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Please grade this batman 3.

Started by ronm3-migration,

8 posts in this topic

KingOfRulers

KingOfRulers

Posted
Posted

I really need to change that. We still send in books, but we sold most of the several thousand 9.8's and up books we had just recently. I work for a store and I do all of the prep work to help the books get as high a grade as possible. They are not personally my books; they are my boss' books I guess. But yeah, we send in a whole lot of books every week. Depending on how big the week was, but usually it's around 100 per week.

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KingOfRulers

KingOfRulers

Posted
Posted

This is from a discussion I had in the CPG boards, so instead of writing a new one all over again I'll just copy and paste it here:

 

The most common problem I see with Ultimate books: as I was saying the first thing you have to hope came out good was the printing of the book. Ultimate books often when cut by the giant cutters will end up having a broken corner. Meaning the corner will actually not be connected to the book at the front cover (could be back cover also) but will be connected starting at the apex or spine of the book. This happens because the blades that cut the books may need to be sharpened OR the books are too thick for the blade to cut perfectly. A way to fight this problem is by putting a little bit of spit on your finger and touching the frayed or hanging corner. Get it moist and put the corner back into place. It will usually stick where you put it without problem. That is just the spine corner I mind you. Many times the other corners will not be cut and squared very well; if that happens then you're screwed. A second problem that comes from the printing press are printer creases. These are very faint creases that usually span the entire length or width of the book. Just do your best not to get these. They usually don't matter, but when you hit 9.8 they do matter. A third problem that you will get on Ultimate books is dust and finger prints. When preping a book you want to wear rubber gloves and use a clean paper towel!!! Unlike regular books, Ultimate books become statically charged very easily. So, when you take the paper towel and clean the book you want to get it straight into a bag and board because it has become statically charged. Don't put it on a table, or on the towel again or anywhere! Straight into a bag and board. If you don't do this the cover will attarct tiny hair and dust particles. Not good for a 9.8-10.0 book. And you of course wear rubber gloves to stop finger prints. It is very important when concerning an Ultimate book because the covers are shiny; not a big deal when talking regular books.

 

Also, when talking about Ultimate books you have to worry about how well Diamond shipped them. This is of course in addition to having to worry about how well the book made it off the printing line. Diamond ships books stacked on top of each other in a regular cardboard box; not a comic box and not in line front to back. This is where the spine stresses are often made. It is possible to decrease the severity of a creases by actually PULLING THE BOOK. Tug on each side of the spine and try to pull the crease out. Then what also helps is to press the book; that will often get creases out too. Put it in a long box for of books for a few days, and that'll help a lot.

 

Now for the regular books (non-Ultimate): They also get problems that stem from the printing press. They will get the printer creases that spans the entire length or width of the book as well. Regular books do get problems that Ultimate books do not though. This problem is printer residue. If you look at the back of my scan you can see a blue-ish tint on the back of the cover. This is VERY common. Do your best with a paper towel and try and wipe it off. It does work, trust me. It takes off enough so that after having cleaned 300 books the paper towel has a dark blue spot on it 27_laughing.gif. Secondly, the corners. The corners on non-Ulimate books are cake to fix. They don't usually break like Ultimate book corners. These corners just get rounded. So, take your spit-riddled finger and square it off simply by trying to sharpen it. Push from the top of the book to the left, and from the spine of the book upwards. A third problem is the spine. I'm not talking creases, but cracking. When the covers are folding the ink will dry and crack. Make it look prettier by taking the wet finger and running it down the cracked part of the spine. Then push from the BACK of the cover to the FRONT. Not the opposite. The threds of the books will stick up if you push front to back. They will lay down like they are supposed to if you push from back to front!

 

Then you've got the Diamond shipping. Same thing as Ultimate books. Diamond is the one that will make sure you have your traditional spine creases.

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