Strictly Ink fail to obtain clearance for Harryhausen cards but make them anyway

A great card that should never have been made...

Another day another corrupt Non Sports manufacturer. Some of you may know that over the last few months I have been gathering information about Barrie Roness and his company Strictly Ink, the reason it has not been published is simple, every time I look into something another problem pops up. Over time a lot of negative things have been said about Strictly Ink and I cant think of one that hasn’t been true. No doubt I am going to get a lot of flak for this much of which will come from some unnamed dealers who have been taking kick backs incentives from Barrie for a long time now.

I want to be very clear on this, I have met Barrie, and I used to deal with him and his company extensively, that all came to an end some time ago when questions about his ethics started to surface. So many questions have been raised about his dealings that I couldn’t possible detail them all in this one article. Because of that we  will publish more in the weeks to come, highlighting problems including BBC licensing, questions about numbered and unnumbered limited sets, his Hammer Licensing problems, the fact that we have autograph cards that are signed and dated 3 years AFTER the sets initial release, the holding back of top end inserts to sell on eBay…. with so many to chose from it can be hard to find a place to start.

Today however we are going to talk about the acts of  deception committed by Barrie Roness in relation to one product. Every word of this can be and has been backed up by lawyers, they in fact are the ones who after some considerable time provided me with much of this information.

Stunning but unlicensed

In 2006-7 Barrie approached Rays then agent to talk about cards, including sketch cards, and these were provisionally authorised, if and ONLY IF Strictly Ink obtained appropriate copyright permissions from the film studios. (The copyright to these films are held with Sony Pictures (Columbia) along with others including Universal and Warner Bros.). As many have found obtaining a license to produce anything can be a time consuming and costly endeavour, and often dealing with large company’s like film studios can be difficult but these are the things that a legitimate company must deal with to make products work.

Rather than do this Strictly Ink simply produced sketch card blanks and promos and started having them filled in. Sony noticed this and in November of 2007 issued them with a Cease and Desist which bars them from reproduction, advertising, marketing, publicity, distribution, or any other form or use of their proprietary material. Strictly Ink were also required to recall and destroy all such materials INCLUDING all trading cards.

Yearset 2009 Advert Click for full size

Soon after this the set was pulled from it prominent position on the site. The sketch cards however were sold, and included in his “yearbox” products, in direct violation of the order from Sony. Not only did he fail to destroy the cards but he went on to knowingly commission MORE to be included in the 2009 yearbox product. He states that these are “unreleased” which I am sorry is a fairly naive attempt at a slight of hand. These cards are advertised as a core component of his product and he had commissioned artists to draw work  especially for this product.

Newly Printed "Gold Edge" cards

He has also had new cards printed for his “gold edged cards” Note that the card design is totally different to the other sketch cards pictured.  He has attempted to say they are unreleased and yet he keeps releasing them onto the market. He has advertised them and commissioned more 2 years AFTER being told to stop. He is still commissioning new work to sell as “unreleased”. This is simple: The very fact that he is advertising, and selling these cards individually or as part of a larger package means that they are de facto “released”. Yet he has the audacity to have a tag line under his new logo which reads “Officially Licensed Trading Cads since 1999”

According to a partner at Turcan Connell the solicitors who represent Ray Harryhausen and the Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation (a registered charity)

“There is no agreement in place by which Strictly Ink is authorised on behalf of Ray Harryhausen or the Foundation to produce any new sketch material”

Their is no justification for what he has done and is still doing, he is aware that he holds no rights to the subject matter nor is he paying anything to use them, but he is profiting from other peoples hard work. (I would like to point out that none of the artists involved would have known about this, they are freelance and would have had no reason to think anything was amiss).  That said if your thinking of buying any of these cards, my advice would be not to. I don’t care how great they look. I guess each person will make there own choice though.

These cards that Strictly Ink produced and continue to commission are unlicensed and unofficial. I understand that Turcan Connell would like Roness and Strictly Ink to cease and desist with any use of Ray Harryhausen’s name and he can expect that to be confirmed in writing shortly. These cards are exploiting one of the best and most well respected stop motion animators the world has ever seen, I wonder when the card industry fell so low as to exploit an elderly man just to make a little cash….

The information regarding the status of the licensing agreements and or the lack thereof has been provided to us by TURCAN CONNELL solicitors for Ray Harryhausen.