hobbyDB

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Sunny and Seasonal

26 C / 79 F

hobbyDB

I'm always getting e-mails from people from all over the world, and I never know what to expect. A month ago, I received an e-mail from Mr. Christian Braun

In his own words:

"Dear Stacey,

We just got through 200,000 catalog pages for hobbyDB and are now working more on vintage toys.  Your website comes up all the time when I do research and I wanted to ask you if you like to do two things for us:

1. Join our Advisory Board - we use our 60 advisors when we look at new types of collectibles to ask ontology and taxonomy questions, normally just one or two times a year.
2. It would be great if you add links to relevant hobbyDB pages, for example add a link to this page (note that I linked to your page on this as you have interesting information and images, we should do this with each of your brand specific posts).

Please let me know if you like the idea and if you have any questions.

Best,

Christian"

I've been writing less and less since about 1 1/2 years ago, but I still try to write. Below is the link to Hobby DB.

Please click here to visit the hobbyDB website

I decided to check out HobbyDB's website. I searched for old toys since that is what I write mostly about. 

Please do not copy any of the images below without the written permission of HobbyDB

My first search was for Buddy L. When you do a search, a page is presented with the current items that hobbyDB has in its' catalogue.

When you then click on an image, you get a catalogued and sorted image, as well as information about the toy.

And when you click on a specific image, you get an enlargement;.

Below is a screen capture of a Meccano Magazine. I also like old catalogue photos or old old magazines because of the style of artwork and old typography (fonts). 

Below is a sampling of toys from the HobbyDb database.

Below is a screen capture for the Wyandotte toy company.

The web page about Hobby DB

 The company obviously is more elaborate than mine, and also is a website that has a section for selling toys. This is a part of the company that is commercial in nature. The page below is just a "clip" of the whole page, so if you are interested in reading more, or in selling toys, you should carefully read this page.

Below is the result for a search of the Steelcraft Company. What  resulted were modern-day images from the Hallmark greeting card company. I assume that Hallmark has a licence to sell their own Steelcraft mini-reproductions of the toys that were made back in the 1930's-1950's.

I fared much better for a search of Hubley toys. Hubley, for those who don;t know, is an American Company from the 1940's-1960's.

Below is a screen-capture of the people on the Advisory Board of the HobbyDB company.

Hi Stacey,

Thanks for coming back to me.  You have our permission to use any of the hobbyDB images or screen shots and I think you know a ton about toys.  Our Advisory Board is a pretty relaxed group of people that bring a lot of perspectives to collectible taxonomy and ontology questions - I think you would be a great addition.

Re your blog and adding links, it is a little bit of manual labor and I would totally understand reluctance.  I have a team that does this kind of thing (we are sitting on 800,000 data donations, i.e. catalog entries that museums, companies, auction houses and collectors gave to us to upload, they could do this (here is how to give us access).  

Just as an FYI here is our announcement from yesterday.Please click here to visit the latest entry to their website.

As you can see, HobbyDB has an exhaustive website of lots of modern and older toys for your reference. You are also welcome to join HobbyDB and to add your own photos and information about your toys. Eventually the website will be even better, as it is always expanding its' database. You might just want to add add a link for future reference. 

Another interesting part of their website is their "manifesto". This section informs the viewer as to their purpose in their website, and how they want to help collectors out there in the world.  This section is well-written, and helps explain what hobbyDB is all about.

Please click here to read about hobbyDB's manifesto

Please click here to visit hobbyDB

Thanks for dropping by to visit,

And as always,

have a great day or night

wherever you may be.

oldantiquetoys.blogspot.com

Stacey Bindman

One of the Best websites About Toys

Monday, November 10, 2014
Overcast and seasonally mild

One of the Best

Websites About Toys

   I have to hone (work on) my reporting skills because I can't really remember how I came to find

Mr. Derrick Clow and his fantastic website title "Collecting Keystone". But I found Derrick and his excellent website last week,and the rest is history - I got his permission to write about his site,and of course use his photos.

  I'm going to have to see what I can do with this Google Blogger site, because Derrick's Wordpress website is definitely one of the best websites that I have ever seen about toys. The design, the page layout, photo quality, writing content, and on and on. I will definitely have to study Derrick's website and see what I can do for the new year!

  I spent about 10 minutes trying to sort out the title for today's post. One of my titles was "and the winner for the best wood toy  website is". I finally settled on the title that you see today.

Please click here to visit this impressive website

You'll need to view Derrick's images in Blogger slide mode. I've made them extra-large for that purpose.Of course, you can go directly to Derrick's web site and browse there.

I know Derrick's spent a lot of time on his website design, and it shows well.

The history of the Keystone company. It's interesting to note that Keystone once also sold camera equipment. I remember when my father would bring home the NYTimes in the 1960's, especially the gigantic Sunday paper. In the photography section, you could always see the advertisements for Keystone. I think they also advertised in photography magazines.

People are often writing to me to ask if their toy is authentic.

derrick has this topic well covered, and you can see the photos that he's taken of the 

Keystone company logos.

One of my favourite areas regarding toys - toy catalogues.

I have a small collection of old and antique toy catalogues (mostly reproductions). I like to scan the pages, then search for original toys to match  up with the catalogue photos.  Derrick had presented his covers of the catalogues, but I'm sure he has the entire catalogues as well.

Not only does Derrick have the catalogues, but he has a great historic background about the company.

 I always enjoy old posters or old catalogue cover pages. 

There's someone about the old design that just draws you into the images.

Maybe I'm just getting too old!

When you find a toy, there is a written description of the toy. Clicking on the image brings to nice large images to better study the toy. The toys below were made in 1942-43, when the USA had entered WWII. As a result, there were strict limitations on metal, and toy manufacturers quickly adapted to produce wood toys. Wood was a less-restricve material that could be found in large amounts across the USA and Canada.

As I mentioned, Derrick takes excellent photography. However, I still wanted to present the toys against white. Notice how he also likes to arrange his toys for nice compositions that allow the viewer to be more stimulated by the eye movement in the photo. 

The collection of paper items such as catalogues, posters, boxes that toys come in, cars and so forth is called ephemera. Derrick had a fine compliment of ephemera (always use any new word that you come across, otherwise you'll forget what it means). 

Once again we see the depth of Derricks' work on his blog.

The first photo of a large grouping of toys is well composed and arranged. from there, he places some oys to illustrate the realtime sizes of the toys. And finally, there is a large-sized image of the wood truck in the lower right corner.

I always have had a liking to natal over man-made materials. Personally, it's the ability of a craftsman or artist to word with 3-dimensional material to create a final pice of work.

I'm sure some of you are wondering if I left anything for you to read on derrick's website?

The answer of course is yes. However, as you already know, I try to create a very good (relative to Derrick) blog for people to visit. And when I find someone, or a company that I am very excited to have discovered, I have to share that with everyone. With space not being a limit of factor, I sometimes probably do present more than I should.

However, quality and excellence do not have any constraints as far as I'm concerned, 

and in the case of Derrick Clow and his website - I'll be back!

(Arnold, please excuse me for borrowing your line).

Thanks for dropping by, and as always,

have a great part of the day or night,

wherever you may be

Stacey

toysearcher@gmail.com