drdroom

Kane believed that if he hired someone to draw something for him, it was the same as if he drew it himself.

 

It's as simple as that.

 

So, it might be real. Stranger things have happened. But knowing how he approached his "art", do you want to spend the money on it?

 

I wouldn't.

Yeah, this. "Fake" is the wrong word, it's ghosted.

Fair use, I think. But extra irony points if the Lichtenstein is based on a Romita panel!

Not even crossed out on most of them.

 

Example

 

Ugh, a Coollines link! That's like getting Rickrolled.

I like to come back and re-read this entire thread every month or so.

Its possible they are real production materials for later re-printings, I think. Or not, Its just a xerox either way, how would you ever know?

I don't know if transparencies were ever made, don't think so, but certainly there would be no reason to separate the text out of the word balloons after painstakingly lettering them INTO the word balloons. Text was printed on the black line plate along with the art.

This is absolutely 900 bucks down the toilet...

^ great graphic.

 

The lichtenstein thing was discussed earlier ad nauseum

Let me summarize pages and pages of that thread for you:

 

Some people don't like Roy Lichtenstein.

 

Other people like Roy Lichtenstein.

Well put. I think that about covers it.

 

Question for Scott: Has anyone ever commissioned you to restore a faded piece originally inked by someone other than yourself?

 

 

Yes.

 

Scott

 

Your skill and versatility makes you a perfect candidate...

 

Follow-up question: Did you charge strictly by the amount of work required (time, difficulty, etc…)? Or did the value of the page come into play? (A la CGC charging more to grade an Amazing Fantasy 15 than they would a silver foil variant of McFarlane's Spider-Man #1)

 

This might be a topic for its own thread, there are so many nuances. I have a couple of late Kirby pages inked by Royer & Berry that have passages of marker. It's not faded yet, but I assume it will be someday, and I don't feel I can display them. I've thought of trying to hire Mike to redo them (no idea whether he would or what he would charge) but it seems to me that the re-inking would end up looking very slightly heavier than the original because the new sharp ink line would have to cover the slightly un-sharp line left by the marker.

Notwithstanding this, standards of legitimate art restoration are always based on the realities and market needs of the time, and as time goes by and values rise while original inkers become less and less available, I think we are going to see third-party re-inks becoming a norm. The recent TOS cover and the restored Foster Tarzan page of a few seasons ago have shown that the market is open to heavy restoration of OA much more than it is with comics.

I agree with Suspense39- Everett is always fun to look at even though he doesn't really serve Kirby well. I like having a bit of him but he wouldn't be my first choice to replace Colletta. Of who was available at the time I'd like Sinnott, Stone, Heck, Giacoia or Klein, roughly in that order.

So, if we have have a thread of 'favourite Kirby inkers', someone like Vinnie Colletta would rank low on the preference scale.

 

As such, collectors are bringing aesthetics into the equation . . .

 

I agree with that, although I think Colletta did some great work on Kirby's pencils in Thor and I think people tend to overlook that because they hate Colletta for all the times he did a terrible job on Thor (not to mention erasing backgrounds, etc.) Nowhere, in my opinion, did Colletta ruin Kirby's work more than he did on his brief and apocalyptically bad run on Fantastic Four, in which he rendered pages so badly that if I were buying purely on aesthetics I would prefer a decent Ayers Sgt. Fury page. But Colletta's work on FF happened to include some of the best stories from the entire run, with great battle sequences, etc. So the prices on his FF work do not dip as much as one might expect. (That, plus the fact that FF art has been hoarded by a few and made even more scarce than it would be)

 

As yet, there's been nobody doing the same with Kirby's Thor pages, which I would call some of the most undervalued out there because of how cool the pages often are and how much appreciation the character has gotten in the past few years. All it would take is a couple guys hoarding Thor kirby's and soon people would be saying "you know, Colletta didn't really destroy these pages, after all."

 

Coincidentally I was just looking at some old Thor's last night (128,131). Man, it was even worse than I remembered. Colletta burned those pages to the ground.

 

Hence my use o the phrase "some great work"

 

Sinnott's Kirbys were universally great.

Ayers always good.

Giacoia underrated and often good

Shores usually good

Royer always good

 

Colletta often bad but "sometimes" good (on Thor only; always bad on FF)

 

 

Matter of taste (though secretly I am objectively correct ). Here's mine:

Sinnott: good to start, ascending to great

Ayers: hugely overrated, dulls the edge of Kirby's drawing relentlessly

Giacoia: highly rated by almost everyone I know, and rightly so.

Stone: underrated and sometimes as good as Sinnott

Shores: wildly wrong but sometimes appealing

Wood: very good but a touch overrated

Heck: very good

Ditko: good

Royer: virtually perfect

Kirby: great in '40s thru '60s, perhaps a little rusty thereafter

Berry: good to very good

Thibodeaux: heavy handed but underrated I think, in view of what he was working with

Reinman: not very good

Roussos: pretty bad

Colletta: mainly terrible, occasionally rising to bad (perhaps with the help of assistants)

 

Sorry for wandering off topic... I promise not to get into a feud over any of these positions (at least not on this thread).

 

Can't agree more with you on the highlighted inker above.

 

I believe I remember hearing that Royer was Kirby's favorite inker, because he simply stuck as close as possible to what Jack drew. Sinnott sometimes fancied things up. Agree that Giacoia on Kirby is underrated but I would say more so on Captain America than on FF. Stone I also liked more than most. Ayers I like more than most because that was my point of entry into the FF reprints and I associate it with discovering (some of) the comic's initial glory days

If we all think Giacoia is underrated then who is left to underrate him?

So, if we have have a thread of 'favourite Kirby inkers', someone like Vinnie Colletta would rank low on the preference scale.

 

As such, collectors are bringing aesthetics into the equation . . .

 

I agree with that, although I think Colletta did some great work on Kirby's pencils in Thor and I think people tend to overlook that because they hate Colletta for all the times he did a terrible job on Thor (not to mention erasing backgrounds, etc.) Nowhere, in my opinion, did Colletta ruin Kirby's work more than he did on his brief and apocalyptically bad run on Fantastic Four, in which he rendered pages so badly that if I were buying purely on aesthetics I would prefer a decent Ayers Sgt. Fury page. But Colletta's work on FF happened to include some of the best stories from the entire run, with great battle sequences, etc. So the prices on his FF work do not dip as much as one might expect. (That, plus the fact that FF art has been hoarded by a few and made even more scarce than it would be)

 

As yet, there's been nobody doing the same with Kirby's Thor pages, which I would call some of the most undervalued out there because of how cool the pages often are and how much appreciation the character has gotten in the past few years. All it would take is a couple guys hoarding Thor kirby's and soon people would be saying "you know, Colletta didn't really destroy these pages, after all."

 

Coincidentally I was just looking at some old Thor's last night (128,131). Man, it was even worse than I remembered. Colletta burned those pages to the ground.

 

Hence my use o the phrase "some great work"

 

Sinnott's Kirbys were universally great.

Ayers always good.

Giacoia underrated and often good

Shores usually good

Royer always good

 

Colletta often bad but "sometimes" good (on Thor only; always bad on FF)

 

Matter of taste (though secretly I am objectively correct ). Here's mine:

Sinnott: good to start, ascending to great

Ayers: hugely overrated, dulls the edge of Kirby's drawing relentlessly

Giacoia: highly rated by almost everyone I know, and rightly so.

Stone: underrated and sometimes as good as Sinnott

Shores: wildly wrong but sometimes appealing

Wood: very good but a touch overrated

Heck: very good

Ditko: good

Royer: virtually perfect

Kirby: great in '40s thru '60s, perhaps a little rusty thereafter

Berry: good to very good

Thibodeaux: heavy handed but underrated I think, in view of what he was working with

Reinman: not very good

Roussos: pretty bad

Colletta: mainly terrible, occasionally rising to bad (perhaps with the help of assistants)

Sorry for wandering off topic... I promise not to get into a feud over any of these positions (at least not on this thread).

So, if we have have a thread of 'favourite Kirby inkers', someone like Vinnie Colletta would rank low on the preference scale.

 

As such, collectors are bringing aesthetics into the equation . . .

 

I agree with that, although I think Colletta did some great work on Kirby's pencils in Thor and I think people tend to overlook that because they hate Colletta for all the times he did a terrible job on Thor (not to mention erasing backgrounds, etc.) Nowhere, in my opinion, did Colletta ruin Kirby's work more than he did on his brief and apocalyptically bad run on Fantastic Four, in which he rendered pages so badly that if I were buying purely on aesthetics I would prefer a decent Ayers Sgt. Fury page. But Colletta's work on FF happened to include some of the best stories from the entire run, with great battle sequences, etc. So the prices on his FF work do not dip as much as one might expect. (That, plus the fact that FF art has been hoarded by a few and made even more scarce than it would be)

 

As yet, there's been nobody doing the same with Kirby's Thor pages, which I would call some of the most undervalued out there because of how cool the pages often are and how much appreciation the character has gotten in the past few years. All it would take is a couple guys hoarding Thor kirby's and soon people would be saying "you know, Colletta didn't really destroy these pages, after all."

Coincidentally I was just looking at some old Thor's last night (128,131). Man, it was even worse than I remembered. Colletta burned those pages to the ground.

There are a number of modern artists who can draw circles around the guys whose work was featured in the Heritage auction today.

 

They started training earlier, they've had better training (more/better art books, youtube tutorials, etc…) they've borrowed all the best tricks from the masters they've been able to learn from the masters' mistakes, and finally they aren't trying to crank out 3 books a month to feed their families.

 

That being said, I'm not spending money on their work. Even though, to observers with no history of reading comics, it might be considered 'Better'

 

 

 

I'm trying to figure out which modern artists WEREN'T featured in the Heritage auction so as to guess who you might be talking about...?

well yeah, that's not surprising. Especially in light of the public knowledge that the 181 interiors are roast. Seems like this would be the best interior page possible from the original arc. The 181 cover would obviously be in another stratosphere but this is still pretty nice.

 

Very interesting piece to try and handicap an ending # on.

Plus 250K

Question for Miracleman guys: is the Heritage page an A page?

Suppose we (by which I mean, not me) were to take the data points that exist for covers, and calculate them as a percentage of the page prices we've already settled on for the equivalent run (where applicable), thus to learn whether there is a semi-consistent relationship across the board?

yeah true. I said "sometimes about the content" but lets face it its often or usually about the content

Very much so. And I say that as someone for whom the artistic quality of the page is absolutely paramount. I still operate in an environment where content (meaning: popular character/ significant storyline) is king. Its a great advantage when there's a great Kirby page featuring, say, Shilo, and a large problem when the great Kirby page features the Surfer. When my A page is everyone else's B or C page, that's the sweet spot!

Not that I'm immune to content either, especially where nostalgia and safe investment potential meet. Ah, what a great hobby.

Should specify Jaime Hernandez L&R; Gilberto pages are less. Kind of a bargain actually, some would say.

Based on quick scan of Heritage archives, I propose:

Giraud Blueberry is at least in 20-30K

Moebius fantasy pages, not enough information

Crumb 5-10K

Crumb Mr Natural, Fritz, other important UG pages 10-20K

Clowes is hard because he has pretty much kept almost all the A+ pages , but gene really speaking Clowes story pages seem to be in the 3-5000 range. Ware 5000+ probably 10000 range for A+

Actually 'A' is what we're looking for, not A+, per the OP. I think this is wise because A+ can be a real wild card and not reflect accurately on the rest of the range, whereas 'A' page value can be somewhat extrapolated downward.

So would you say a Clowes A page is in 3-5 or 5-10? & Ware A pages 5-10?

Colan large art Iron Man, 3-5K. Possibly Heck LA Iron Man as well? I know of 3, but maybe those are A+ pages.

Let's add some more! Is anyone qualified to break out these guys: Crumb, Corben, Moebius/Giraud, Tardi, Clowes, Ware, Hergé.

Ditko & Wrightson Warren work can safely be added to the 5-10K range

I think Jaime Hernandez may have entered the 3-5K tier, though I'm a bit unsure on the A/A+ distinction with his work.

I'd recommend dropping Kubert war/Hawkman one notch also. I just bought a 2X splash in that range, and the best war panel page I can recall seeing went for less than $5k on Clink.

Here's a war page over 5K, and not the best I've seen (though I wouldn't kick it out of my foxhole...).

http://comics.ha.com/c/item.zx?saleNo=7079&lotNo=92213

There are no EC artists/pages on the list? Also, no Barks?

 

Very good point. Where do the Wood, Ingels, Davis, Feldstein, Krigstein panel pages fall ?

 

I'm not the expert but I think only Wood, Frazetta & possibly Kurtzman will make it into the +3K club for an A interior panel page.

 

I wouldn't disregard Ingels, I know of two panel pages that sold for over $3K, one I think on Heritage back in 2010 or 2009 ( can't seem to find it at the moment)

 

Also this Jack Davis page sold for $3350 in 2010 http://comics.ha.com/c/item.zx?saleNo=7021&lotNo=92055

 

And I don't even think it's an A page ( no host )

Its not a A page, its an A+ page! Hatchet in the head. For Ingels, I'd consider reanimated dead tissue pages to be A+. (choke)

There are no EC artists/pages on the list? Also, no Barks?

 

Very good point. Where do the Wood, Ingels, Davis, Feldstein, Krigstein panel pages fall ?

I'm not the expert but I think only Wood, Frazetta & possibly Kurtzman will make it into the +3K club for an A interior panel page.