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Impact of Gerber's Photo Guide on GA collecting?

Started by piper,

51 posts in this topic

piper

piper

Posted
Posted

I just received my copy of the Gerber photo guide in the mail. Very cool! :cool:

 

Did it give the GA market the spark it needed to reach its current lofty heights? Did it change your collecting goals?

 

 

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Primetime

Primetime

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We all know that these Photo journals brought to life many books that were otherwise unknown by covers (ie. Suspense 3)...many collectors sought out books due to the comic cover exposures that were either forgotten or not well documented...These photo journals have helped me the past 14 years (thumbs u

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G.A.tor

G.A.tor

Posted
Posted
Many of the books you see are pedigrees too!

most of the timely's are verzyl's mile highs... lots of berk's centaurs (many many peds)...

the gerbers were and still are, Wonderful

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adamstrange

adamstrange

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Gerber's book is #2 behind Overstreet's Price Guide in terms of its influence on the hobby.

 

Oh, and it's the finest book produced about any collectibles market.

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buttock

buttock

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The Gerbers were a HUGE influence on the market. Their importance can't be underestimated. For a dozen years after books were easily marketed as a "Gerber 7/8/9" or a "No-show" which enhanced their salability.

 

My one gripe is that they shifted the market unbalanced toward collecting for the cover and not the whole book.

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piper

piper

Posted
  • Author
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Many of the books you see are pedigrees too!

 

I'd be interested in hearing more about which pedigrees show up in gerber's guide.

 

Was his inclusion of a scarcity index something new to the hobby?

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BLBcomics-migration

BLBcomics-migration

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The Gerber Guide will stand the test of time as the single most important influence on the rarified old comicbook market when not discussing prices - that honor goes to OPG annual for 38 years running now

 

As far as the covers project goes - and data on creators contained in many many books

 

regarding the text he placed in there, i would not trust hardly any of it, especially his Scarcity Ratio Index in many many cases.

 

I know for a personal fact that 100% of the info he presents in his book on the Tom Reilly collection is wrong. No, i take that back. He got one thing correct.he got Tom Reilly's name correct. He never talked to ANY of us involved and i asked every one involved when the books finally came out in the late 1980s. He simply made it up.

 

fer instance, he calls Amazing Spiderman a (4) SRI which translates into some 2500 copies in existence. Heck, i have been dealing thru the mails since 1966 age 13 when AmSpi 1 was a relatively new book and have sold like a thousand copies myself, especially back in the earlier days in the 60s 70s 80s before the warehouse of the comics company i ran containing a million comic books was destroyed in flood waters, making me a much smaller dealer person these days

 

- i humbly submit there are probably that 2500 copies is just the LA area alone, that there are probably 20,000 copies out there, at least - buried in collections

 

- the price comes from demand, not scarcity on any level

 

that 20,000 figure i think there is out there is based on thinking 10% of the 250,000 print run still exists - Spiderman turned "hot" for every one i knew by issue 3 or 4, when Doc Ock and Sandman came on the set

 

i wrote an analysis up in some CBM Gary Carter published a decade ago regarding Gerber's SRI -

 

Gerber examine some 260 collections in the 1980s

 

He hit me up early, he lived in Reno and would come down to the Bay Area on a regular basis - and he took pics all the time in my store. So did Gene Henderson at each summer's San Diego Comicon. In the years leading up to the flooding of Best of Two World;s warehouse in Feb 1986, there was always a wealth of old comic books in my Telegraph Ave Berkeley store.

 

In the credits in Vol Two Gerber weighted the listings in his two volume set by how many pics he used out of your stuff. My name appears about three inches down from the top of the first column.

That is what Ernie told me anyway during one of his many visits into my stores.

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G.A.tor

G.A.tor

Posted
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what ever happened to the proposed DC silver age vol 5? ... my understanding was that about 90% of the books had been photo'd by the late 90's, but I guess it never saw the light of day?

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jbcomicbox

jbcomicbox

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what ever happened to the proposed DC silver age vol 5? ... my understanding was that about 90% of the books had been photo'd by the late 90's, but I guess it never saw the light of day?

 

Money (and I think DC co-operaton)

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jbcomicbox

jbcomicbox

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Although the greatest contribution to the hobby, Ernie lost big time money on this life-long project. All the color separations were individually done as to each book (On the Marvel PhotoJournals they were done by the page or half page- that is why the quality of some of the productions are not as good)

 

Ernie had to buy many of the Church books he photographed and then re-sold them.

 

The PJs allowed one for the first time to "windowshop" for books and find "neat" covers and add them to lists. It opened up a four color world of wonderfor thousands and thousands of collectors. Even as a non-comicbook person the Guides as just a tremendous accomplishment. (People can nit-pick his scarcity index, but just stay on the the "big picture"- Twenty two thousand GA and and Dark Age books in two volumes)

 

I met Ernie through his need for (surprise, surprise) Centaur and pre-Centaurs. (I made it in the opening paragraphs of acknowledgments. (Also my Marvel collection served as 95%+ of the Marvel PhotoJournals. You want to know what a mess is? Rebagging many thousands of books after Ernie and Paul- who were at my house for two solid weeks- finished photographing them. The inclusion of the Marvel Mags (Ernie was VERY specific- NO BREASTS)- and the foreign Marvel Comics was my brain child)

 

Oh, don't forget his other great gift to the hobby- the process to heat seal mylar for use as comic book sleeves.....

 

 

Next years is twenty years.

 

Ernie Gerber I salute you!!

 

Jon

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lou_fine

lou_fine

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The PJs allowed one for the first time to "windowshop" for books and find "neat" covers and add them to lists. It opened up a four color world of wonderfor thousands and thousands of collectors.

 

Oh, don't forget his other great gift to the hobby- the process to heat seal mylar for use as comic book sleeves.....

 

Yes, by far the most significant one-time publication in the comics collecting field which will continue to stand the test of time! (thumbs u

 

And for the true collectors, need we say anything about the impact of the mylar sleeves on comic book preservation!! (thumbs u (thumbs u

 

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