Tony S

He doesn't claim to be a professional... I am not a professional presser, and I’m not a professional grader. However, these are the methods I use when I press comic books as a hobbyist.

From that website... "I am not a professional presser, and I’m not a professional grader. However, these are the methods I use when I press comic books as a hobbyist." However, if your point is about the pictures, then you are 100% correct. Before and after pictures are of the the same book.

Yes - the comic book looks better and likely grades higher. . And if you are satisfied with a low quality pressing performed on a poor choice of pressing machine, who am I to question? However, a professional that knows what they are doing and is using the right equipment and techniques would have improved the book further. There is a small spine roll that needs realigned and the bottom corner clearly needs more work. The spine realignment alone would make very noticeable improvement in the appearance of the book.

It's not the right kind of press. Amateurs and hopefuls want to use T-Shirt presses because they are cheap. The right kind of press starts at a grand $$ new. Which is why they are popular used. Buying the right kind used is a matter of waiting. Because used they come in two flavors. Hardly used and used to death. The right kind of press is a dry mount heat press. Their original use is for mounting photographs. Seal/Bienfang now D&K is the best known brand. It should be obvious that mounting photographs demands a much better press than melting ink or dye into cotton T-Shirts. The pads (if buying used, the pads often need replaced) often cost close to what some of the cheap T-Shirt presses cost. But the right kind of pad is also really important. And T-Shirt presses don't have the right kind of pad. The reason you see these types of presses on YouTube videos is because people that actually know how to press are not making YouTube videos. Here's your "trade secret" for today.

How tragic and heartbreaking for the family.

The best candidates for restoration removal of color touch are books where the color touch is professional. A or B quality. Amateur restoration almost always penetrates the paper. What this means is that professional color touch can be removed from the paper. Amateur color touch requires removing the paper. You have holes. I doubt there are any guarantees. However, from experience I have seen books that went to CCS for restoration removal (Color touch specifically) and when going through the regrading process were identified as restored. I called and the books were sent back to CCS for further restoration removal and books were graded universal. This is from the Frequently asked questions on Restoration removal "Although we work to achieve the best possible results, because of the unpredictable nature of removal, a particular outcome, including the comics’ grade, cannot be guaranteed." I believe that "a particular outcome" would be interpreted as no guarantee of removal.

Another thing to consider not yet mentioned is the effect of both spine roll and a popped staple on the grade. If a book has an unsightly spine roll AND the grade is 4.0 or less, it's entirely possible that such a book that has a staple detach during pressing still stays the same grade or even improves. Because the pressing improved enough defects to offset the detached staple. And because a detached staple isn't that big a defect on a 2.0-3.0 book where it would be a huge defect on a 9.0 book. Spine rolls are unsightly and removing them will oftentimes make a dramatic improvement in the looks of a book. It becomes a risk reward thing. If the risk of staple(s) detaching is low, it is more worth taking the risk. If the risk is high, it's probably best to pass. And as Joeypost notes, if the spine roll is too large CGC will decline to encapsulate the book. Which forces a decision. Press to encapsulate. Or leave raw.

There are a couple of ways that what the OP wants can happen. Most of the ways that come to my mind all have downsides for either buyer or seller. If the seller has a CGC dealer account, then they could send books they have sold to CGC. In the name/ship to address of the buyer. I've done this a few times for customers - but not eBay customers. I don't sell a lot on eBay and when I do most of the time it is books already slabbed. There shouldn't be much in the way of downside here for buyer or seller, as this one of what CGC's dealer accounts are for. If the seller only has a collector account, they can only send in books for themselves. So an eBay seller with a Collector Society account could send in the book just sold. But it would be in the sellers name and return shipped to the seller. Besides extra postage, there are potential problems here. What if the book does a lot better than expected and now the seller doesn't want to sell? If the buyer has a CGC account (either type) they could ask the seller to ship the book(s) purchased to CGC under their account. Send the seller a completed submission form to include with the books. The potential problem here is for the seller. It's not wise on the sellers part to ship sold merchandise to any address other than the listed PayPal address. If sellers wants to quailfy for seller protection from eBay or PayPal, it's required to ship to the address on the PayPal account.

What pressing delivers as far as grade improvement totally depends on the book. Some will not improve at all, some a little, some a lot. If the book isn't safe to press it's possible that pressing would make the grade worse. If sending the books to CGC's in house pressing service (CCS) I suggest you pay for the books to be prescreened. They will decide if books are safe to press and if likely to improve in grade.

Made me laugh. I do very much respect you. The boards would be a lesser place without you No, your point is spot on and illustrates I was being silly. Adding grading notes will not make people's jaws fall off. MIGHT make a few 9.6's sell for less..... Maybe. Hard to quantify.

One of the reasons I think highly of you and a few others here and your comments is that you - like I - are not afraid to take the contrarian, unpopular position. No, you are not alone in your viewpoint. Nor however am I. You just enjoy the majority. There was a time when the majority opinion was that Raidthor - radioactive water - was healthy. Rich people that could afford it drank for health reasons.. Until their jaws fell off... Just sayin... Right now, today, I believe you are correct in your opinion about why Voldy 9.8's will often sell for less. But that wasn't the case three years ago, when praise of Voldy was so high the mods here made a "no promotion of competitors" rule and SB jokes (similar to Chuck Norris jokes) were all the rage. And even today it really depends on what venue the sales take place. My own personal experience was a Star Wars 1 9.8 on Comic Link. That auction there was my Voldy 9.8 and a CGC 9.8 selling just 90 seconds apart. The CGC one sold for about $150 more. The Voldy one actually presented better. No white on the bone, structurally perfect. But it had several absolutely minor grading notes, the CGC none. BTW, no sour grapes on my part. I sold the book when Star Wars 1 was ridiculously overhyped and over priced. I could buy it back today for 1/2 of what it sold for. I owned several copies and sold my "regular" 9.8's and kept the signed #1's. Cash in when the timing is right... So sure. On Facebook and eBay it is the great unwashed. Most wouldn't know that grading notes even exist. On ComicLink??? That's not the case. Bidders read the grading notes -and decided the lack thereof meant the CGC was more "perfect". As someone that sells the majority of what I slab, I'm fine with a lack of grading notes. As far as learning how CGC grades, there is no substitute for cracking the book and looking. Sure - it costs money. But knowledge is seldom free.

What Bob has said here. I've not replied to this thread before but Bob came really close to what I would say. Grading notes take time. And they will NEVER be a complete, 100% accurate list of every single defect. They are just the defects the grader's took time to write down. I would also add that graders notes are a double edged sword for sellers. Take Voldy books - which always have graders notes. Why do their 9.8's sometimes/oftentimes sell for less? I would suggest part of the reason is CGC 9.8's have no graders notes. Voldy has them. So a Voldy 9.8 looks less "perfect" to the buying public simply because it has (freely available) notes listing a few tiny defects. While CGC's 9.8's do not. Be careful what you ask for. IMHO things are fine just as they are. No changes are needed here.

I don't clearly see any problems with the clean and press. A couple of your pictures show clear damage to corners of the paper. Pressing can't fix ragged, torn paper. Spine stress lines that break color cannot be fixed, period. Often times graders notes will indicate "light spine stress lines" and those can't be fixed either. Just a result of the paper being folded. Some of the confusion over creases and stress lines breaking color has to do with the color of the paper. White is the ABSENCE of color. So you won't see "breaks color" in white areas for creases and stress lines. But that doesn't mean the paper wasn't damaged. If there had been any color, damaged paper would be listed as "breaking color"> Fingerprints are more complicated. Light smudges from handling can often be buffed/cleaned up. But real, honest to goodness fingerprints cannot usually be removed. Comic books are printed with oil based inks. Our fingertips are slightly oily. The oil on our fingertips can mix with and soften the printer ink, forming quite perfect fingerprints. In areas that have color, this done and over. It can't be fixed. in white areas it is sometimes possible to remove such, but not always.

I'd be curious to see the grader notes on these books and pictures of the entire book. The limited view makes it hard to come to any conclusions. But it is not obvious to me that the books have been improperly encapsulated. The second picture of the bottom looks entirely normal. The bottom of books often rest below that ridge you see. The ridge being only on the outside of the outer holder. The outer holder is flat and smooth on the inside. And the top picture is clearly an impact ding at the spine. But it's not clear at all to me that said ding happened as a result of encapsulation. The grading notes would tell the tale. If they mention a crunch/bend/ding at the top of the back spine, this is how the book arrived on the graders desk. And yes, 8.5 is also entirely possible for an impact ding at the spine on an otherwise 9.4'ish book. Anyway, Brittany is on this so I'm sure you'll be fairly treated.

CGC has gotten stricter the last few years on cover tanning. How it affects the grade is like any other defect - the degree to which said defect exists. With modern books especially like you show here I personally would not bother submitting such. You will likely be disappointed with the CGC assigned grade and your money would be better spent purchasing copies that do not have tanning and sun shadows. Dry cleaning done as part of pressing only removes dirt, pencil marks and such off the SURFACE of the paper. Tanning is part of the paper.

THIS times 1000. I don't know what you do in your 9-5 job, but I assure you that based on the numbers so far, you will find selling 25,000 comic books a year will take a lot more than 40 hours a week of your time. This times 999..... Especially response to question B. No one is going to answer this question. Unless they are offering their business up for sale OR applying for a loan at the bank. Even then the numbers will only be provided to serious buyers or the bank loan officer. For decades I did mail order sales of collectible comics as a part time business via mail order while I worked a normal 8-4 job. You might find this is what is best for you but using online/ebay/comic books shows. Because old fashion mail order is much out of favor. I would also offer - as advice - that you need to move up the food chain as far as value of your inventory if you want to make $$ and not work like a rented mule. It takes just as much time and effort to sell a $5 book as $50 or a $500 book. You will likely have a larger gross profit margin selling $5 books. But you should make a lot more $$ per book selling $500 books. Or even $50 books. When it comes to listing items, taking pictures, answering inquiries,, packing items for shipment - the time spent is the same regardless of the value of the book(s).

Restored books don't follow a "50% of unrestored" price rule. There is a curve, based on condition. Restored books on key issues tend to bring around 1/2 in LOW GRADE. But when you get to high grade books, the percent that restored brings versus unrestored starts to shrink drastically. In 2011, AF 15 in CGC 9.6 set a sales record for Silver age books at 1.1 million dollars. Four months ago a Slight Professional restored AF 15 sold for $86,000. That less than 10%

Sometimes it works out for people. A few weeks ago sent in a X-Men 1 PGX graded 8.5 to CGC. It got an 8.0. My client paid - as you noted - about the 7.5 price. Because X-Men 1 makes a huge jump in price from 7.5 to 8.0, he made serious $$.

Reinforced is using rice paper or similar to strengthen the book. It's most commonly done along the spine or centerfold but I have seen entire covers that were reinforced. Piece(s) added is just what it sounds like. A comic has missing piece(s) which are replaced with other pieces of paper. Professionals use similar paper (often from another vintage comic book) cut it to fit and glue it in. Leaf casting is done by creating a slurry of similar paper to what is being leaf cast. Then the page/cover with missing pieces is put into said slurry and the new paper adheres to the old. After removal and drying the missing pieces are filled in. When pieces are replaced / leafcasted there almost always color touch up or art recreation done. There is no inherent "good or bad" as far as each process. All are restoration. What matters is if the restoration is professional or amateur. A professional can replace pieces or leaf cast and both will look great when done. A professional reinforcing a page or spine will use archival materials and final result will be difficult (but not impossible) to see. Amateur restoration often looks worse than nothing done. I've seen pieces replaced with ruled notebook paper and elmer's glue.

It is as Yorick said distributor ink. If you are unfamiliar with what distributor ink is.... Comic books back in the day were sold on a returnable basis. Retailers might only make a couple of cents on a comic book - but they only paid for the ones sold. Comic books were printed with a cover date that ranged 2.5 to 4 months later than when the actually arrived on the newsstands. This was an attempt to get retailers to keep the comics out for sale for a longer period of time - the publishers hoping for more sales and fewer returns. Retailers were wise to this and some would write or stamp an arrival date on the cover. Retailers were also deciding individually when to pull comics to return. Comic books back then were also distributed by regional distributors. Here in the Evansville Indiana area it was Loge News (I might be misspelling) Many distributors tried to enforce some consistency on how long comic books were out for sale before being returned. They did this with a color code system. Big stacks of comics would be placed on a table and an employee would use a can of spray paint and ideally do a nice neat stripe of color along the top edge of the comic. Then once a month the distributor would send - along with new comics - a note telling the retailer to "pull all red (blue, green, etc) coded comics and return for credit". Even if careful, the top and bottom comics in the stack tended to get more spray paint on them. Here in Evansville the joke among comic book collectors was that the employee spraying comics at Loge was paid by the number of cans of paint emptied, not by the hour. A lot of comics had excess distributor ink. If done neatly and the paint is only along the top edge, it doesn't affect the grade CGC assigns a book. Excessive ink will impact the grade - and how much the grade is affected depends on how bad the excess distributor ink looks. Your book here certainly has a fair amount of overspray. But I've seen a lot worse. The book will not be considered restored - at least not over the distributor ink. Nice pick up for a $1.

The bottom staple is not "destroying" the book. If you keep the book in good storage conditions ( heat and humidity comfortable to human beings, not exposed to light (in a box) the rust is not getting any worse. 1) Don't bother removing and replacing the staple. That would result - if sent to CGC - in a conserved grade. 2) It would be a risky press, as the staple as pictured may well pull through the front cover 3) If you would like to have CGC graded 2.5-3.0, sure, send it in for CGC grading. 4) If you want the $$, sure. Sell it. 5) 2.5-3.0.

What marvelmaniac said. Your idea is called "marrying" pages. You have taken pages from another book and married them to this book. It will earn a restored "purple" label. Restored books - especially books published from 1970 on - are worth a fraction of what blue "universal" label books are. You are better off just getting hit on the grade of the book as is. Or keeping the book raw (unslabbed)

Very sad.... He was an important character on Walking Dead during it's best years. https://comicbook.com/tv-shows/2018/10/07/the-walking-dead-scott-wilson-cause-of-death-confirmed-rep/

If you lay a comic book out on your driveway - in full sun - you'll start to notice a change in paper within just a few days. Comic books hung on dealers walls where the store has big windows and florescent lighting and the lights are on 8-12 hours a day 5-7 days a week will start to look faded and have color shifts in a couple of months. Experts in the field displaying and preserving valuable paper documents (Library of Congress, Northeast Document Conservation Center) list "best practices" for such. LED lighting at the lowest level practical, lights only on when the items are being viewed, no windows with sunlight coming in. And of course temperature and humidity should be controlled to the ideal ranges. Which fortunately isn't hard. If you are hot and sweaty in the room with your comics - the room is too hot and humid. If you are comfortable, your books are as well. So the takeaway from all of this is limited exposure to light - including using light to examine books or scan them - isn't going to be an issue at all. The real damage occurs from long term exposure. And it's possible to balance display and exposure. A windowless room (or darkening window shades), LED lights - and the lights only on when you are admiring the books. I personally prefer to frame pictures of covers and art prints for display in my comic room and keep my comics - raw and slabbed - in boxes in the dark. But I know many collectors like displaying their professionally graded and slabbed comics. If one follows the recommendations of professionals in the field of paper conservation it is possible to do so safely. If one displays their slabbed books in bright, sunny rooms there will - in a year or less - be regrets.

The Overstreet Price Guide grading guidelines do not consider replacement of staples with vintage staples to be restoration or conservation. Professional grading companies (CGC) disagree. Staples cleaned or replaced - even with vintage staples - will get a conserved notation from CGC.