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. Oh snappppppppp!!!!! Yup, freaking fast building sets this guys has! I gotta tell ya Stephane it sure has been fun watching you amass sets with speed and razor focus on what your hunting..... Your sick sir, very sick.... and I do mean that as a complement! (thumbs u

Nice Liam! (thumbs u

I see the beginning of a nice little set Tim!

It's been awhile (she moved here when she was 11) but if I can get her to sit down and look at it I'm sure she can muddle through it. She would probably do better than Google translate....

I google translated it and though it left some to be desired I think I got the gist..... seems funny to me how in the German system the lower the number the better the grade! 0 is mint!

Nice! You have these books on lockdown man....

Ahhh shoot! Hado is going to see that Spiderwoman 1 and poop himself! Amazing books as usual Stephane!

Thats just freakin cool Hector!!!!!

Thanks for the clarification CLaudio! Makes sense for sure.... I have heard about the Germans way of grading and how their grading scale was pretty advanced? Do you know about it? Is it similar to the 10 point CGC scale we have here? Curious now..... I have also been told by some that of all the countries in Europe the Germans were the most obsessed about grade and condition. High grade CGC-able German books are more readily available I have seemed to notice and been told by some others? is this true in your opinion?

No, that’s not accurate: as far as Italy goes, think of it as mostly unexistent between Very Fine and Mint. In the 1970s you had grading, while most collectors did not even look at it here. Ok sorry, at least as far as Italy is concerned its even worse! Basiclly if you are a grade snob you will have a very small.. small.. small.. foreign collection! nah but really what I meant is right now its 70's-like over in Europe. As in most collectors over there have a very general view of grade. unread condition could be anywhere from a vf to a nm. Would that be accurate as far as Italy Cluadio? Are their Italian dealers using terms like NM over there? Whats the terminology? My understanding is each country has their own terminology and its somewhat similar to used, good, and unread or something like that. Thanks Claudio! (thumbs u

Marmat is a amazing contact to have! If I may get on my soapbox a bit... Contacts are extremely important in the foreign game... One might think, "oh why do I need contacts? I can navigate the foreign auction sites no problem." But, often times being able to access and know what you are looking for still will not produce results. Many foreigners will not ship outside of their country or outside greater Europe. Sometimes.... as an example I will use Mercadolivre of Brazil, you simply are not allowed to bid or buy without much headache. Its like being a kid in a candy store.... with no ability to buy its heart wrenching. Probably one of the most frustrating aspects of these books is this difficulty sometimes in the buying venues. I predict some American collectors will be turned off by this. The times they are a changing though.... and it seems as time goes on it does get easier and easier to acquire books from the foreign Ebay/auction sites. The other side of this coin is flippers buying low and selling for double or triple to US buyers. This is one way to acquire foreigns without having to navigate the other side of the digital pond. Europeancomixforyou has been doing this for years and probably making a healthy profit. This takes some of the fun of the hunt out of it but its still a viable option for those without sufficient contacts overseas. Europeancomix web store.... http://www.ebay.com/sch/europeancomix4you/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from= The other biggie is this... One of the first things to do when beginning a concerted effort to seek foreign books out is to re-examine your ideals concerning grade. Think of many countries grading standard's to be similar to ours in the 70's. Nose bleed mint books very often just simply do not exist and if by some miracle they do they are usually locked deep within locals collections. Many of the foreign bronze and earlier books didn't see bags and boards until the late 80s and even 90s. So... they had a long long time to go from the 9's to the 8's and 7's in grade if that makes any sense..... You probably already have figured this out.... but for any of the lurkers out there this is just a little advice.... And congrats on your new foreign books!!!!!!!!

Welcome aboard the foreign train! Is this one of your first foreign books? That corner crunch isn't to bad... (thumbs u

Ok guys.... 2 new punnys from Mexico! These books were digest sized.... here is the limited 1 in a mylar for size reference.... I like the lack of a price issue box in the upper left.... really allows the amazing painted art to pop without the cluttered look of the American version. I kinda like the red title too, adds to the "circle of blood" design story. This book is def rough but I was thrilled to find it on EBAY at all. These 2 books were the first that I have ever seen of them on EBAY or Mercado. I knew these Mexican VID versions were rare but it wasn't until recently that I found out more information. Apparently according to Mexican collectors I know over there there was some controversy with these books. I guess there was a issue of violence and weather or not these books should have a 18 and older warning? I am not exactly sure how this affected the print run but according to my sources the early issues of VIDS punny publication had very small print runs. So lets look at pics from the inside compared to American scans of zecks artwork. When I first checked it out I thought the coloring looked a little different... I was thinking the smaller format size would do harm to the artwork, but I was pleasantly surprised it still seemd pretty good. Notice how the prison distance seems altered in the panel. Also notice how Franks head is not overlapping the middle panel? Why is this? Because I think the publisher altered individual panels to make them fit better the smaller size while sacrificing some art to better fit other art. Altered text so as to fit in as much of the cool punny image as possible... Ahhhh I figured out later while flipping thru the book why the coloring seemed off. The Mexican foreign uses more yellow in its coloring. Pretty much where the American is blue the Mexican is yellow. This difference in color makes the Zeck art in the Mexican feel more tension filled or something. Could color theory here be causing this? Blue just feels more relaxed or something? I don't know but its neat.... anyways.... my Punny sets gained some peeps!

Ahhh yes the design decisions seem to have been done well for sure! I particularly like with this issue how the target is allowed to go up and bleed beyond the top without much distraction as far as the title. The Mexican 201 allows for this as well and really makes the target pop similar to this one. Beautiful stickers too….. On a different note…… Man I would love it if someone would write an informative feature article on Italian Marvels in english for FCC magazine…. I wonder who could do that? Can you think of anyone over there who might be interested in something like this Claudio?

Im with you RJ! Another cool club I can join! And like Solarcadet said.... don't dismiss the Italians folks!

Thanks for the props guys! (thumbs u Yea, I have a very specific way of shooting the books when they are in sets.... I have thought about doing a thread teaching this technique... Ahhh man Claudio, I know I remember when you told me how hard that Italian one was going to be. If you have the stickers already though that should save me money if I go for one without? Similar to my Gli Italian TOD1 book I dont care if the stickers are fashioned to the spine... id just be happy to have them period! Let me see what I can do Claudio... The neat thing about the 201 is it was licensed all over the world... another tough one is the Turkish one! Ill have to find a scan but I know I have seen it.... Man that Italian book sure is nice!

Nice one bro! (thumbs u

Some of my newest books.... Hungarian Spawn #1 Id say my Spawn #1 set is def not messin around! Swedish Spidey 201 And another reason why the set collecting type is so neat... look at the target and see how many variations the Foreign publishers chose to use..... By themselves you might not notice the subtle differences... Id like to thank Tony for the Hungarian Spawn and Swedish Spidey! Also I couldn't have acquired the Aussie 201 without my buddy Tim.... dude has an eye that can laser in on rare foreigns man.....

That is a cool book Hector! (thumbs u

More NB goodness....... ................. Tims Hulk..... don't worry Tim its gonna get to ya! Little hint..... When sourcing books from overseas and getting large packages with multiple books.... have a buddy chip in on the international shipping and earn himself a couple of books.... little foreign hunters tip! Everyone wins! (thumbs u ............... God it would have been nice to get some earlier Swampys! Does a Swampy #1 exist in NB? Id say its a good probability....

Ahhh dude.... if someone can come up with a Goodwill bats 227 I might have to let them sleep with my wife.... Just kidding.... baby, if your reading this you know im kidding....

So, the next types.... The goodwill bookstore copies! Goodwill did some interesting stuff.... they changed the numbering.... they included ads for the printer that printed the books, JMC press. And we are pretty sure they didn't follow continuity.... this might be why they chose their own numbering system. The first book I opened was Rawhide kid 101.... front cover back cover The number 05375/02464 are the numbers Goodwill put into the info box? What is the significance of these numbers? The American cover for reference.... Now this book fell apart when I opened it.... it was rough... how sucky...... Now the inside indicia states the Goodwill info... notice they cut out the issue number and left it blank. It was very important to them to remove the issue number and assign their own apprently. Again why? The Goodwill books had weird coloring pages along with ads on the back covers..... Now probably my nicest Goodwill book....... Avengers 102 Out of fear of doing more damage I left this book in its mylar.... Again a weird number, but only 1, and different from the Rawhide kid. This number includes a letter, and a dash? Could the 3 -75 be month and year? And, someone wrote in pen the American issue number for reference? A collector trying to help himself maintain continuity in story arcs? Who knows but its there..... American for reference... The next book..... Daredevil American reference.... same deal with the covers... the goodwill numbering... and on the inside, the issue number removed... The JMC press ad is a little different on this one.... some information is printed at the bottom of the ad. I wonder how close in bed the printers were with the bookstores themselves. Tim AKA LSComics and I have sometimes wondered if the licenses were bought by some third party and then auctioned off to individual bookstores? Maybe the third party was in bed with the printers and the bookstores came to them for the printing rights? Maybe the third party bought licensing rights and then sold individual titles to the different printers? In this way some DC titles could be being printed and found at multiple bookstores? Who knows.... back cover with kid getting his but burned coloring page? Again, no ads in any of these books except the JMC press and goodwill ads.... along with the coloring pages on the back. Ok, ontu the next book..... THe Cap 152! This book closely matches the Avengers above in the numbering in the info box. THis book again reconfirms my idea of the numbering having something to do with month and year? Beat up book for sure..... American cover.... Indicia... And this one looks like a weird cut and paste job by the printers..... like a paste up of only the info they wanted there.... notice the sentences are not even even? Lots of inconsistencies in these books.... with poor printing standards found in many... Again that same JMC press ad..... without info at bottom... A shot of the insides.... not to bad I guess? But, one of the print quality issues we see everywhere in these FIlipino books is the lack of print registration. This can occur for multiple reasons... deformation of the print drums that hold the plates because of age, laziness on the part of the print operators, poor quality plate making you name it. I used to work at the Roswell Daily Record so I have seen big press's run..... so I do know a thing or 2 about it... an example of horrible registration on the magenta and yellow plates.... This book had a huge Goodwill ad that spanned multiple pages.... Back cover.... Now, the most interesting of the Goodwill books I have! The bats 229! Could my bats grail 227 exist? I think its very possible.... Now notice Goodwill put a number that actual insinuates a continuity? A issue number? A issue number in the order these bats were printed by Goodwill? We dont know but its a number that isn't 229. American cover for reference.... Now up until this point we have only seen JMC/goodwill ads on these books.... nothing else... But not this time. A ad called the "Gallery of coming attractions" gives us some clues..... First clue is that the Bats 229 is included in this ad and it is assigned a number.... This matches up nicely with the number on the front... This tells us this number is a sort of issue number and could quite possibly be assigned according to the order these books were printed? Look at all the other DC books on the back.... Could a TEC 400 be around? I think so.... the all classic Supes 233 is there, and a Supergirl #1 would be darn cool! Could a HOS 92 exist in a Goodwill version? Could a Bats 227 pop up? A 232, 234, or classic cover like a 244? I do think the more key you get the more chance that if these books were here in America they would pop up on EBay or database sites similar to LSComics 237. We would have seen them hopefully by now....... I dont think they are here. These Key DC Goodwill books are still in the Phillapines.... hiding in a closet somewhere in a FIlipino collectors little brothers stuff..... not known that it could possibly be the only copy in existence!!!!!! What if a Iron Man 55 exists? The breadth of the Marvel and DC stuff all the bookstores printed means almost any Bronze age key is at least possible. Thank you for going on this journey with me guys.... and pay attention! Next time you are going through a old long box of mid grade keys from the bronze age... or going through some dealers stock.... these books could be hiding in plain site! Find um.... Not taking anything away from the 35 cent variants or many of the other rarer bronze variants of course..... But, in my opinion the Fillipino bookstore books are the ultimate Bronze age treasure hunt.... (thumbs u

National Bookstore is the biggest and most prominent bookstore here in the Philippines. They have more funds in reprinting materials. Goodwill Bookstore has only small stores located mostly in the malls.Not sure if they are still business right now since I cannot find their stores anymore. As for Alemars, they are the minority here since they only have very few stores in the country. Alemars also closed shop years ago. Of the three reprints, I consider Alemar's the rarest. Awesome! (thumbs u Thanks for the comments...... So, do you remember seeing goodwill books on the shelves? Do you remember trying to read them as story arcs and were they printed in some kind of continuity that made sense?

2) Hector, you should see the one Matt still has to send to me. Yup hoping to get it out next payday.... Its nice for sure! Hey Tim, stop that nasty talk.... im working on the Goodwill examinations and stuff and I have to get it done before wifey wakes up otherwise it could take another day..... stop distracting me sir!

THanks my friend! (thumbs u Another 3 DC NB that I am digging right now.....