Pencils vs Inks

[Maxim St. James]

I was just wondering which is more difficult to attain and obviously the Inks show better, but are there people that collect just pencils? Is there a premium paid for inks vs pencils? I was curious about this topic. As a collectable which would you rather have.

Just curious on other people's thoughts

[BodaZoffa]

Pencils & Inks are generally more expensive & more collectable. I've seen people stray away from just penciled art. It costs anywhere from $100.00 to $200.00 to get a penciled piece inked by a reputable artist.


I have bought penciled art off eBay for VERY reasonable prices & then sent the art off to an inker (Bob Almond) to be inked.

Boda

[magnusr]

I was just wondering which is more difficult to attain and obviously the Inks show better, but are there people that collect just pencils? Is there a premium paid for inks vs pencils? I was curious about this topic. As a collectable which would you rather have.

Just curious on other people's thoughts

There's been lots of thoughts on this one. Inks drawn on top of the pencils (on the same paper, which is the absoluteley most common method), always command higher prices than lightboxed inks. The combination of pencils and lightboxed inks would be slightly more valuable. Anyway, seperate pencils are very rare. For Valiant it might exist, but I've never heard of any. On the other hand, copies of the pencils are often included with Valiant inks, and it is fascinating to compare. Btw, some unfinished pencils that showed up recently where immediately inked.

/Magnus

[Maxim St. James]

Is it because the durablity of the pencils that are in question. Thats why most people prefer the inks then, or a combination of that and the inks showing better. That being said wouldn't the, and I use caution when I say it "uncommoness" of the pencils be worth more. If thats true then why would you get them inked. I could see a commissions, pinups, sketches, but original pages. I don't see many pencil pages on ebay, most are inks, and most interior pages run about 10 to 30 bucks with premiums being paid for certain artist and characters. Most covers coming in between 150.00 to 300.00 for original valiant stuff pre unity excluded of course. I agree in that I don't see many combination of pencils and inks being sold. So the question has to be asked has any had one of the other and then seen the other half for sale?

That would drive me crazy

[BodaZoffa]

Is it because the durablity of the pencils that are in question. Thats why most people prefer the inks then, or a combination of that and the inks showing better. That being said wouldn't the, and I use caution when I say it "uncommoness" of the pencils be worth more. If thats true then why would you get them inked. I could see a commissions, pinups, sketches, but original pages. I don't see many pencil pages on ebay, most are inks, and most interior pages run about 10 to 30 bucks with premiums being paid for certain artist and characters. Most covers coming in between 150.00 to 300.00 for original valiant stuff pre unity excluded of course. I agree in that I don't see many combination of pencils and inks being sold. So the question has to be asked has any had one of the other and then seen the other half for sale?

That would drive me crazy

The only pencils like this that I have seen are usually page roughs. Some of these go for pretty high prices depending on the artist. Buscema is one of the more expensive artists I've seen.

[BodaZoffa]

Here's an example of a penciled page rough....

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 99172&rd=1

[x-omatic]

Is it because the durablity of the pencils that are in question. Thats why most people prefer the inks then, or a combination of that and the inks showing better. That being said wouldn't the, and I use caution when I say it "uncommoness" of the pencils be worth more. If thats true then why would you get them inked. I could see a commissions, pinups, sketches, but original pages. I don't see many pencil pages on ebay, most are inks, and most interior pages run about 10 to 30 bucks with premiums being paid for certain artist and characters. Most covers coming in between 150.00 to 300.00 for original valiant stuff pre unity excluded of course. I agree in that I don't see many combination of pencils and inks being sold. So the question has to be asked has any had one of the other and then seen the other half for sale?

That would drive me crazy

Thats a very good question.

It will depend on the age of the pencils. For example, a 1960's Kirby uninked penciled page can have a higher value than a inked page of the period. Because of how rare his work wasn't inked.

Today some artists inked pages are getting rare as they almost never have their work inked. Some "light box" the pencils and ink on a different page. Some have "blueline" copies made that the inker then ink on. And some are being printed directly from pencils so there will only be the pencil versions.

[dino]

Here's an example of the differences (and an excuse to show off)



Unfortunatly, I didn't think to ask Bob Layton to ink seperatly.

[charles_yo]

good original question - you have to realize that there was no technology until recently that could reproduce pencils correctly for publication, so you had to have everything inked. It is indeed rare for there to be pecilled pages from the past that weren't inked... the ones that are were from stories that were abandonedpart way thorugh the process, or trial pages or design concepts.

The inking with a light box on a separate page is not really a great way to go, especially since Strathmore quite making a 1 ply bristol. You lose a lot of subtlety of the drawing in the conversion, no matter how good your light table is. Its one of the things that makes it difficulrt for inkers to break into the business: they're working on a light table off of a crappy xerox, while the real guys are working right on the page. No wonder the pro looks better in the final product.

As a collector of original art, I love the mercilless pools of black that you get on the pages, the work looks so powerful with the black and white. However, I like the abandoned pages sometimes, the stories that were left behind, the energy of the looser pencil work, the purity of vision. I have at least one pages of pencil work from gulacy that I had to ink on an overlay for production reasions. I held on to the pencil original heh. I have some other pencil work on pages that were stopped mid-production. Would they sell for a lot on the open market? some would, as the pencillers were "name", but basically they're not going to go anywhere for a while. I like having both in my archival box.

Lets put it this way, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I would pay big $$ for an FF Kirby page inked, becuase they just rock, and I might pay even bigger $$ if it was an unpublished page since it's a one of a kind piece that most people haven't even seen!

[cinlach@aol.com]

so if i had a penciled sketch and i wanted to get it inked...about how much would that run?

i've got a kevin sharpe shazam piece that's really sweet...i've always wondered about getting it inked.

i toyed with the idea of doing it myself...i copied it and inked the copy...quickly realizing i was WAY over my head.