Rick2you2

Honestly, I didn’t think 2019 was bad, but I didn’t go upstairs for more than half an hour to an hour. There was nothing on the main floor which interested me. When I went to earlier ones (although I missed a few due to ticket unavailability), they also seemed to have more energy. That was missing for me this time.

I agree on the guest list. And, too much merchandising in Artist’s Alley, I thought. Where were DC, Marvel, Dark Horse or Eclipse this year?

Absolutely correct. Since it never concludes, it can have no flaws.

Conventional opinion is what flows from conventional wisdom.

The person labeled as a whistleblower furnished reams of data to the Wall Street Journal from her two years time there while working on issues which I will loosely call “personal negative corrective procedural development”—namely, fixing stuff. What I found particularly interesting was that while Facebook spends money on hiring people, it apparently does not implement procedures which would reduce its status as a forum that is attractive to advertisers. Basically, even bigots buy cars. Zuckerberg has now responded stating that controversies on this subject drive away advertisers. Maybe some advertisers, but like I said, even bigots buy cars. “Hate speech” is whatever you want it to be, but it is generally the antithesis of conventional opinion, and usually is just perjorative.

I had liked that piece when he first had shown it on Facebook. He’s another one of those underappreciated artists of which the hobby has too many.

Brides aren’t always worth what you end up paying for them.

…where it should set a record. 😂

To me, price increases are a very mixed bag. The higher things go, the less likely I can afford more of them.

Your collection is your own; your personal opinion is what matters. I have passed on pages with what I consider flaws, and bought pages because the “flaws” don’t bother me. The whole subject only matters if you think you might want to sell it later, in which case, pay attention to the artist and the title’s popularity. A crummy Kirby page on a popular book will always pay off eventually. “

It must. That would probably be the cost, more or less, of a plastic bag to dealers who sell pages during conventions.

Interesting you should say that roughly 1/3 would have resulted in a loss. Just wondering if there were any patterns you noticed.

The other one is much better. I would consider $500 a little low, but not by much.

I actually like it a lot. The pose is unusual, and it shows his brooding character. I would have been very happy with it. Someone got a good piece at a low price. I recently got a commission which was not what I expected, either, but it was a skillful job and very much complimented (at least on Facebook). Yes, I will definitely be keeping mine. That’s the think about artists. Sometimes they insist on using their artistic skills, even if we weren’t expecting the result. You can reduce the risk of something radically different by asking for a preliminary before he does a final.

They almost never turn out well, financially, from what I’ve heard, and they certainly won’t turn out well for me because of my niche interest. But they are almost always worth it because of the connection it makes to the artist. One thing I do recommend is to not ask the artist for a simple figure. Give him an idea to frame a single image around, even something simple, like eating a slice of pizza. Let his imagination show off his artistry instead of just his drawing skills. He’ll enjoy it more, too.

I wasn't directing my comment to your programming, just the danger of relying on word searches. That's why I check everything (pretty easy in my case). There are, of course, "fuzzy logic" searches, but that's probably not worth the effort and is lilkely to throw off too many "false positives". It's a shame there is no way to write a program which screens out garbage.

The unfortunate problem with keyword searches is that they assume the keyword was “key” to the person writing the description, he/she, could type, and also knew how to spell. I once picked up a nice bit of art which others may have missed where the entry clerk had mistakenly entered a character’s name as “Phantom Strangler” (which actually sounds like a great potential character). Since I sometimes search for the Phantom, I got lucky. Looking for something which is activity-based, like Alex’s collection of arm-wrestling characters (although he gets commissions) is a similar problem. Or, just group shots without identifying individuals.

Looks like another “Beyond Beef” weekend.

It was ComicLink's booth, I asked, but it was the stuff the guy owned (or controlled) who was sitting there, not for auction.

Suitable for any Morlock. For the money, good deal.

I was a little surprised tonight when a page from Phantom Stranger issue 4 just sold for $3,360 including BP. Neal Adams’ pencils and Bill Draut’s inks on a page containing the very first appearance of Tala with a good half splash. While she isn’t exactly in Kingpin’s class, she has shown up in a number of supernatural books and in animation. Definitely more street cred than, say, the Polka-dot Man. Someone has also been trying to sell the very next page for years for $5,000. Someone got a good buy (not me, I have other fish to fry).

I guess it came in a bit shy of the record.

And, you still have to pay $9.95 for shipping in the US.

Can I block “half-naked Velma”, listed for $220 who, after she doesn’t sell in week 1 on eBay gets relisted on weeks 2-infinity? Is that even doable from a technical perspective? As it is, I am tired of seeing the first Martian story going for $3,000,000 discounted to $600,000 (it looks like it was done by a first grader). First few times, funny, now, annoying.

I think that’s putting it mildly. A lot of what shows up includes unsold stuff from eBay that gets listed over and over, while more and more people keep posting things like their sketch of a bare-bottom Velma as art—and then redraw the image and call it WW. Is there any way to permanently block individual images from showing up in repeated “new” listings? I’m not even counting the sketch books; the umpteenth listing of Dean Yeagle’s sketches of a young girl in various naked poses doesn’t annoy me, even if I don’t want it. God knows about the unsticky or sticky condition of its interior pages.