Hopefully some of the more common terms used with the hobby are explained here
Trading Cards
Promo cards
Initially given away for free at the release of a set, these become valuable, particularly if they are unavailable due to location or age.
Base set
These are the cards that make up the set. These should be the easiest and cheapest part of a set to collect, and that may be enough.
From back in the golden era of the 1970’s this was the entirety of the set, as was the case for the original Star Wars (1977) and everything else around then for over a decade.
Classically there may be 90 cards in a set, randomly available in packs, pack in boxes, boxes in cases.
Alternatively the cards may be released as a box set, so you buy a single box, and you have the full set, and possibly some extras, like collectable items (Total Recall) or random autographs (Twin Peaks).
There may be variations on a base set, making the base set more collectable. These include an emboss variant, or foil stamped or numbered or even different coloured border variants.
Chase cards
Introduced in the late 1990’s these are additional cards to the base set, randomly inserted with the base set cards (sometime with the odds available), which are in addition to the base set and may create multiple levels of additional sets, with differing degrees of rarity.
Some examples include cards that are separately numbered, or card made out of a different material, like foil, lenticular, metal or clear acetate.
Signature cards
Typically there are two types of signature cards – on card and stickers. Both are signed by the talent involved, but the difference between the two are that on card are signed (often as a sheet) on the card, while stickers are created where the talent signs a sheet of stickers what are applied to printed card stock later.
Advantages of the stickers are that they may contain holograms, or other methods of ensuring authenticity. They do mean that the manufacturer can hold a sheet of signatures for years, even after the death of the signer.
On card are typically more attractive as the signer has actually handled the card that you may own, and the card was produced and signed as is, not created sometime later.
There is a third style, which is more contentious, and these are the cut signatures.
A cut signature card is produced by procuring a piece of signed material, and cutting it to fit within a separately manufactured card. the card would have a window cut to display the signature. The benefits of this are that long dead talent can be used as part of a card set. The down side is the authenticity of the original signature. You are relying on the success of the procurement of the signature by the manufacturer. If it is a large company, then they have their reputation at stake. As a result, a company like Rittenhouse Archives will produce cut signature cards that are highly reliable, typically using signatures from personal checks, obtained from the estate of the person involved (eg Rod Serling, Irwin Allen, etc). Alternatively, they have used signatures from other sets in new cards (eg Jonathan Harris from The Twilight Zone became Jonathan Harris in the complete Lost in Space).
Other companies have used cut signatures and their source is undisclosed. Without knowing the providence of the signature, it is very hard to know it’s authenticity. As the Latin card collectors say Caveat emptor.
Relic / costume cards
Sharing some similarities with cut signature cards are relic and costume cards. For these cards a piece of matter from the production set has been obtained by the manufacturer and then cut into pieces small enough to be encased in cards.
The item may or may not be actually screen used, as major productions, like the James Bond films, will often have three or four exact matching costumes for continuity and once production is over these are regularly sold to auction houses. As the material may have different textures or be made up of multiple colours these cards may have natural variations within themselves. An example of this is a card with a swatch of shirt from a Bond film, if the shirt was featured in a fight scene, sections of the shirt may have fake blood, and other section not. So some of the resulting cards will be clean white, while other may have some red stains.
Master set
A complete set of all the cards released as part of a single set. These would include promo, common, chase and obscure cards like case toppers and dealer incentives.
Movie Posters
One Sheets
The standard US and Australian main large poster, measuring around x (h) by x (w).
Variations on this are modern posters are regularly printed on both sides of the poster, the back being a reverse of the front of the poster. The reason for this is their use in light boxes – display devises that shine a light from the back to illuminate the poster.
Day bills
The smaller version of the one sheet. Often with a very similar design, but sometimes rearranged to suit the smaller frame available.
measuring around x (h) by x (w)
Quad posters
Popular in the UK these landscape style poster measuring around x (h) by x (w)
Lobby cards
a series of heavy cardboard pictures from the film, traditionally displayed in the foyer of a theatre to entice the viewer. Typically there would be eight (8) cards in a set.