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Major Grail !!! Bone #1 CGC 9.6 Wow, I can’t believe I own this! I won it last night in the Comic Connect auction. My winning bid was $1272. I was willing to go a little higher; the good thing about C-Connect’s extending time feature is you can always raise your bid if someone goes higher (although for the most part I hate this feature). Not much activity at the end. I was sweating bullets the last 2 minutes as I really didn’t want to bid higher. Last GPA sale was $1500 in February. Okay, that makes me feel good to get it at $1272. But in January there were two sales at $1000 and $1050. Over the last 2-3 years the book has fluctuated in this range, from about $1000 to $1600. I’m astonished the book has sold for as low as $1000 (or thereabouts). I’m sure the buyers are turning cartwheels, but I cannot believe a seller would sell for that low amount. As an aside, I’m really shocked people sell moderns on C-Link or C-Connect. They’re not the best venues for moderns, as I think they get lost among all the gold and silver. I’ve repeatedly gotten really good deals on C-Link and C-Connect. If I wanted to sell Bone #1 (or another high value modern), I’d either sell here on the boards or on eBay with a starting bid I’d be willing to live with. The only exception would be super hot books like Walking Dead #1. Anyway, back to Bone #1. This is a hard book to find. I’ve been actively shopping for this for a while. On eBay right now there’s a 9.8Q for $5000 (egad!) and a 9.6 blue for $2500. But you don’t see it often. At shows they tend to be mid-grade raws, and expensive (north of $1000). There are 27 9.6s (universals) on the census. No 10s, only 5 9.8s. I think most are in private collections, never to see the light of day. It’d take a lot for me to ever consider selling mine. Interestingly, no 9.6 or 9.8 yellows (the highest yellow is 9.4). I’m already struggling about whether to crack the slab to get Jeff Smith’s signature. My initial thought is I won't. More likely I'll try to get him to sign a different issue with less risk, like #2 (the first appearance of Thorn). I’ve had a couple of near misses this year. In January a boardie offered me a CGC 8.0 for $500. I decided to pass as I wanted a higher grade book. In April I almost bought a CGC 9.4 from another boardie. He wanted $900, I was only willing to go $850. His offer was tempting, but I couldn’t get my head around that last $50 for a 9.4, I wanted a 9.6 or 9.8. If I was going to settle for a 9.4 I wanted a really good deal. So I’m really happy to have this comic. Bone is special to me. For one I think the story’s great, one of the all-time greatest comics. But even more importantly, it’s something I’ve shared with my kids. All kids read Bone nowadays in school. My oldest daughter and son both really like it so it’s something I’ve been able to share with them. My daughter just started college last week (our first to go to college), so this shared experience is even more important to me.

San Diego Is In! I submitted 5 books in San Diego, Modern fast track. I got them back on Monday, so it took only about a month. Frankly, I'm shocked (and very happy) they came back so fast. Thanks CGC! All of them are SS. Three are by Joe Benitez. I bought them from his table in Artists Avenue. The first is the Lady Mechanika ashcan. Unfortunately he only had about a dozen to pick through. All had printing flaws (mostly rough edges where white showed through), and printing flaws don't affect the grade (from what I understand). This one came back 9.6. I was hoping for 9.8 but I guess at some point CGC does have to ding a book for too many flaws, even if they were due to the printing process. My goal is 9.8 for this book, so I guess the search continues. Joe was offering his advance ready copy (ARC) of Lady Mechanika #4. Joe brought along 2 boxes of the #4, and he was kind and patient enough to let me pick through all of them (and I have to thank the CGC witness for his patience too!). I finally picked out 2 and submitted both. I was pessimistic about the grade through. Both had flaws around the staples, where it looks like the staple pushed the cover up (but there's no color break). On the long walk back from Joe's table to the CGC booth, the CGC witness assured me the books wouldn't take a hit as they were clearly printing flaws. I wasn't so optimistic. But the CGC witness was right! Both came back 9.8! Here's one of them. I'll probably sell the other. If you're interested PM me and maybe we can work something out. (One note -- Like an insufficiently_thoughtful_person, I didn't buy a copy to read! I'm dying to know what happens in #4!) The other two are by Franchesco. He's become one of my favorite modern GGA artists, and he's about the nicest person you could meet. These books are his 2013 and 2014 sketch books. They're the limited editions and go for $50 each, but after we shared a few laughs he let me have them for $25 each (as I said, he's incredibly nice and approachable). I wanted to submit to CGC but the problem was, he only had a handful of each to select from (maybe 5 each). But luckily, both came back 9.8. So, four 9.8s and one 9.6 -- a great haul from SDCC! By the way, I think 2014 will be my last San Diego Comic Con. When I reflect back, I had alot more fun at WW Chicago last summer. It's a better con for comics, much less crowded, less expensive, way less hassle. If you're a comic collector, SDCC is not nearly as much fun as other cons.

By the way, I don't know Anthony Castrillo and I've never dealt with him, so I have no first hand knowledge on how he is to work with. So I'm not trying to start anything. I do like his art. Here's another I got earlier this year from a boardie here.

Are Sketch Ops on these boards worth the bother? Frankly, I don't think so. They just seem to take forever. It's different for commissions at cons. At least then you know you'll have it by the end of the con. Once though an artist was taking commissions at a con but said he could not finish at the con. He promised to get it done within a month. My mistake, I went for it. Well, it took 4 months, not 1, and most of the time I was unsure if it would really happen because he wasn't good at responding to my emails. And then there's the cost. You're certainly not getting a deal when working directly with the artist. The one thing you do get is the chance to get a commission to your specifications. And that's a big thing if it's a special artist and special characters. But I think you have to have that combination to make it worth the cost and hassle. I really do like SS cover sketches, I've gotten into them the last couple of years. But I think it's a lot better to buy on eBay or these boards. Here's one I just got on eBay by Anthony Castrillo. I was the only bidder and was able to win it for only $89, less than half his commission rate (from what I could gather from some searching). I've read some threads here about how Anthony's commissions take some time. I don't know him and never dealt with him, but it's those kind of threads and my own experiences that make it doubtful I'll ever participate in another sketch op unless it's someone really rare like Dave Sim. For an artist like Sim he's rarely at cons and there's not alot of his art flowing around. I'd love a commission of Cerebus with Jaka, so for an artist like him I'd be willing to pony up the money and I'd wait however long it would take. But for most other artists -- especially the ones you see at cons and have alot of art available on eBay -- it doesn't seem worth it. Just my opinion ...

Two issues closer to completing my Original Marvels Collection I picked up 2 issues for my Original Marvels Collection (completing my runs of ASM, Avengers, Cap, FF, Hulk and Iron Man). Now I'm down to just 17 more issues! I got the ASM 5 from a boardie. I paid more than I originally wanted, but it looks good for a 3.5 and they're expensive on eBay. The FF 26 I got via best offer on eBay. It's a nice looking book except for the chunk out of the upper right corner. The left corner looks funky, but the seller assured me it was fine. I haven't gotten the book yet so I can't say. Either way it was a fairly nice looking inexpensive book to fill a hole. I don't plan on submitting to CGC.

SW3D - I never heard of Sucker Punch until your post. I checked it out on the internet and now it's definitely on my list to watch. Thanks!

Getting a deal when no one else is looking I picked up this nice looking Brenda Starr on eBay recently. I watched it for a couple of weeks. There were no bids but that's not unusual, typically all the bids come in the last seconds. I did the same, using bidnapper (even with my bid coming from bidnapper I watched the last couple of minutes on eBay.) I was shocked when mine was the only bid! I can only assume no one else happened to be looking (maybe the summer and vacations). I'll include it as part of my next Value submission that I'm dropping off at the Baltimore convention. Could this book get 8.0? I'm really excited to see.

Hey SW3D and Griff, Thanks for your words of support! I definitely agree, Stevens has a golden age feel to his work, similar to LB Cole. I think J. Scott Campbell is a modern artist who uses some (but certainly not all) of those visual elements. Here are a few books from my collection. I'm trying to upgrade the first book. The last 3 were graded on-site at WW Philly. I was of course ecstatic to get the 9.9 but it only gets 30 points! (A 9.8 only gets 25 points.) Here's one of my favorite LB Cole covers. I definitely see parallels between Cole's work and Stevens' (and JSC's too).

Jumping Into the Dave Stevens Covers Registry Competition Recently I've decided to compete in the Dave Stevens Covers registry. It kind of snuck up on me. Dave Stevens is one of my favorite artists and I collect his work. I've always collected his stuff raw, but over the last year I've been collecting graded copies of favorite covers. Then I started picking up other graded Stevens comics if they were at good prices. That all led to my decision to compete in the registry. It's fun, but a challenge. Right now there are 26 sets, with Doctor Joe way in the lead with 3317 points. His set is only 45% complete so it'll be hard to overtake him if he decides to build his set (although he's had no changes in over a year). I'm way back at #8 with 1195 points (26% complete). I'm not sure if I'll ever catch up. Some comics are tough to get in 9.8, so if you have one it gives you a huge advantage. 3-D Zone 16 is a good example, 308 points in 9.8 versus 105 in 9.4 (which is what I have). I've recently bought 2 raws; I haven't gotten them yet, hopefully one of them is a 9.8 candidate and I'll submit it in Baltimore. Lately I've been going for the low hanging fruit. Orbit #1 is 200 points and DV8 #1 is 104 points (in 9.8) and both are fairly easy to get on eBay and not too expensive (especially DV8 -- I can't figure out why that one gets so many points). Others are going to be hard to get in high grade, like Amazing Heroes 37 -- where the heck are you going to get this 1983 fanzine in high grade? But then it's only 32 points in 9.8, which I don't really understand. This set also includes comics with back covers by Stevens. Recently I contacted CGC to add Dark Horse Presents 100 to the set. This comic had 5 covers and originally CGC had only a single listing for all 5. That would be a bad thing to get them to add this comic to the set. Fortunately, CGC eventually added a listing for each cover. So now the copy with the Stevens back cover is 100-1. My problem is, the copy I bought off eBay has the original listing. But, CGC has been great. Gemma told me to submit it in Baltimore and they'll relabel it for free. They might even be able to return it to me in Baltimore. Now that's customer service! Here's the comic with the current label and the Stevens back cover:

Easing Up on the Grades for Walking Dead Keys I'm mostly a completist, I like collecting runs. But for the Walking Dead I'm collecting just the keys, as collecting the entire run would cost more than I want to spend. For moderns I prefer 9.8 (who doesn't?) but again I've eased up on this with some WD keys. 9.8s are very expensive and more than I'm willing to pay (I'd rather work on getting Amazing Spider-man 2-5 and FF 2, 3 and 5). There's a big drop off in price for WD going from 9.8 to 9.6 so I've decided to ease up and take 9.6s for the high ticket items. Here are a couple I've picked up the last 2-3 months. WD #2 with the first appearances of Allen, Dale, Carol, Amy and Andrea (and a few others). And WD #27 with the first appearance of the Governor. I was close to a deal for WD #1 in 9.6 a couple weeks ago (on these boards) but we couldn't quite agree on a price.

Yes, displaying statutes is definitely space-intensive. We're going through a home renovation now where I hope to have as much space for my comics as I have right now. We'll see, got my fingers crossed.

CGC SS Photos Something I'm having fun collecting this year are CGC photos of actors wtih certified autographs (I don't really see the point of CGC photos without autographs). Here's one I got recently of Drago from Game of Thrones. As with all collecting, it's all in the timing. Even as recently as late last year, Drago's autograph was pretty expensive. But he's no longer on the show so the prices of his sigs is going down (those with Dani don't count since she's still on the show and hugely popular -- how can she not be as the mother of 3 dragons?).

How Does CGC Grade Missing Pieces? I bought this Hawkman #1 from a boardie a couple weeks ago and just got it. It was accurately described as around Good with a piece missing that doesn't affect the story. I'm working on completing this Hawkman title on the cheap. My goal is an overall average of around VG. This book was offered at $30 postpaid, so it was a great way to check it off the want list. When I bought it I didn't intend to grade it. But having gotten it, I'm tempted to send the book in to CGC, if for no other reason to better understand how they treat certain defects. The book actually looks pretty nice. It could go anywhere from Good- (1.8) to Good+ (2.5) -- I think it's definitely better than Fair/Good (1.5). But, as the seller said, the book has an advertisement missing (see the last picture). It doesn't affect the story. Well, it mostly doesn't affect the story, as it does take out the lower part of the last panel (but not the captions). I believe CGC grades incomplete books at .5, where "incomplete" means something missing that affects the story. I'm curious whether this Hawkman 1 will get a .5, or maybe something higher with a notation of the missing chunk. I doubt it would get qualified (?). Anyway, if I end up grading it I'll post what happens here.

This Matt Baker beauty came up on eBay earlier this week. It's been on my want list for a while. The 2nd highest on the census and not outrageously priced. GPA is of limited use for comics like this because there's so little traffic. I'm sure though If it had been on display at this price at SDCC it would have sold in seconds. More likely it would have been a wall book and offered at at least 50% more than the seller's price. I almost bought it for the asking price. But the seller had it set up for best offer and the cheapskate in me couldn't resist, so I offered 25% lower than the BIN price. I was afraid someone else might snatch it up, but I decided to wait a while to see if the seller would counter. But the seller accepted my offer! I couldn't believe it. I paid immediately via PayPal, now I just have to sweat a few bullets waiting for it to arrive.

J. Scott Campbell's Mary Jane Statue Campbell's MJ statue is also very detailed. I have it displayed in my comic book room next to the corresponding signed print I bought from dscott back in April. Next to it Campbell's variant Superior Spider-man #20 is displayed next to the signed print (also from dscott). Here's a story from SDCC. Campbell has a print of the Gwen too and he was selling it at the con. On Friday after buyng the Gwen statue I went over to his booth (way over on the other side of the hall). Campbell wasn't there so the booth was mostly empty. The sales guy asks me if I want anything. I tell him I want the Gwen print and he tells me it just sold out. Ugh! I asked if I can buy the remaining copy displayed on the wall. He says sure! Just then another guy (the interloper) walks up. He says "Hey I was here first and I want that one!" Me and sales guy look at this guy like he's from Mars. I mean, it's not like the booth is crowded, if he was really there first he could have approached any of the sales people before I got there. So sales guy looks at me, as if worried I'm going to make trouble. Nope. I'm annoyed but inside I'm chuckling. The interloper clearly thinks the print is rare because it sold out. No, it's not rare (it's not even signed by JSC, and certainly not a limited run). I'll just buy it the next con I'm at or on eBay. So then sales guy peels the print off the backing. It's held on by some glue, so by the time he gets it off the print is pretty mangled. Sales guy asks interloper if he still wants it. Interloper is clearly unsure. I mean the print now has 3 long creases, no one in his right mind would buy it. Interloper eyes me. Just to with the guy I say to sales guy "I'll buy it if he doesn't want it." So interloper squares his jaw and says "I definitely want it." After interloper leaves me and sales guy grin at each other.

J. Scott Campbell's Gwen Stacy Statue I finally got a chance to take the Gwen statute out of the box. The detail is amazing. I wanted to share these pictures. I think it's the best comic related statue I've ever seen. The Gwen was limited to 4000 pieces. MJ had 6000 pieces. It'll be interesting to watch how the 2 statues track in price over time.

San Diego 2014 - Some things I got Due to travel and work I wasn't able to unpack from SDCC until last night. Here're some other things I picked up. I ended up buying a total of 68 comics. Kind of tells you how much SDCC is not really a comic convention anymore. Here are a few comics I picked up (sorry for the glare). They were on-sale for half off sticker. These comics were freebies. Aspen had a spinner rack of free comics. Zenescope gave away a bag with the Jamie Tyndall cover. I got the Cyberforce from someone, I was walking buy and he pushed it into my hand. I could barely say "thanks" before the crowd pushed me along. TwoMorrows had everything on sale for half price. I bought both of these and would have bought more but these books are heavy and hard to carry around. I think I got these from Entertainment Earth. Or maybe not, I can't remember. Finally, I thought both of these were cool. They got kind of dinged up on the flight home. I'm trying to decide whether to keep them in the box or take them out.

San Diego 2014 - Final Thoughts Before getting to my final thoughts on this year's SDCC, here's a pic of the Sails Pavilion around 1pm on Friday. And here's a pic of Gaslamp from right outside Sails. There was so much to do outside the con the surrounding area seemed crowded all the time. I bought this book from Doug Sneyd, long time Playboy cartoon artist. For a little extra he drew a bunny inside the front cover. So, here are my final thoughts. SDCC is such a hassle. Hard to get tickets, had to get a convenient hotel room. It's unbearably crowded. It seems the freaking train is always there whenever you want to cross the street. I had the Game of Thrones and Walking Dead panels on my list of things to do, but Hall H takes too much of a commitment of time to get into -- you have to essentially spend the night camping out. The wait isn't worth it particularly since the panels are later posted on youtube. The comic panels are not as hard to get into, and if I had more time I would have enjoyed it more. These panels are what really sets SDCC apart from other cons. If you're staying for most of the con and can attend a bunch of panels then I think SDCC may be worth it. But if you're going to shop for comics there are better cons. There are so few comic dealers at SDCC. Other cons have better variety and overall better prices. Here's the thing, tickets for SDCC are so hard to get and attendees have a decided advantage with early registration. I'm leery of not going next year (assuming I can get tickets) as once out of the past attendee loop it will be hard to ever get tickets again. So, I'll probably try to get tickets for next year during early registration. Ideally I'll get 4 day + preview night, as not going to preview night this year was a major bummer. If I do win the ticket lottery and go, I'll tone down my goals on comic buying. Instead of my big want list, I'll select 15-20 comics off my want list to shop for. I'll just browse around, not get bogged down with heavy bags, go to a few panels, take pictures and maybe pick up a comic or three.

San Diego 2014 Friday #4 - Water Damage Woes I almost pulled the trigger on 2 buys that were killed by water damage. Harley had a Walking Dead #1 on sale for $1100. The front cover had a few dings but no color break. I thought with a press it might get 9.6, even 9.8. This is my favorite kind of deal, a raw book where I assume the risk of grading but in exchange I get it at a lower price. But then I looked at the back cover. There was a small amount of water damage right in the middle. Ugh! Even with the defect it was probably still a good buy, but I decided to pass. I did pick up 4 early (pre #10) Pines Dennis the Menaces from Harley. These books are so hard to find in any condition I would have paid his under $20 sticker prices, but he had them at half off. I'm now only 3 issues away from completing my run. One book I have on my want list is Hawkman #4. There must have been 10 copies in the room. They ranged from VF or so for over $600, or VG/FN for around $250-$300. I was hoping to get a 6.0 candidate for around $200 - $250. Dale Roberts had the best copy in that range. I always enjoy shopping at his booth. He's upfront with how low he's willing to go, and if you don't reach agreement there's no drama about it. After looking at every Hawkman #4 on the floor, I went back to Dale's booth. I wanted to check the staple as I was worried it had popped. The staple was okay, but then I noticed some minor water damage along the top. It was still a fair deal at Dale's price, but I decided to pass. So the search for the first Zatanna continues (I already have a reading copy but I'm looking to upgrade). Coincidentally, right after that I ran into this Zatanna: I did pick up this Mademoiselle Marie from Dale. These books are hard to find at all, and I rarely see it in this grade. Here are a few more wall pics:

Yes, when I blow it up it looks like 9.6

San Diego 2014 Friday #3 - a couple pickups Speaking of .5s, here's another I saw. It seems CGC grades an incomplete comic as .5, irrespective of the condition of the rest of the book (is that right?). I haven't thought about it before, but it must be tough to price out these books. The CGC .5 grade must bring the price down. As a dealer, it might be easier to move the book by taking it out of the slab and selling it raw with an incomplete notation. I picked up these 2 comics from Anthony Snyder. One thing I've figured out about Anthony, it's worth the time to go through his boxes of CGC comics. Often times, what other dealers put on their walls he has in his boxes. This deal was helped by GPA. I pulled up GPA on my iPad and we used those numbers to help arrive at a price for the 2 books. I thought this was a cool Elektra on Anthony's wall. Sorry for the blurry image, the iPad zoom isn't the best.

San Diego 2014 Friday #2 - Point 5 Temptation As I write this it's Saturday and the con is over for me as I flew home last night. It's always a letdown after a con but I'm actually happy to be away from all the crowds. Still it was a short SDCC for me -- I spent more time at WW Philly. I guess I wish I would've been able to attend preview night, that would've topped off the con for me. Also I've decided I'll never again go to SDCC if I don't have a room in Gaslamp; the con is already a hassle to attend, if you add in the inconvenience of a commute it just doesn't make the con worth it. Anyway, This is a book I saw yesterday, the first .5 I've ever been tempted to buy. It has major flaws, incomplete and torn cover. The restoration is due to some glue. But it surprisingly presents well. The dealer had it priced at $350. I offered $150. The dealer told me he paid more than that. I thought about upping my offer to $200 because it's one of my grails and it does look nice despite the grade, but it was hard to justify. So I let it go. I wonder if it's going to sell.

San Diego 2014 Friday #2 Hey newshane, yes here are some wall shots. Sorry, I didn't keep track of the dealers, and my camera wasn't the best (I was using my iPad mini). But here's what I got.

San Diego 2014 Friday #1 So I referred to the dealer as the fooz ball guy. I don't want to leave it at that, as he's a good guy and I've bought from his booth over many SD cons. So I went back, here's a picture of Phil at his booth: I have to say, I hated staying on Coronado. The area and hotel (Marriott) are nice, it was just inconvenient and away from the action of Gaslamp. Although I got to see things I never saw before, like the back of the convention center as I rode over on the ferry, and the Marriott with the big Legends banner. One good thing I discovered is this food truck parked at the back of the convention center. This was great! A sausage, egg, cheese, HASHBROWNS breakfast sandwich on an english muffin for $5 (I was happy it was on a english muffin cause I'm on a diet . Also a chorizo and egg breakfast burrito for $5. So which to choose? Yeah, I got both. For $10 it was the best breakfast I've had in a while. So you want to know how crowded this con was? There was a very long line to get the con t-shirt. Okay, not a hall H line. But at least an hour line. So long they had to break the line in 2 parts. Although when you think about it the line made sense, because a con t-shirt is the ultimate con exclusive. The worst traffic jams were around booths selling or giving away exclusives. And you know alot of these will be hitting eBay. Personally I'd rather pay a little more on eBay than spend lots of time waiting in line (on my want list is the Shield carrier from a couple cons ago). I took this next picture at the bag check. All these bags belong to one guy. I cannot imagine the effort it took this guy (and his family/team) to get all these Hasbro products.

San Diego 2014 Thursday #4 More walking around the con: This is a cool Game of Thrones original painting. It wasn't for sale, the display said it was on loan from George R. R. Martin's collection: They have the Walking Dead Terminus you can walk through. I'm hoping to do that Friday. Big banner for the next Hunger Games movie: Here are a few things I picked up. I got the new Campbell MJ and Gwen statutes: I got these Schomberg covers. The dealer (the fooz ball guy, although he didn't have his table this year) gave me a nice discount off the sticker prices.