My third article for Gemr.com is up. This one looks at five characters/ franchises that deserve the have their own Pop Vinyl or Hard Candy figures from Funko. Hope you enjoy. š
Tag: Collection
Mighty Max Article Follow Up
As I mentioned in my previous post, I recently had published my first article for collector’s website Gemr.com, The History of Mighty Max.Ā As a kind of follow-up to that article, I thought I’d write up a small article here about why I love Max so much and why it’s one of the toys that made me.
The 10 Best Graphic Novels NOT in the 100 Greatest List
Recently I picked up the magazine The 100 Greatest Graphic Novels of All Time!Ā magazineĀ from Future Publishing. I thought it’d be interesting to go through the magazine and see which ones I’d read and which onesĀ I needed to. The magazine was very well written with some really thoughtful commentary on the books presented within resulting in my “to read” list gaining quite a few additions.
While the magazine covered many great graphic novels – and indeed you’d need a slew of magazines to cover all the graphic novels that you should read in a lifetime – there were of course a few of my personal favourites left off. Thus, I thought I’d write up my own list.
Continue reading “The 10 Best Graphic Novels NOT in the 100 Greatest List”
The Issue With Variants
Variant covers for comic book issues have been a staple of the industry for some time now. The first comic book to have a variant cover was 1986’sĀ The Man of Steel #1.Ā While there wereĀ technicallyĀ variants before this, they were all due to small differences such as distributor logo.Ā Man of Steel #1Ā was the first to receive variant artwork, which is what variants are mostly known for nowadays.
Variants played something of a not unsubstantial role in the “spectator boom” of comics in the 1990’s. There are a lot of pieces to the spectator boom puzzle which I won’t go into here, but if you’re interested you can read this great article by Michael McCallum on ComicBooked.com.
To give a brief history of the boom, people suddenly got the idea that buying a comic and holding on to it for 10, 20, or 50 years would eventually put their kids through university or pay off their house. Big firms such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York TimesĀ wrote articles about the possible future value of these once unpalatable items and so people started buying comics by the armful.
Boxes Of Hording
If you play and/or collect any kind of collectible card game (CCG) chances are storage is an issue. After you start building up your collection into the thousands figuring out where to put them all will be one of your biggest concerns.
Iāve been playing Magic: The Gathering for around four years now and Iāve amassed a collection of 12,500+ cards. Throughout this time Iāve tried many different methods of storing them and while some worked, others didnāt. In this article Iāll go through what some of those were and how I found them.
Moving From Single Issue Comics To Collected Editions
Recently I had let go of my first love; comic books. I had been reading comics pretty much continuously for 24 years, most of that with a monthly standing order at my local comic store. Comics were my favourite hobby, my addiction. When something is that big a part of your life for that long a time it is very hard to let go. However, I was not prepared to give up on the comic book medium completely. No, siree! If monthly comics were no longer practical, then I was going to do the next best thing; I was going to move to collected editions!
However, it was not just a quick switch. I had to prepare! Remember, this was a 24 year habit I was moving away from. Certain āiās had to be crossed and ātās needed to be dotted. Hereās what I did to ready myself for the big change.
Continue reading “Moving From Single Issue Comics To Collected Editions”
Why I Stopped Collecting Retro Games
Something I used to collect pretty passionately was retro video games.
My focus was on Sega, particularly the Mega Drive (or āGenesisā to any Americans) and their last console, the Dreamcast. I also had a few Master System games that I could play via the Master Converter and tried the Saturn out for a little while but never really go on with it.
Anyway, at the height of my retro collecting I had six consoles (multiples of some) and around 150 games. It was a lot of fun playing the older games and the magazine Retro Gamer fulled my desire to get more.
Three Awesome Websites For Collectors
If you do a bit of Googleing youāll find there are heaps sites out there for collectors. However, it can be hard to distinguish the good for the, well, not so good. To help out with this I thought Iād talk about three of my favourite collector websites.
ComicBookRealm.com
As much as I love the wonderful comic database software from Collectorz.com, one of the big things itās missing is an automated value/price guide system. This is where ComicBookRealm comes in.
My Three 2018 Collectorās Resolutions
Iām not really a New Yearās Resolution kind of guy, but with so much changing in the last two to three monthsāāābeing married, immigrating to the UK, moving into a new house, having to find a new jobāāāit felt like 2018 is a good time to take stock of things and re-evaluate. So I had a think and came up with the following collection resolutions.
Quality Over Quantity
I recently read Collection Control: 10 Tips to Tame Your Hoard from GeekDad here on Medium. One part of the article really stood out to me;
3. Quality can be better than quantity
Hobbies can be expensive, as you undoubtedly know. When I first started collecting action figures as a teen, I bought what I could afford, which wasnāt much. However, as an adult, I realized I had a ton of lower cost figures. Sticking to my budget, I could never afford the stuff I really wanted, but here I was stuck with a multitude of cheaper figures. It was a big collection, but it was pretty lackluster. Sure, I could have saved my money, but I was an impulsive teen and didnāt have the patience. However, I was able to turn my numerous low-level collectibles into a few key pieces that are highlights of my collection. Would I rather have a handful of loose figures, or that dream mint-on-card collectible? I may have downsized, but I also upgraded.
I canāt believe that this has never occurred to me before! It is, of course, a very simple and obvious idea and yet it hadnāt hit me. One of the biggest issues I had when moving is packing and unpacking all the collectables, and donāt even get me started on the amount of things I have back home in Australia!
Not getting as many ālittleā things would make moving somewhat easier. For example, for the (approximately) Ā£75 I spent on the set of five Doctor Strange Pop Vinyls I could have bought one high quality statue. While Pop Vinyls are cool and all, personally Iād prefer the statue. Thus, this is something Iām going to strive to do going forward; being more selective of what I spend my money on. Rather than buy a heap of cheap items Iāll endeavour to by better qualityāāāand possibly more limitedāāāitems.
ReFocus
Keeping with the theme of being more selective, Iām going to double down on something I talked about in my Starting a New Collection article; having a collection focus. I feel that the breadth of items Iāve been picking up over my various collections is a bit too wide so Iām going to take another look at this and pair the focus down to just those things Iām really interested in. For example, Iāve already decided Iām not going to pick up the new Sonic the Hedgehog Pop Vinyls as I donāt particularly like the new designs (apart from Eggman which I will probably get) and already have the originals. Thus, that money can be put into something I really want to have in my collection, such as all those Archie Sonic comic back issues I need.
Enjoy What I Have
This may sound obvious, but something I really need to start doing is enjoying what I already have before buying more stuff. Iāve a bad habit of buying new graphic novels, books and games before Iāve read/played the ones I already have.
Iāve 156 games in my Steam library. Of these Iāve played 76, of those 76 Iāve completed only 57 (the stats on the page are a little out as some games I had to play off line to have then run properly, such as Bayonetta).
Of the 91 books Iāve catalogued, Iāve only read 31 of them. Thatās 50 odd Iāve not yet picked up. I donāt even want to think about what the numbers are for graphic novels.
Going forward Iām going to try and finish at least 5 things before I buy any new ones. Yes, this may be hard given things such as Steam sales and the release of much anticipated books/ graphic novelsāāāand I might give myself a pass when I finally bring my X Box One over to the UK from Australia and pick a few of the games Iāve missed over the last two years that Iām really keen to playā but in general Iāll try and not add to the collection until Iāve gone through at least a good portion of it.
So thatās my collectorās resolutions for 2018. How many will I stick too? Well, to be honest it depends on what cool stuff is released this year. Honestly, I think the last one is going to be the hardest to do as I get way too excited by new books, comics and games but I shall try my best.
Perhaps later in the year Iāll look back at this post and evaluate how Iāve done. Until then, wish me luck.Ā š
To Keep the Box, Or Not to Keep the Box? That is the Question!
Itās common knowledge that many, if not all, collectables are worth more if they are kept in their original packaging. But if youāre not planning to sell your items, is there any reason to keep the box? Obviously this is something of an individual preference, but Iāve done both in my time and there are certainly pros and cons for each.
If an item comes in a box that would be functional once the item is taken out I tend to keep it. Most Magic: The Gathering products are good examples of this as the boxes they come in can be used to store cards. Similarly, if something like an action figure or statue has a box that can be opened without the need to destroy it (unlike blister packs) then Iāll generally keep it for later use. There are exceptions to this, of course, as I rarely keep boxes for Pop Vinyl figures.
Iāve always been of the opinion that action figures and toys look so much better outside their boxes, even when those boxes have display windows. The items feel more tangible somehow; you can pick them up and feel them, you can pose them how you like and you can see them from all angles. Gathered together on a shelf or display figures and statues look so much nicer than a heap of boxes. However, the boxes can be of great use even if youāve taken the items out. If you need to move your items to a new house or into storage those original boxes can act as a safe place to store them in transit so they wonāt be damaged. If your figure comes with an assortment of accessories you can put any youāre not currently using in your display back in the box for safe keeping. And if youāve limited space, you can put other items inside those boxes if you wish to switch up your display. If the item was expensive it might also be worth keeping the box, just in case.
Of course, keeping the box means having to store more stuff. This is where choosing what boxes to keep and what to throw away can be important. As I mentioned I donāt tend to keep boxes for Pop Vinyl figures as the Pop boxes arenāt particularly strong so they arenāt much good for storing or transporting figures. Also, the Pops themselves are pretty sturdy things so the chances of them being damaged are minimal. Thus, I feel there isnāt really need to keep the boxes for Pops and if I do need to store them a larger box will do.
Some boxes are just as beautiful as the items that were within them. This is particularly true for special releases or collectors editions. The box for the Mighty Max: Skull Krusher toy (seen at the top of this post,) is Is a perfect example of this. Just look at that beautiful artwork!
Keeping the boxes of your items or not greatly depends on what you feel is best for your collection and your own needs. If the collection is something that you might one day part with you may want to keep the boxes to ensure you get the most for each item (remember, though, the box needs to be in good condition too). If you think you might be moving your items anytime soon you may want to keep the boxes as well or, if youād rather have optimum space, you might prefer to throw them all out.
As I mentioned above, I like to keep my options open and base the decision on keeping an itemās box on the item itself and if I feel the box may be of use in the future. Either way, there is much more to a collectionās boxes than just making sure your items hold their value.
Do you keep your collectionsā boxes or throw them out? Iād love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
