Proof Identity & certification system

The defect is recorded, not styled.

Proof certifies that a commissioned illustration was made by a named person. Its whole credibility rests on being hard to fake, so the analogue look is not a filter: every artefact is printed twice, out of register by a measured amount, and that offset is logged against the certificate number. Two pieces never share a defect.

Client
Proof (invented)
Place
London
Style
AI-aesthetic backlash / analogue proof
After
The 2024 onward hand-made counter-reaction
Type
Lora; Courier Prime for the record
Offset
0.2 to 1.4 mm, logged per certificate
01

The mark is printed twice

Key in black, then the same word again in red, off by a fraction. What looks like a press going slightly wrong is the serial number of that particular print.

Proof Human authorship, certified
0.4 mmProof
1.1 mmProof
In register · not permittedProof

The mark at two recorded offsets, and the one state it may not be in

Never in register
A perfectly registered Proof mark is the counterfeit. The offset is the signature, so a clean one is evidence against the thing it is printed on.
The range
0.2 to 1.4 mm. Below 0.2 it is invisible at arm’s length; above 1.4 it stops reading as a press error and starts reading as a graphic device.
Two inks
Key black and one wet red, overprinting. The overlap goes dark and that dark is not specified anywhere: it is whatever those two inks do on that stock.
On screen
The website shows the offset of the certificate you are looking at, taken from the record. It is not decorative on screen either.
02

Issue a certificate

Each press a new certificate: a number, an offset in millimetres, an angle and a timestamp. The mark above it moves by exactly that amount. The log is the identity.

Proof
Certificaten/a
Offsetn/a
Anglen/a
Pressedn/a

 

The press Issued this session

No two certificates carry the same offset.

Uniqueness
An offset already in the log is rejected and the press pulls again. It is the only check the system makes and it is the whole product.
Why record it
Anyone can apply a misregistration filter. Nobody can produce a certificate whose offset matches the one in the register, which is what turns a look into evidence.
The number
Sequential, never reused, printed on the artefact and held in the register. A gap in the sequence is a withdrawn certificate and is published as such.
Honest limit
This proves a certificate is ours. It does not prove a person made the drawing; that is done by the studio visit, and the system never claims otherwise.
03

Two inks and a stock

Black, one red, and an uncoated paper warm enough to be visible in a scan. The third colour on any artefact is the overlap, and it is never specified.

Key#1A1814The first pass. All type, all rules, all of the record.
Wet red#C0392BThe second pass, offset. Never used on its own for anything.
Register blue#2E5A88Crop marks and the register targets. Trimmed off everything except the certificate.
Stock#FAF8F2Uncoated 200 gsm. Warm, so a flatbed scan of it is obviously paper.
04

A book face and a machine face

Everything a person wrote is set in the serif. Everything the press recorded is set in the monospace. The two never mix in a line, so you can always tell which is which.

Statement
Lora 600Made by a person
Aside
Lora italicand we went and watched them do it
Body
Lora 400A Proof certificate records that a named illustrator was observed working on the commission. It records what we saw and when. It does not certify that no software was involved.
The record
Courier PrimeCERT 04412 · OFFSET 0.8MM · 214° · 2026-03-12
05

Applications

The certificate itself, a sticker for the frame, a letter and the register online. Each carries its own offset, and the website shows the one belonging to the record you are reading.

Proof Certificate of human authorship
This certifies that Ama Boateng was observed at work on “Harrow Road, February”, a gouache on board, at her studio in Peckham on 4 and 11 March 2026. Two visits, four hours, unannounced.
Certificate04412
Offset0.8 mm at 214°
Issued2026-03-12
Registerproof.org/04412

Certificate, A4 · offset 0.8 mm

Proof 04412

Frame sticker, 60 mm · offset 0.5 mm

Proof 12 March 2026
Dear Ms Boateng,

Certificate 04412 is issued and entered in the register. The offset recorded for your certificate is 0.8 mm at 214 degrees; it appears on no other certificate and will not be reissued.
Proof · 14 Hoxton Square · London N1

Letter, A5 · offset 0.6 mm

Proof Register · How it works

Certificate 04412

Ama Boateng, “Harrow Road, February”. Two unannounced studio visits.

Verify a certificate
Offset0.8 mm
Angle214°
Issued2026-03-12
StatusValid

The register · the mark carries that certificate’s own offset

06

Voice

A claim about authorship is only worth the precision of its wording. Everything states what was observed, by whom and when, and refuses the larger claim it would be easy to imply.

Say

Observed at work on two unannounced visits, four hours total.

What we did, how often, how long. All of it checkable.
Not

100% human. Guaranteed AI-free.

Unprovable, and the first counterexample destroys the register.
Say

This does not certify that no software was used.

The limit stated on the certificate itself, not in terms and conditions.
Not

Real art, made by real people, for real.

Sentiment in place of a method. Says nothing a forger could not also print.
07

What breaks it

This look is the current reflex for anything wanting to seem human, which means it is mostly applied rather than earned. The first is fatal here specifically.

Proof
An offset chosen because it looks good Fatal here. The moment somebody nudges the red because 0.8 mm looked timid, the offset stops matching the register and the certificate is worthless. The defect is data; taste has no vote.
Proof Proof Proof
The same defect everywhere One offset copied across a whole print run. It is now a logo with a wobble, which is precisely the fake-analogue thing the organisation exists to distinguish itself from.
“made with love,
by actual humans”
Sentiment instead of method Handwriting, warm words, a promise of authenticity. None of it is checkable, and a register that trades in feelings is not a register.
Proof
Texture as a filter Grain, halation and a sepia cast applied over everything. It is the same gesture as an AI image asking to be believed, and here it makes the certificate look generated rather than pressed.

Proof is invented, built as a portfolio exercise in the analogue-proof reaction. London and the practice of certifying provenance are real; this organisation, its register, certificates, illustrators and visits are not, and no certificate number here refers to anything. The visual language is after the hand-made counter-reaction of about 2024 onward. Those designers are credited as influences only. Part of the One Rule Each series.

Rule

Every artefact carries one defect, recorded rather than styled: an offset in millimetres and an angle, logged against a certificate number and never repeated.