Stalzer2002

This isn't something that I collect, but I do have a Juanjo Guarnido Blacksad in my Blacksad: Amarillo collection.

Nice. As a budget collector myself, this is something I'm looking forward to.

You can get some very nice George Perez and Gene Colan pages for only a few hundred dollars.

Not sure I have anything he'd be interested in, unless he was doing a Colan Daredevil book (which would be awesome!). I was mostly curious about how much effort goes into finding the OA, or if books/artists are chosen on the precondition that Scott Dunbier already knows where most of the art is or can easily find it. It seems like for many artists, whose work has been sold for years and was once not terribly valuable, it would be hard to locate a majority of the pages of a run of issues. When I search CAF for pages from a particular issue, I often don't find much. Well, I for one would love any kind of Colan book, so you might wanna get on that. Here's an interesting article where Scott talks about putting together the New Gods book. http://herocomplex.latimes.com/books/idws-scott-dunbier-champions-comics-artistry-with-heroic-precision/#/0 I guess if you develop relationships with the right people, whether it is artists who kept their original art (like Simonson) or dealers/collectors who have spent years tracking down work by a particular artists (like Mike Burkey and early Spider-Man), anything is possible. There's probably a lot of classic comic art that's sitting in someone's basement, basically lost. But with prices in the five or even six figures, the stuff that is out there has probably filtered down to a relatively small number of people.

They used to, but last year they started a line called "Artifact Editions," which include whatever pages they could get their hands on from a particular run instead of complete issues. The Watchmen and the upcoming John Romita Spider-Man twice-up and Frank Miller Daredevil books are all Artifact Editions.

I've never had a request turned down, but there are some artists who won't do certain things, such as personal likenesses. I'd imagine that if someone isn't interested in doing a piece, they'd just say so. If you're not hearing back, it's probably because they're busy or forgot to respond. I definitely agree that you should do some research before contacting an artist. Most artists are good people, but there are a few bad actors out there. I always go into cons with a plan. Actually, once I decide what artists I want to get pieces from, I contact them ahead of time. At a minimum, it pays to know what their rates are before the show. But if they're taking a pre-order lists, you can get some very nice, detailed commissions.

Coollines has pages from Thunderbolts 12 by Mark Bagley with dialogue on the art. http://www.coollinesartwork.com/featured.asp?Piece=297522 Yet none of Mike Burkey's Bagley Thunderbolts pages have dialogue, including several from the very same issue. http://www.romitaman.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=15441&ArtistId=970