A general discussion of collecting cool things, such as vintage and modern toys, comic books, ephemera.
History shows that pop culture icons become most collectible around 25-30 years after their height of popularity–this is when kids who grew up with the toy are old enough to get nostalgic, and have the funds available to seek out those treasures from their youth. Think about it, around 30 years ago, the most popular [...]
Mark Bellomo is the author of some of my favorite books for collectors, including Totally Tubular 80′s Toys and The Ultimate Guide to G.I. Joe. I guarantee you that he has more toys than you and me. Mark has put together some videos that showcase his collection and give a good idea of the vast [...]
The other day, I showed you how I made a new photo backdrop for some action figure pictures I wanted to shoot for my new online shop. Here are some of the results so far… I really like the way these are turning out, especially how the “cheap” Burger King Dr. Doom looks like he’s [...]
Well, I got a little crafty again this weekend, and did some hot glue gun slinging to make a new backdrop for action figure photographs. The fun thing about making a backdrop like this is that you don’t need to be precise, and you can use pretty much anything you have laying around. The first [...]
In my last post, I showed you to assemble a simple backdrop that gives some pretty dramatic results to your action figure photos. I wanted to show you some of the different ways the backdrop can be used. The hardware store sells colored party light bulbs for around $2.50. Check out the effect a different [...]
I wanted to find a way to photograph smaller items, like action figures, in a more exiting manner than just snapping a picture of them against a white background. If you buy or sell toys on eBay, you know how important a good photo can be. So, I went down to the basement and got [...]
A lot of times, I’ll find a sweet vintage toy at a yard sale and am always excited when it has the original box. Unfortunately, most of the boxes have seen better days, and are bent, ripped, taped, and mildewed, but I’m always optimistic that there is something worth salvaging. For many vintage toys, the [...]
I recently bought an empty box for ten bucks. Yep. It’s what I do. This is a huge box that once held the GI Joe Killer WHALE Hovercraft, and it has some awesome graphics. Unfortunately, the box had been taped on all sides with ugly brown packing tape and many of the graphics were completely [...]
Justin Gammon of WeirdoToys fame put together this creative little video to show how he shoots those great photos for his site. You might not collect weird toys, but you can certainly learn from Justin how to take better photos of your action figures and other toys. You can see some of his photos on [...]
If that headline made no sense to you, then this article probably isn’t up your collecting alley, but read on anyway and get a little education! Coins are graded like every other collectible, but they are graded on a scale from “poor 1″ to “mint state 70″ with many levels in between. The grading of [...]
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