Cards Error Guide

 Square Corners / Square Cut

During the process of producing a trading card, sheets are first cut into card-sized rectangles with pointed corners. To create rounded corners, the points are then removed in a separate process using a die cutter. When a card misses this step on any of its corners, it becomes one of these four types of errors.

Additional Ink

Occasionally, extra ink will make its way onto a printing plate or the rollers used to move the sheets, causing a card to have a splotch or area of ink where it should not be

Albino Back

Albino Back is an extremely rare error that occurs when the back of a card only receives black ink during the printing process. The cause of this error can be twofold: either color ink was not loaded into the printer, or the printer itself malfunctioned.

Alpha Cut Corners

This error is exclusive to Magic: The Gathering. Sometimes, 4th Edition or Revised cards will come with the more rounded corners usually reserved for the Limited Edition: Alpha set. This is likely due to the wrong corner-rounding dies being used on a small batch of cards.

Blank Back

Typically, the backs of trading cards are printed first. This is a rare error that occurs when a plain sheet without a back printing is used to print the fronts of cards.

Double Printing

As the names imply, these rare errors occur when a sheet of cards is printed twice or even three times before being cut and placed into packs. It is doubtful that this error occurs naturally, and it is probable that many of these errors are in fact “Make-Readies.”

Make-Readies are press check sheets that are used to help with printing press alignment and ink levels

Doubled Holo Pattern

This is an exceptionally rare error caused not at the printing facility, but at the holographic foil-producing company. On the Kangaskhan above, the design in the holofoil is very clearly doubled.

End of Holo Roll

The rolls of holographic foil supplied to the trading card manufacturers is laminated to the card stock either before they receive the card stock or sometimes at the printing facilities themselves. When the end of a holographic roll is reached, an additional roll must be spliced to the first one.

Fold Over / Printed Fold Over

The printers used to manufacture trading cards are school bus-sized marvels of modern machinery, printing hundreds of cards per second. The cards are typically printed on sheets of 110 individual examples with some extra paper (called selvage) around the edge of the sheet. Very rarely, the corner of the sheet may fold over onto the card after it is printed but before the cutting stage.

Incomplete Texture

The Black and White: Next Destinies set was the first to feature cards with textured surfaces. These proved extremely popular, and textured cards have been a major part of Pokémon since then. Occasionally, issues with this process arise. For example, part of the texture may not be properly applied (Incomplete Texture), the texture may be in the wrong position (Misaligned Texture) or it may be absent altogether (Missing Texture). All three of these types of errors are highly sought after. One must be wary of cards with Missing Texture, however, as most counterfeits share that same quality.

Insufficient Ink

This error occurs when the printer is running low on ink. While Arkezon does not recognize so-called Holo Bleeds, the graders did recognize the clear insufficient ink error on this Evolutions Zapdos holo card. The white opaque layer meant to hide the holofoil pattern from bleeding through the yellow parts of the card is nearly missing on this example. The small amount of ink that was applied allowed far more holofoil pattern through than intended.

Inverted Back & Texture

This error occurred when a sheet with normally printed backs was placed into the printer backwards

Inverted Stamp / Misaligned Stamp

Cards are sometimes stamped with foil text in order to signify a special release like a show, Prerelease event, or for a special gift for staff. When the sheet of cards to be foil stamped is fed into the foil embossing machine upside down or misaligned, an error like those seen on the two Clefables above can occur. The foil stamp can be inverted and on on the wrong side of the card, or the stamp is simply in the wrong position. Occasionally, these errors make it out into the marketplace where they often command a large premium.

Miscut

Miscuts are the most popular type of error submitted to Arkezon. They are obvious errors even at a glance, and they are relatively common compared to most other error types. Minor Miscuts are those showing at least half of one alignment dot in a corner or a card missing some of the design but not yet showing another card. Miscuts show part of at least one other card. Major Miscuts show part of at least two other cards.

Short Miscut

On this Crabominable V, the left side of the card was likely in the position the bottom of a card would normally be. The right side of the card then completely missed the corner rounders, and therefore shows some extra selvage from the edge of the sheet.

Twisted Miscut

Lastly is the Twisted Miscut like the Sylveon GX from Hidden Fates above. This card entered the corner rounding machine at an odd angle, resulting in three of the rounded corners being misplaced, and the top right corner missing the process altogether!

Misaligned Print Layer

This error occurs when there is a registration issue during the printing process. That means that either the sheet is not quite in the correct location within the press, or the press itself is mis-calibrated for a particular color. Both problems can lead to numerous issues that can have vastly different appearances.

Missing Holo Layer

This is a very rare error that would typically affect an entire sheet of cards. If the incorrect card stock (one without holofoil laminated to it) is selected to print holo cards, then the cards of course come out nonholographic

Obstruction

Occasionally, when the ink is transferred from the printing plate to the blanket, a piece of debris can get stuck to either the blanket or the sheet of cards being printed, and block ink from reaching the surface of the card like on the back of this Steenee from Sun & Moon. When the obstruction-causing debris is transferred to the card with the ink and is retained within the card itself, it is known as a Retained Obstruction

Offset Printing

This is a rare error that creates the appearance of multiple “ghost” images on a card, like the Entei pictured. This likely occurred when either a loose printing plate or blanket shifted while applying the image to the blanket, imparting a few light impressions from the plate to said blanket. When it was then used to print a sheet of cards, that extra ink can be seen as multiple light images behind the main one.

Crimped

​When cards are packaged, they are surrounded by the pre-printed booster pack art foil that is then heat sealed around the proper quantity of cards to become a pack. Sometimes, this process can go wrong, and a card or cards can slip forward or backward and come in between the crimper’s heat-sealing mechanism.