Complete Restoration Experiments

[Hero Restoration]

Oh, and PS, good job on the Adventure Comics #61. You still have a lot to learn to iron out some of the kinks (as you pointed out), but the job you did is within shouting distance of similar jobs I've seen from other, known professionals in the field over the past decade. Your foundation of knowledge and proper conservation/restoration techniques is miles ahead of where it was when we met you, and that is great.

 

Thanks Scott,I will take that as a win. Shouting distance isn’t to bad depending on which professionals you are comparing it to.

 

 

Your work is inspiring, Mike. Thank you for sharing it here.

 

Thanks Ron, I am glad I inspire you. I really enjoy taking a poor (term not grade) condition book and making it look better again and increase it’s longevity.

[Hero Restoration]

Wow. Great job on the Adventure.

 

I love this thread

 

Thanks and I am glad you like the thread.

[chrisco37]

Outstanding work on the Adventure book. It looks fantastic.

 

Keep them coming. Definitely one of the best threads on the forums.

[Hero Restoration]

Outstanding work on the Adventure book. It looks fantastic.

 

Keep them coming. Definitely one of the best threads on the forums.

 

One of the best threads ? Wow, that is a terrific compliment and a nice reward for the effort I put out trying to provide as much detail in my postings as I do.

[Hero Restoration]

I have a question for everyone about covers coming out lighter after wash and color touch. I would like everyone's honest opinion if they think the interior on this 1952 Phantom Stranger cover came out to white or not.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[FFB]

Did you bleach it? If not, then you're probably fine. It's hard to tell from a scan/picture whether the paper looks too white in hand.

 

I have a question for everyone about covers coming out lighter after wash and color touch. I would like everyone's honest opinion if they think the interior on this 1952 Phantom Stranger cover came out to white or not.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[FFB]

Oh, and PS, good job on the Adventure Comics #61. You still have a lot to learn to iron out some of the kinks (as you pointed out), but the job you did is within shouting distance of similar jobs I've seen from other, known professionals in the field over the past decade. Your foundation of knowledge and proper conservation/restoration techniques is miles ahead of where it was when we met you, and that is great.

 

Thanks Scott,I will take that as a win. Shouting distance isn’t to bad depending on which professionals you are comparing it to.

 

I'm talking about the good ones. I know you're not 100% happy with how the book came out and that you see room for improvement, but let's get real for a second. That book was no easy task - you not only had to restore a beat up book, but you had to replace a lot of crappy, amateur restoration, and still wind up with a good looking end result - which you absolutely did. Give that assignment to any of the top professionals in the business right now and they'd tell you that book is no cakewalk. It was a really challenging book and you did a very nice job with it.

 

Look at some of the pictures that the pros have on their website from when they've had to get rid of extensive amateur restoration and then still make the book look good. Some of the end results look better than what you got out of the Adventure 61, but then again, some of them aren't as good. Does your finished work look as good as Kenny's right now? No, but it doesn't exactly suck either.

 

You are going to get better with additional practice, but that Adventure 61 is a very solid bit of work in its own right. I am blown away when I see this book and look back to the work you were doing when you first started posting here. You have no formal training in restoration, no trained conservator as a mentor that I am aware of, and you have essentially cobbled together your own restoration studio and learned what you know by doing as much reading as you can, asking a lot of questions, and then through trial and error. I think this shows that you simply have the sheer determination to get better through hard work and practice, and that you love and are fascinated by what you're doing. I'm digging it.

[Baz]

Am new to those boards but when I saw this thread, it killed my entire morning of productivity (and in a good way!).

 

Wanted to drop a note that I think did excellent work on some of those and I completely understand what you mean when it's hard to "stop" sometimes - I run into that problem when I have to restore/clean up digital photos.

 

Just amazing to see the before/afters and I look forward to reading more!

 

I should send you a snapshot of one (or maybe two) of my older dell 4c books for your opinion.

 

 

[That Ron Dude]

Simply looking at the available scans, I can notice no lightening of the ink areas.

[Comicdey]

great job on the adventure....you've come a long way

[Hero Restoration]

Time Capsule Recap

 

 

The time in between books is getting larger and work getting more complicated so it has been a while since my last post here. I am working on an exciting project right now involving replacing a missing coupon using leaf cast technology and an ink transfer system I have been developing. It will be ready soon but in the meantime I thought it would be nice to see how far I have come thus far.

 

This thread has grown to 28 pages and with all the comments it can be hard for new readers or even recent readers to see how I have progress since December of 2009 when this thread began. Sometimes I would like to ignore my early works but it is sometimes fun and educational to look back to projects I thought were great at the time and shake my head in dismay when I look at them now.

What you are about to see is a consolidation of my progress over the last 18 months. I will show you the bulk of the works I have show in this thread in an attempt to show you how my work has progressed and how I have learned from my mistakes.

 

 

Book 1 12/17/09

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I look back at this book and to be honest, I was proud of the color touch back then and I still am. Unfortunately that is the only thing I am proud of with this book. Structurally it is a mess, the spine looks terrible and that top over hang is just awful.

 

Book #4 1/24/10

 

 

 

Considering it was one of my first tape removals it wasn’t bad biut it could have been so much better. Small tearing, color loss and remaining tape stains are all things I would like to think I could have avoided if I did that book now.

 

 

Book 9 Avengers GGR #4 Ratachewy 3/7/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see the cover and all the pages were missing the whole corner. Even after replacing all the paper and color touch the book still looked like . It was after this post Scott (EffEffbee) made a comment that really lit a fire under me and would change things drastically for the better.

“I recommend that for areas of loss, you do some Google searches on leaf casting paper, build a leaf casting table, and start experimenting. It's great for you to learn the manual way of filling areas of loss, but if you're going to restore books with huge chunks missing, you're never going to get the manual piece fill to look natural.”

 

 

 

Book #10 Fantastic four #18 Color touch overload. 4/4/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was my 3rd attempt at leaf casting. While the leaf casting went well my color touch and art recreation did not. I learned many things not to do from this book based on some of the responses I got. The complete miss match of color and use of overlays was bad judgment and when I look back at this book I have to just laugh. It is from that point I made a conscious effort to match colors as close as possible and to avoid overlays at all cost.

 

 

Press job 6/3/10

 

 

 

 

 

Not bad back in 6/10 when I was just getting the whole pressing thing figured out.

 

 

 

8/5/10

 

 

 

Before

 

 

After

 

 

 

Before

 

 

 

 

 

After

 

 

 

While I was very proud of the leaf cast work on this book the color touch and problems with the top right corner have haunted me to this day. I have since decided to be relentless with getting the color touch to match close enough that the after color is very close to the before. I want to go back and redo this book but I just have been too busy with current projects.

 

 

Book #14 9/10/10

 

 

 

BEFORE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AFTER

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BEFORE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AFTER

 

 

 

Getting better at tape removal on this one. I managed not to do any damage in removing the tape and didn’t do any color touch or structural repairs.

 

Book #15 10/24/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Although I made progress working on this book over previous ones there are still so many things I am not happy with here.

 

 

 

 

Book #16 11/20/10

 

 

 

 

 

Not a bad job here but not the most complicated either. I can’t wait till I show you the book I am currently working on because it puts this missing bar code replacement to shame.

 

 

12/16/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who says square bound books can’t be pressed?

 

Book 19 My first crack,press and resub. 1/13/11

 

 

 

I will have some more of these to show soon but I haven’t decided where I want to post them yet, in a separate thread or maybe here.

 

 

Book 20 The Golden Age 1/26/11

 

 

 

I am nearly 100% satisfied with how this book came out.

 

 

Book 22 3/22/11

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one didn’t come out too bad either, the off white on back cover is one of my best color matches.

 

 

 

Book 23 Nowhere to go but up ! 4/11/11

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now before I show you the back I wanted to show you this:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

See how in the top image there is some grey spots? This is my scaner acting weird becuase it does not look like this in hand even under a magnifier. The bottom half is what it really looks like so keep that in mind when you look at the next comparison.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here you will see what I think was foxing almost completely removed from the pages:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And now in the interest of full exposure Here are the full size scans which I feel shows more than it does in hand:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

would like to recap with what I am happy with and what I am not happy with.

 

 

 

What I like: The cover is what I would consider the right height now. Nearly all the color touch went as I hoped. I was really worried about the FRBC and the FTLC but I think they came out good. I also think the spine is my best work to date. The round part is nearly smooth and consistent without the art or black line looking distorted. I think the staples came out really good and clean and look just right to me. I also was glad I was able to recreate the top edge of the DC logo; such a small curved line concerned me. I am glad I was able to remove as much of the dust shadow as I did and the owner wanted to forgo color touching the white to keep it from being to heavy on color touch so I left as it is.

 

 

 

What I don’t like: On the back cover I ended up with what look like a few printers creases. This is due to the cover expanding and contracting during the leaf cast process. I am working on this problem and hope to have it worked out soon. I am also not completely satisfied with the repair on the first page. It’s not bad but I could have been better. That’s about it except some little imperfections, I really could pick the work apart but I know it will get better because I am never satisfied and also looking for ways to improve my work.

 

I hope you enjoyed my recap and stay tuned for more exciting adventures from Hero Restoration.

 

[FFB]

Are you still doing color touch by hand?

[trmoore54]

Mike

My involvement here on the boards is rather sporadic in terms of the categories and threads I seek/visit...just caught up with this one today and I have to say I am blown away! My hat is off to you in your diligence and pursuit and readily apparent passion for the craft.

 

Just wanted lo let you know and I am very supportive of well-conceived and well-intentioned restoration and conservation. And I agree with what has been expressed by others...this is DEFINITELY one of the best threads on the boards...seriously, appreciate the thorough and thoughtful presentation as well as commentary.

 

MAJOR KUDOS!

 

Tom

[Hero Restoration]

Are you still doing color touch by hand?

 

I assume by hand you mean with a brush? I have been using both a brush and an air brush depending on what I am trying to paint. Still having some trouble with both but each book I do gets me closer to the way I want it to look.

[Hero Restoration]

Mike

My involvement here on the boards is rather sporadic in terms of the categories and threads I seek/visit...just caught up with this one today and I have to say I am blown away! My hat is off to you in your diligence and pursuit and readily apparent passion for the craft.

 

Just wanted lo let you know and I am very supportive of well-conceived and well-intentioned restoration and conservation. And I agree with what has been expressed by others...this is DEFINITELY one of the best threads on the boards...seriously, appreciate the thorough and thoughtful presentation as well as commentary.

 

MAJOR KUDOS!

 

Tom

 

Thanks Tom, your support is greatly appreciated !

[JazzMan]

Very cool recap, Mike. There's two things that stand out to me:

• You have a mission (and it seems you are on your way to achieve that) and
  
• You are never satisfied with your work and continue to do better.

 

There's nothing worse than complacency. Keep up the good work!

[FFB]

Are you still doing color touch by hand?

 

I assume by hand you mean with a brush? I have been using both a brush and an air brush depending on what I am trying to paint. Still having some trouble with both but each book I do gets me closer to the way I want it to look.

 

Yes, that's what I was getting at. Thanks for the answer. You might take an airbrush class at a local community college for some training. A little formal training would probably go a long way toward improving your airbrush skills.

[Hero Restoration]

Are you still doing color touch by hand?

 

I assume by hand you mean with a brush? I have been using both a brush and an air brush depending on what I am trying to paint. Still having some trouble with both but each book I do gets me closer to the way I want it to look.

 

Yes, that's what I was getting at. Thanks for the answer. You might take an airbrush class at a local community college for some training. A little formal training would probably go a long way toward improving your airbrush skills.

 

I completely agree Scott; training couldn't hurt in all areas that I am exploring.

 

Sorry I didn't get back to you right away, I had to look up the classes available and work on my finals for this week and next.

 

I am finding Air brushing one of the tougher things to learn on my own. I mean, I can spray but the perfection of it is difficult to master. Unfortunately, the junior college I am attending does not offer it and the next closest 2 junior colleges which is 1hr and a half away doesn't offer it either or at least as near as I can tell from class schedules. I would have to make some calls but I am not sure if I can attend 2 junior colleges at the same time.

 

I have also been doing some digging into conservation opportunities as far as volunteering or internships in my state but not getting anywhere with that either and without a foundation in conservation related college education I am not likely to find any . Comic book restoration doesn’t seem to go over to well in the conservation community so I will be hard pressed finding anyone willing to give me a break but I will keep at it. Online material is helpful but not absolute in its guidance. For example I have read that there is about 10 different ways to neutralize acid in pages so which one would be best for the pages is going to take me a while to figure out. Yes, I could just blow the money and use the spray but I figure if I am going to wash the paper anyways It would be more cost effective to incorporate it in the wash.

 

I want to take organic chemistry but it is not on my degree requirements list and financial aid has a cap on credits. It’s ironic, it seems as though most of the possible opportunities might open up for me in several years and by that time I might have advanced enough on my own that it won’t matter much. Toughest thing for me right now is some of the areas I want to improve on rely on my knowing exactly what covers and pages are made of and I can’t find that info out and those who know aren’t sharing. I know the sizing content of both covers of all era’s and pages but that is about it. What I would really like to know the most is if pages have lignin in them.

 

Experimenting can get expensive as I have to buy expensive chemicals and experiment and if they don’t pan out that is some big money down the drain as laboratory grade chemicals are not cheap.

 

Wow, I guess I needed to get that off my chest, maybe someone with some knowledge I need will read this and take pity on me.

 

[FFB]

Maybe buy an "Airbrushing for Dummies" book and/or try to find YouTube instructional videos online to flesh out what you read?

[DeadOne]

Very cool recap, Mike. There's two things that stand out to me:

• You have a mission (and it seems you are on your way to achieve that) and
  
• You are never satisfied with your work and continue to do better.

 

There's nothing worse than complacency. Keep up the good work!

 

Well said.

I enjoy looking at your threads Mike and couldn't agree more... keep up the good work.