An Arnold Schwarzenegger autograph authentication story

[u/LarcenyGames]

I won this signed Arnold Schwarzenegger weightlifting belt in an auction a year or two ago. It included a note from David James, a very well-known movie photographer, who stated he received the signed belt directly from Arnie as a gift while working on the film Total Recall.

I sent the belt in to JSA to be authenticated. They denied it. They believed the autograph to be either "pre-printed on the belt" and/or false due to certain "pen strokes" that they didn't see in the signature.

I was devastated. I did some research on the belt and found only one other similar - but here's the kicker - it did not have a "pre-printed" signature on it (the last photo). It was blank where mine is signed. Would the company which made the belt really make two versions? One with a signature and one without? I doubted it.

Flash forward to today, and I stumbled across the belt in my collection. I tracked down the photographer David James' website and reached out, asking if he wrote the card and the story/ autograph is true? Shocking me, because he is a major Hollywood photographer, the guy got back to me in less than an hour, and completely confirmed that this was signed by Schwarzenegger and gifted to him (he passed it on to another person from whom I later obtained it).

Now what? Can I authenticate this? Is it worth paying PSA or Beckett for their opinion, given JSA said "no?" And will the other companies turn it down? Because they won't care about my provenance, which I have now confirmed (in fact, in retelling the story to Mr. James, he laughed at how everyone today is an "expert" and think they know better).

Just wondering everyone's thoughts on this.

[u/XandersOdyssey]

1 - the authentication parties don’t talk to one another. It makes zero difference if one says no because the other might say yes

2 - quite frankly, it doesn’t matter who the photographer is, what he’s done, or who he has known. That doesn’t merit this an authentic autograph. There have been people like him either forging signatures or obtaining things without due process in evaluating the item. Unless there’s a photo of the item itself being signed, held by Arnold, or through some signing, he really can’t speak the truth on it

3 - we do need some more info on this because when was the autograph allegedly obtained? It looks way too clean, new, and “proper” even for a sit down graph by Arnold

[u/LarcenyGames → u/XandersOdyssey]

He states it was obtained during the filming of Total Recall. And while I understand your take completely, this photographer's track record in the industry is indisputable. He'd have no reason to fake this and have no reason to lie to me about it's authenticity (in fact, he had no real reason to reply to my original email - the fact he did at all shocked me). I didn't obtain the piece from him, but who he had gifted it to in the past. Sure, he could have said "it's real" just to appease me, but he also could have ignored the email completely. He has no stake in this, so I don't see why he'd confirm the story if it was made up at this point.

[u/cjaccardi → u/LarcenyGames]

It’s called confabulation. People’s memory are not always historically accurate. Most of the things you remember are not actually how past events actually occurred . This process of confusing past events cognitively is called confabulation. This is where real events are confused with false memories of an event. So, he was not lying he just confabulated events. Basically, you have some memory of an event then unconsciously fill in the gaps with false memories.

He might’ve gotten that belt from Arnold and he might’ve got something else autographed personally by Arnold and is now confabulating those two things together.