, we'd be getting a dozen or more new molds every year, not three or four.

Anyone who pontificates otherwise has been drinking too many fruit-flavored malt beverages.

Test Color Teasing

Just to show you that I am not always a complete tease, here are a few of those Test Color photos I mentioned in passing last time:

These are all fairly typical of the kind of Test Colors available to hobbyists in the 1980s, in terms of both molds and colors. Neat, but there’s nothing to them that makes them stand out from the regular Breyer rabble, especially to newer hobbyists or those not particularly versed in Breyer minutiae.

I wouldn’t mind owning any of them, mind you, and I suspect a lot of you feel likewise. Yet I rather doubt most of them would be competitive outside of Collectibility today. (That is a pretty shade of bay on the Phar Lap, though!)

The term "Test Color" is an awfully generic one: at its broadest and least specific, it can refer to any model that was not made as part of a production run. This could even include items that were once in regular production, but were not when it/they were produced. (My NPOD Big Ben might fall into this category, for instance.)

A Test Color could be a Cull, a finished/touched-up Cull, a happy accident (i.e. a mistake) of the painting process, a lunchtime frolic, misinterpreted painting instructions, a gift for a friend or family member, something done to fill up some downtime…

Or it could be an "true" Test Color: an item painted to demonstrate/illustrate/test a new or potential production run item, either a Regular Run or Special Run.

Some newer hobbyists, who are most familiar with the term through the BreyerFest auctions, tend to think of Test Colors almost as Factory Customs, since many of the ones that are offered for auction nowadays have a higher degree of finish than most production items. (I am always amazed that some get a little indignant when the tested color actually, you know, gets used a short time later. What do they think the word Test in Test Color means?)

The models you’re seeing above are likely the kinds of Test Colors that originated via Marney Walerius, a hobbyist who had somewhat free rein at the factory in the 1970s and 1980s. Sometimes she rescued genuine Test Colors from the various nooks and crannies of the facilities. Sometimes she fished stuff out of trash barrels and finished/fixed them.

And sometimes she made them herself: to satisfy a notion, to propose an idea to the Powers That Were, for compensation, or for various promotional purposes (live shows, raffles, tours, prizes, etc.) So in a sense, many Chicago-era Test Colors were Factory Customs, too.

Sorting this all out after the fact, as you can imagine, is something of a headache. An item that’s classified as a Test Color could have been multiple things: it could have been something Marney did on a whim, AND later got used in production somewhere along the line. True Test Colors were often given away as gifts or tokens of appreciation (or compensation!)

In most cases, it’s been easier to refer to a nonstandard model - something that goes above and beyond being just a variation - as a "Test Color", because more often than not, we will never know the specifics of its creation.   

Bats

The flea market was cold and quiet today. I found a few good deals, including a quilt hoop (for a buck!) and a 1968 copy of The Care & Training of the Trotter & Pacer (with dustjacket!) There were a few models, but nothing worth the effort. I need to move more models out of the house, not into it. Gotta get cracking on the sales listings again…

If one of my pending deals goes through this week I just might buy myself a Bats in the Belfry as a reward. I love the mold, and the paint jobs on the ones I have seen so far have been exquisite.

To be honest, I never had a problem with, or really understood, the hate-on over the fuzzy bats on the original Nosferatu. The reason I never got around to buying one was because the Cigar mold doesn’t fit on my shelves. I love my Wanderlust, my QVC Seabiscuit, and my Glossy Affirmed (swoon!) but darn it, those suckers eat up a lot shelfy real estate. The Nokota Horse isn’t exactly petite either, but he’s got that multiple posability thing going on, and I can work with that.

I was making a few minor corrections and additions to my Nokota Horse file yesterday, in my ongoing effort to get my pile of research notes under control. Sigh: out of its 12 releases so far, 6 of them have piece runs of 100 or less. Here I thought the whole Esprit thing was bad. Fully half of the runs of the Nokota Horse are completely inaccessible to me, and likely always will be.

The Newsworthy mold isn’t a lot better: out of the eight releases so far, only the original release would qualify as a regular run, and even that only ran for about a year and a half. I'm not sure what to call the Enchanted Forest - a midyear release already on the Discontinue list? I guess that’s what he gets for the sin of merely being Bay.

All of these super-brief runs and micro-runs on new molds got me thinking about that question I posed earlier this year: is Reeves really heading towards a "Test Colors For Everyone!" business mode, a la Stone?

I hope not. It’d completely wreak havoc in the hobbyist sphere, where there’s already a huge issue being made over the effect that a handful of "big spenders" have been making on the hobby as a whole. What happens when they can - for a price - pretty much order whatever the heck they want?

I take a little comfort in the fact that most of the models I’ve seen come out of all of these "Make Your Own Test Color" programs haven’t been all that appealing to me. I guess it’s a side effect of being able to get whatever you want: most hobbyists are going to go for something completely, utterly idiosyncratic. It’s so completely tailored to their likes and dislikes that it won’t "fit" anyone else.

That’s also why I’m one of the lone voices out there arguing that models coming out of those programs aren’t really Original Finish. They meet all of the technical requirements - painted in the factory, with factory techniques - but in every other regard, they’re customs. They’re made to order, with a single defined customer in mind.

At best, I could concede them being another category: the Factory Custom.

Most shows are starting to break the RR and SR categories into further subdivisions - separating earlier Regular Runs from later ones, and low-piece count Specials from the more plentiful ones. I suppose, in the not so distant future, they’ll have to have a Factory Custom/OOAK subdivision, too.