Prescreen worth it? 1 1

[mephistopheles]

I have a batch of 25 books I want to submit, but I am really apprehensive after watching youtube video after video of questionable grades from cgc. I know we can't see the defects but with lack of grader's notes, it's seems like the graders are either grading very harshly, or picking numbers out of a hat. I don't want a bunch of potential 9.6-9.8 coming back 9.0-9.2 because the dude grading my books is having a bad day. Conversely I don't want to get a dozen raw books back. Is a 9.6 prescreen worth the risk?

[revat]

On 2/22/2023 at 8:36 AM, mephistopheles said:

I have a batch of 25 books I want to submit, but I am really apprehensive after watching youtube video after video of questionable grades from cgc. I know we can't see the defects but with lack of grader's notes, it's seems like the graders are either grading very harshly, or picking numbers out of a hat. I don't want a bunch of potential 9.6-9.8 coming back 9.0-9.2 because the dude grading my books is having a bad day. Conversely I don't want to get a dozen raw books back. Is a 9.6 prescreen worth the risk?

I don't really think anyone can answer this question for you, as the money, the risk averseness, the time, and a million other factors are just personal preferences.  I would say to some extent it might depend on your prior submission history and your own grading skills (relative to the final CGC grade).  

Another thing to consider is pressing.  Perhaps (no guarantees of course) paying for pressing would ensure the grades more to your satisfaction, however would also increase time and cost. 

But unless you tell us all your personal experience and criteria and skill and financial preferences and credit card numbers and social security number we can't really be of much help.  It's too personal.

good luck.

 

[joeypost]

Each book that fails is $8.00.

 

[KCOComics]

This is just my opinion. 

Most people who are disappointed in the grades they get don't really know the nuances of grading.  

It's not overly harsh to not give books a 9.8 when they have very minor defects.

If your objective is to get 9.6s and 9.8s you want to take every detail into consideration. Spine tics, dull corners, tiny creases, back cover details.  I would review each book myself and be very critical of even the most minor defects.   

[mephistopheles]

On 2/22/2023 at 7:11 PM, joeypost said:

Each book that fails is $8.00.

 

But if it's a potential 9.6-9.8 you could resubmit it and get the grade next time..

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 2/22/2023 at 11:36 AM, mephistopheles said:

I know we can't see the defects but with lack of grader's notes, it's seems like the graders are either grading very harshly, or picking numbers out of a hat. I don't want a bunch of potential 9.6-9.8 coming back 9.0-9.2 because the dude grading my books is having a bad day. Conversely I don't want to get a dozen raw books back. Is a 9.6 prescreen worth the risk?

Seriously...? Grading has always been subjective.

[mephistopheles]

On 2/22/2023 at 9:10 PM, KCOComics said:

This is just my opinion. 

Most people who are disappointed in the grades they get don't really know the nuances of grading.  

It's not overly harsh to not give books a 9.8 when they have very minor defects.

If your objective is to get 9.6s and 9.8s you want to take every detail into consideration. Spine tics, dull corners, tiny creases, back cover details.  I would review each book myself and be very critical of even the most minor defects.   

The people I watch on youtube are knowledgeable about grading and reasonable. It seems many are saying CGC has been grading harshly recently. Maybe it's all a coincidence, maybe the graders have more time to evaluate with the recession lowering submissions. The real problem is the lack of reliable graders notes. I posted this video in another thread where on the books he did get grader notes on, they copy pasted the exact same notes across 5 books of varying grades. 26 minute mark:

 

[KCOComics]

On 2/23/2023 at 8:06 AM, mephistopheles said:

The people I watch on youtube are knowledgeable about grading and reasonable. It seems many are saying CGC has been grading harshly recently. Maybe it's all a coincidence, maybe the graders have more time to evaluate with the recession lowering submissions. The real problem is the lack of reliable graders notes. I posted this video in another thread where on the books he did get grader notes on, they copy pasted the exact same notes across 5 books of varying grades. 26 minute mark:

 

I'll check out the video a little later. 

And I will admit, I'm not very in tune with YouTubers. So I won't speak to how good they are at grading. 

 

CGC does go through stricter and looser periods. I can tell you I sent in 25 books a few months ago. 18 were high grade, bronze age horror. I only wanted 9.0s or better. 1 came back an 8.5 (and I knew that one was iffy), the rest were right where I thought they would be. 

So I think it's about having realistic expectations.  I'm not a great grader. I do miss things and I'm so impressed with some of the people on these boards who are so good.  But there are ways to get better and give yourself the best possibility for a positive outcome. 

CGC has it's flaws. You don't have to look hard to see examples of poor grading or quality issues. But for the millions of books that they apply subjective grades to, I think the consistency is more remarkable than we give them credit for. 

Edited February 23, 2023 by KCOComics

[comicginger1789]

On 2/23/2023 at 8:06 AM, mephistopheles said:

The people I watch on youtube are knowledgeable about grading and reasonable. It seems many are saying CGC has been grading harshly recently. Maybe it's all a coincidence, maybe the graders have more time to evaluate with the recession lowering submissions. The real problem is the lack of reliable graders notes. I posted this video in another thread where on the books he did get grader notes on, they copy pasted the exact same notes across 5 books of varying grades. 26 minute mark:

 

Grading comes with experience. No disrespect to this guy, but is Instagram and Youtube accounts are only a couple years old. I am sorry, but it takes more than a couple years to get even somewhat decent at grading. You can be good sure but you will make mistakes. You can start off great, getting 9.6-9.8s, get complacent and then start overlooking things because YOU don't think it matters but to CGC they do. Hence why you see a lot of these 20-35 year old guys having very varied success.

You gotta follow guys who have been using CGC for a decade or more. You gotta follow guys who really highlight what to look for when grading. All of this is not to say that CGC is perfect. They will make mistakes. But what I would personally do is post some of these 25 books in question on the grading forums here. Get feedback from the guys who have been members since the early 2000s or even the early 2010s....from experience, when I post a book for feedback here, if 9 out of 12 say 8.0 and the rest say 9.0, well it usually comes back close if not exactly as majority predicted. Plus, people here are not attached to the books being posted so they will be as harsh (or harsher) than CGC in most cases. That would be my approach.

Or spend the $8 a book if they miss 9.6. Or just buy 9.6-9.8 books if you really want that grade.

[comicginger1789]

On 2/23/2023 at 9:48 AM, KCOComics said:

I'll check out the video a little later. 

And I will admit, I'm not very in tune with YouTubers. So I won't speak to how good they are at grading. 

 

CGC does go through stricter and looser periods. I can tell you I sent in 25 books a few months ago. 18 were high grade, bronze age horror. I only wanted 9.0s or better. 1 came back an 8.5 (and I knew that one was iffy), the rest were right where I thought they would be. 

So I think it's about having realistic expectations.  I'm not a great grader. I do miss things and I'm so impressed with some of the people on these boards who are so good.  But there are ways to get better and give yourself the best possibility for a positive outcome. 

CGC has it's flaws. You don't have to look hard to see examples of poor grading or quality issues. But for the millions of books that they apply subjective grades to, I think the consistency is more remarkable than we give them credit for. 

I'll speak to Youtubers...a lot of them are average graders at best. The two best that I follow are the Comic Doc (Canadian guy, been pressing and cleaning and grading comics since the 2000s) and Improve-Collecting Comics (very strict and sensible with his grading strategy, very rarely sees bad results when he unboxes because of how thorough he is prior to grading and sending off his books). Again, CGC will make errors and no, on most books 9.4 and 9.6 you won't get notes. The answer is usually the corners not being sharp, or staple stress or a spine tick or two, finger prints or a minute stain or tear somewhere on the book (interior included)

[mephistopheles]

On 2/23/2023 at 11:32 AM, comicginger1789 said:

I'll speak to Youtubers...a lot of them are average graders at best. The two best that I follow are the Comic Doc (Canadian guy, been pressing and cleaning and grading comics since the 2000s) and Improve-Collecting Comics (very strict and sensible with his grading strategy, very rarely sees bad results when he unboxes because of how thorough he is prior to grading and sending off his books). Again, CGC will make errors and no, on most books 9.4 and 9.6 you won't get notes. The answer is usually the corners not being sharp, or staple stress or a spine tick or two, finger prints or a minute stain or tear somewhere on the book (interior included)

Improve collecting is one of the youtubers I was talking about. Comic Doc has also been complaining.

 

[comicginger1789]

On 2/23/2023 at 10:39 AM, mephistopheles said:

Improve collecting is one of the youtubers I was talking about. Comic Doc has also been complaining.

 

Fair enough. And that happens. The difference between 9.6-9.8 sometimes, sadly, comes down to the grader. That’s the human aspect that has existed always with the company. A lot of 9.6 books can probably pass through different hands and get 9.8 and vice versa. It’s why I think the value difference between the two should not be as wild as it is but that’s a different conversation.

[mephistopheles]

On 2/23/2023 at 5:23 PM, comicginger1789 said:

Fair enough. And that happens. The difference between 9.6-9.8 sometimes, sadly, comes down to the grader. That’s the human aspect that has existed always with the company. A lot of 9.6 books can probably pass through different hands and get 9.8 and vice versa. It’s why I think the value difference between the two should not be as wild as it is but that’s a different conversation.

Yeah I agree the difference is negligible and some 9.6's are better than some 9.8's. The thing that scares me in the first video is the grader just copy-pasting the same notes across 5 books of varying grades. It shows a lack of integrity on the employee's part and having someone like that handle my books makes me very nervous.

[Axe Elf]

On 2/23/2023 at 4:20 PM, mephistopheles said:

The thing that scares me in the first video is the grader just copy-pasting the same notes across 5 books of varying grades.

It seems to me that the grader's notes are so general that they often do apply across five or more grades.

"minor cover wear" appears in the Heritage description from 5.0 through 7.0...

"slight staple tears" appear in the Heritage description from 7.0 to 9.0...

"finger bends to cover"... could conceivably be on an 8.0 or a 4.0.

So if you get the same generic description for a few different books it doesn't necessarily mean that they all look the same, or even that the grader was lazy and just copied and pasted the same notes to several books.  The books could be pretty different and still have the same generic defects.

[mephistopheles]

On 2/23/2023 at 9:45 PM, Axe Elf said:

It seems to me that the grader's notes are so general that they often do apply across five or more grades.

"minor cover wear" appears in the Heritage description from 5.0 through 7.0...

"slight staple tears" appear in the Heritage description from 7.0 to 9.0...

"finger bends to cover"... could conceivably be on an 8.0 or a 4.0.

So if you get the same generic description for a few different books it doesn't necessarily mean that they all look the same, or even that the grader was lazy and just copied and pasted the same notes to several books.  The books could be pretty different and still have the same generic defects.

In theory I guess it's possible, but the odds on the only 5 books with notes having all the same defects are astronomical.

[LowGradeBronze]

I would question the statement that CGC are grading harshly at the moment. It depends on the age of the book to some degree. Moderns should be graded more harshly it could be argued. But I've seen what I would call very loose grading on some recently graded BA books too.

[joeypost]

CGC has been harsh of late, but it’s not across the board. This would lend me to believe it’s one or two of the new graders. 

[comicginger1789]

On 2/27/2023 at 9:47 AM, joeypost said:

CGC has been harsh of late, but it’s not across the board. This would lend me to believe it’s one or two of the new graders. 

And this makes the most sense. I have found that those grading the books in the economy tier tend to be the more consistent. I am sure someone out there has an experience to disprove this, but overall I think the complaints for grading inconsistencies happen much more with the CGC designated "modern" books.

[comicginger1789]

Plus does CGC care if a grader is overly harsh and hits a book with a 9.4 or 9.6 grade that should get 9.8? Of course not....because it means there is someone out there, potentially, who will buy that book and crack and try to resubmit, thus generating more revenue. 

[mephistopheles]

On 2/27/2023 at 12:25 PM, comicginger1789 said:

Plus does CGC care if a grader is overly harsh and hits a book with a 9.4 or 9.6 grade that should get 9.8? Of course not....because it means there is someone out there, potentially, who will buy that book and crack and try to resubmit, thus generating more revenue. 

You could make the argument for sure.