Trevor

A focus of my lifelong collecting habit has been on unique items. My first real contributions to this forum, and likely the main reason I got into DVDs and film, were with promotional and exclusive discs.

In comics, I’ve always sought out promotional and limited editions and the like. Not at first, but eventually I decided it would be cool to have at least one item personally touched by my favorite creators.

Meeting them is nice, but not really in my wheelhouse. Not a fan of crowds, don’t trust myself to not buy everything in sight at cons, and never have the right words when talking to “famous people” or people I admire. Have great memories of meeting Matt Wagner and Neal Adams, but don’t think I stammered much out to them besides “thank you”.

So I’ve been rolling the dice on them being legitimate and buying a few signed items on ebay or the like over the years. I’m pretty confident of everything I’ve bought being legitimate, much of it official artists sketchbooks, or from reputable sellers like Stuart Ng. Never spent more than $35 or so per item, until the other day, but have some priceless-to-me items like books signed by Will Eisner and Joe Kubert.

More later, but does anyone else prize signatures?

davidh777

majorjoe23

I’m with David, I mostly only value them when I get them in person. an exception is Alan Moore, who doesn’t do cons, so my three signed items I’m very happy with. I also found a comic con program signed by Will Eisner in a dollar bin. It was about six months after he died and I snatched that right up.

Trevor, what was the item you spent more than $35 on?

Trevor

I used to be with you two, and never cared unless I was there for the signature. But I’ve come to accept the reality that I’m never going to meet these people, and there’s little in my collection I enjoy more than my copy of Contract with God that was signed by Eisner. Wish it had been a dollar of course!

Finding my old receipt, I actually paid ~$50 for my signed Moebius, Eisner, and Dave Stevens books.

The other more expensive item was just now. I’m working on some pics and will post it soon.

majorjoe23

Trevor

So the other day, making my monthly comic book order, I almost bought one of those IDW oversized Artists Select series signed books. It was a John Byrne Fantastic Four one, list price $150, $115 with my DCBS discount. I figured that even if I went to con where he was, which I probably won’t, I don’t wait in lines. But before I spent that $115, I’d check ebay for other Byrne signed books. I stumbled upon a guy selling his copy of that hardcover DC Variant Cover collection from last year. He seemed a very reputable seller, lots of transactions, great ratings, and seems to do a lot of signed books, with no complaints on their authenticity. I reached out to one of the creators with a pic claiming to be his signature, and the artist confirmed it and remembered signing the book. I emailed the seller a bit and he seemed cool, so bought it. His packing was the best I’ve ever received. I’m pretty confident that the signatures are all legit.

The book is a gorgeous piece for any collection even without the signatures, and he accumulated 51 of them. John Byrne, Frank Cho, Sergio Aragones, Adam Hughes, dozens of my favorite living creators. It was $199, but the book itself was like $50, and it would have taken me thousands of dollars in travel costs and con fees, and dozens of hours of my time to collect these signatures. Here’s a pic of a few of the pages.

Red Hood

I find getting autographs cool, especially if you do get them yourself. There are some situations that are better than others, as getting an autograph from Stan Lee became pretty expensive in the last 10 years and the main complain was that people were treated like cattle and were not able to interact with Stan. That was more about the shitty people Stan surrounded himself with that the man himself, but getting a second hand authentic autograph item of him is not that different than getting one from him directly. But there are many other situations, in which just going to the table and talking to the creator is simply priceless. For example, George Perez, who is now retiring from the con circuit, is a great guy to go and get stuff signed as he will talk to you and treat you like the fan you are. Jim Steranko is another great guy to go get an autograph from because he has amazing stories to tell everyone, but don't ask him for a photograph. Skottie Young is great. Same with Jim Lee, Joe Quesada, Chip Zdarsky, Roy Thomas, Al Milgrom, Weezy and Walt Simonson, and the list goes on.

Because of my years in collecting and going to cons, I have been able to get hundreds of books autographs and even created friendships with many artists and writers. I've always encourage people to go to cons just for this.

Josh-da-man

I have the following autographed comics matted and framed in a single giant frame hanging on my wall:

Sandman #50 (Gaiman)
Death The High Cost of Living #1 (Gaiman/Bachalo)
Walking Dead #100 Silverstri variant (Kirkman/Silvestri)
Kabuki Circle of Blood #6 Dynamic Forces LE (David Mack)
Nameless #1 Ghost Variant (Morrison)
Preacher #19 (Ennis/Dillon)
Grendel #1 (Wagner)
Crow #2 (Tundra) (O'Barr)

Trevor

Yeah, cons can be awesome, and I’ve had several great experiences with creators. (This just sprung to mind, and I don’t think I shared it here, but I had an amazingly surreal 10-15 minute phone conversation with Bob Burden the other day.)

But given my current situation and various factors, I’m confident that meeting many more creators is not happening for me. So this is sort of the next best thing for my circumstances. I don’t think I’ll do many more, probably closing in on 100 signatures now, and can only think of a few more “must gets”. I think I have Frank Miller, just need to make sure I have or get Bernie Wrightson and Scott McCloud off the top of my head.

movieguru

I have quite a few signed comics and other memorbilia. I prefer to get them signed in person whenever possible or there is always the question of wheather or not they really signed the item. The most I paid for one that I didn't have signed personally was a CGC graded copy of Journey into Mystery #83 signed by Stan Lee. It was the Golden Record Reprint from 1964 and not the original from 1963, but it was a nice copy that graded out at a 9.2. It was listed on Ebay as an auction and I placed a low bid of around $500 not expecting to win it as it should have gone for around $800, but I got lucky and one the auction. I paid for it the next day and within seconds of completing the payment for it, a notification came on my screen that said Stan Lee had just died. it was a nice book, but I ended up selling it a few months later for more than twice what I paid for it. I already have tons of items signed by Stan and I'm not a big Thor fan so I figured I'd part with it.

The other item I paid a bit for was for a signed copy of the first issue of the 1986 Superman series signed by Jerry Siegel. It was one of the limited edition Dynamic Forces that they sold years ago framed with a name plaque. I paid around $200 for that. I really want a signed Action Comics #1 reprint as I like that cover better and it has more significance. If I can find one for a good price I may get one eventually.

The most costly item I have is my signed Captain America Shield. I paid much more for it than the Journey into Myster Comic, but I paid for each signature individually over time so I didn't lay out a lot of money at once except for the shield itself. It has the most significance to me as I aquired all the signatures myself. With Stan being gone now I can't do anything like this again so I would never trade this one in for anything. It got a lot of attention when I took it to conventions to get some of the creators autographs. I'll try and post a picture of it on here below if I can get it to work right.

Red Hood

That's awesome. I've been wanting to meet Bob Burden forever. He lives relatively close to where I live but for some reason I haven't been able to spot him at cons. I would love to get him to draw a Flaming Carrot on my sketch book

Trevor

That’s amazing mg!

majorjoe23

movieguru

Steranko seems like a really nice person. I've met him a few times. When I had him sign my shield, he took the time to ask me questions about it and looked over all the other signatures on it even though he had a line of people waiting for autographs. He often shakes your hand using both of his hands. he used to be a magician as well. He takes a lot of effort in his appearance for someone in his 80's. He almost always a perfectly pressed suit. His teeth are a really bright white and his hair, while likely a toupee doesnt have a strand out of place. He even seems to make an effort to make sure he has a slightly dark tan.

One of the nicest artists I have met was Allen Bellman who brags about being in the comic industry before Stan Lee. I bought a Captain America print from him. I asked him to inscribe a patriotic quote on it as well and he comes around his booth and hugs me. I've seen him a few times since then. He and his wife Roz are always friendly and personable with everybody. His son passed away this year and he seems to be having some health issues so he's been cancelling a number of his convention appearances. But if any of you go to a con in Florida where he is at, he is one that is worth the while to meet.

movieguru

I love Walt's brontosaurus signature. when I was a teen I changed how I signed my name after seeing his signature. I originally just used basic cursive to sign things and it looked pretty plain. After seeing his sig I changed mine to where the first letter in each name was cursive and the rest was print letters.

fujishig

My initial answer was going to be that I only cared about signatures if I got it myself, but I changed my mind after reading this post and seeing this book. Amazing.

Now how do you get creators to sign an ipad cover, Trevor?

movieguru

It looks like a nice book and i would surmize that the signatures are real. The people that are selling forged signatures online are generally going to focus on just a few celebrities so they can get them to look authentic. Having to forge 51 different people's signatures would be very time consuming for the $100 or so profit he or she would make. Each hand forged signature would take a good amount of time to get right and if you make a major mess up on one of the signatures, you would have to start over with a new book since you can't erease the sharpies from the books that most creators sign with. i would imagine having to forge 50+ different signatures would be a difficult task without making more than one mistake.

I was at the East Coast Comic Con last year and a guy there had the coffee table sized 75th anniversary Marvel hardcover there. That thing was huge, i own one myself. He has been taken it with him to cons for a number of years getting autographs in it. He has them sign either the front or the back inside of the hardcover cover. He had them sign one after the other in a straight line from left to right and then just moved to the next "line" righ below that and continued. He must have had at least 100 signatures so far and hasn't even filled one side of the cover yet. What was really cool was he had a folded up letter in an envelope that he stored between the pages in the middle of the book. He pulled it out to show me. It was a letter from Steve Ditko. He had wrote a letter to Steve Ditko asking him a quesion or two about what he thought of something regarding comics and included a stamped envelope for Ditko to mail back his responses. So Ditko just wrote on the bottom of his questions, "I have no opinion on that!! Regards, Steve Ditko". Steve Ditko never made convention appearances and would never sign any Marvel items so that is the best you can get. Some other collectors have similiar letters. Sometimes his response to questions is just, "No." and then he signs his name and mails it back to them. I wish I knew about this but he passed away about a month or so after I heard about this, otherwise I would have tried my luck to see if I could have received a response to a letter,

Red Hood

Don Rosa is another great one to talk to. He always do free sketches and always has stories about his trips to Europe and the different collections they have done of his work over there.

movieguru

Yeah, I've met Don Rosa quite a few times over the years. He's a really nice guy. I love his spoofs of all the classic comic book covers where he subs in the duck characters. He always does free quick sketches. He really hates resellers and makes sure he personalizes every book he signs and every free sketch is personalized in a way that you can't matte the print to block hte personalization for resale. If you look on Ebay for his sketches, you can see one seller that gets his free sketches and then goes to great length to cut out the personalized name resulting in a very oddly shaped print. Sometimes the seller will put a sticker over it trying to hide it.

rexinnih

For me important with those I collect in person even more so. I grew up in San Diego and wish I leveraged autograph opportunities more in those early years of the con. I did get quite a few but there could have been so many more. Now if I go to a con, I check my collection against who is going to be there to get as many as I can.

PhantomStranger

I don't go out of my way to obtain signatures but if you are around the comic game long enough, it's almost inevitable you'll eventually end up with signed stuff. As a big fan of Alex Ross, I probably have half a dozen pieces with his signature on them.

Sometimes the signatures are just along for the ride. I once picked up a fantastic print of Mary Marvel that just so happened to be signed by Kevin Maguire of JLI fame. I got it for Mary Marvel but his signature was a nice bonus.

cultshock

Usually this is the case for me as well.

OK, gotta agree with this.

Walt Simonson is awesome. Years ago I unknowingly sold something to him on ebay. When I received his check (yeah, this was quite awhile ago, remember when you could pay for ebay purchases by check?? ) I noticed that the names at the top said Walter and Louise Simonson and I thought "Holy shit, wait a minute!". I emailed and asked if he was THE Walt Simonson and he admitted he was and we had a small but wonderfully pleasant email conversation back and forth a few times. Great and extremely modest guy, I'd love to meet him in person and tell him this story.

I treasure the autographed books I have signed by Al Williamson, Bernie Wrightson, Frank Miller and John Byrne. But I got those signed back in the 80's, when no one charged anything, it wasn't the business it is now, I miss those simpler, more intimate times.

movieguru

About eight or so years ago I was selling a few new sealed DVD's that I had extras of on Ebay. I usually don't pay attention to the names on the shipping label, but I just happened to look at thisone for a brief second. I thought the name sounded familiar and I though it might be a comic book creator. So I googled the name and I was right. It was Alex Saviuk. I messeged him as well and asked him if he was the same one that did the art for Spider-man comics, and he said yes that was him. I suppose if you sell enough stuff on Ebay, you will eventually sell to someone you are familiar with or some kind of celebrity. I've sold over 12,000 items on Ebay over the years so it's likely i've sold to some sports athletes or minor celebrities without even knowing it. A few times I've sold things that went to the prop department of some major movie studios.

majorjoe23

DWilson

I was at the Chicago Comic Con back in the day when Moebius was a guest; Marvel/Epic had just started releasing collections of his works. I friend of mine was in line to get his copies signed and I tagged along. By the time we got to the table, I decided to buy the first volume then and there and not only did Moebius sign it, but because I was buying it at his table, he sketched a profile of "Arzach" on the inside front cover. My friend was jealous because all he got was a signature.