Small Color Spot on Front Cover - Color Touch or Not? 1 1

[apocalypse76]

I bought a book recently which has a small spot on the front cover which can only faintly be seen on the front cover in the middle of the letter E in the word Tales. However, the spot can be seen clearly on the inside of the front cover and appears as a purple spot about half the size of a dime.

It is very curious to me because it appears to be a spot of color touch, but it doesn't appear to be "touching up" any kind of color breaking defect. There is absolutely no variation in that spot of texture or color that color touch usually has. Furthermore, that spot has a green letter E with a black border around it against a yellow background. The spot is purple which doesn't incorporate green, black or yellow. 

My personal opinion is that this is not color touch, but it is strange, so I wanted to turn to the board members to see if anyone has seen this in their experience and if they had a book with this defect graded before. Grading experiences like this or insightful thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Edited March 9, 2023 by apocalypse76

[theCapraAegagrus]

There's a dark spot here:

[apocalypse76]

Yes I am aware of the dark spot, that is why I took the close up of that spot. I am confused because I have never seen color touch that looks like this, and what would the person be trying to accomplish? There doesn't appear to be any color breaking defect present in that spot and there is no variation in texture or gloss in that area either. I was wondering if anyone has ever seen a printing defect like this before? It could be some kind of accident as well, but I just can't see this being restoration because nothing appears to have been restored in that area.

[silverseeker]

@apocalypse76, I found something similar with a JLA #8 that I purchased back in 2021...the spot on my book was not as dark as the one on yours, but the consensus was that it was a drop of ink from the printing process...

[apocalypse76]

@silverseeker, Thank you for the response. Your experience appears to be very similar to mine from the size of the stain to the color of it. I believe the same as you all do that it is a drop of ink during the production process. On your book and mine color touch just doesn't make sense. I can't recall ever seeing this before so it must be uncommon but evidently it is something that did occur. Out of curiosity, how did you handle that defect with your purchase? I am assuming you have not had that book graded but did you bring it to the seller's attention or just let it go?

 

 

 

 

[silverseeker]

On 3/10/2023 at 1:20 PM, apocalypse76 said:

@silverseeker, Thank you for the response. Your experience appears to be very similar to mine from the size of the stain to the color of it. I believe the same as you all do that it is a drop of ink during the production process. On your book and mine color touch just doesn't make sense. I can't recall ever seeing this before so it must be uncommon but evidently it is something that did occur. Out of curiosity, how did you handle that defect with your purchase? I am assuming you have not had that book graded but did you bring it to the seller's attention or just let it go?

 

 

 

 

Hi @apocalypse76, the book was actually graded 7.5 Universal by CGC (I cracked it out to read), so it was definitely not treated as color touch...hope this helps!

[apocalypse76]

That helps tremendously, thank you!

[Axe Elf]

The magenta spot on Silverseeker's book would be more consistent with a drop of printer's ink, because it is magenta, which is one of the three colors of ink used to print in color (yellow, cyan, magenta).  The spot on Apocalypse's book is purple, which means drops of cyan and magenta would both have to have hit the same exact spot, which isn't very likely.

More likely it accidentally came into light contact with the point of a purple felt-tip marker or something at some point.

[Hulksdaddy1]

Not color touch, since it's not trying to improve the appearance

[KCOComics]

I think CGC will consider it CT.

I had a similar situation 6 or 7 years ago.  It was a similar sized spot of green on a purple background of a prehero marvel book.  It certainly wasn't done to improve the appearance of the book. 

They will see the marker and bleed through and consider it CT.