Defining your collection

[zaboraviti]

i don't think i could afford buying everything or whatever catches my eye which is why i'm not going to face the space issue for a really really long time
when i started collecting i didn't know i started collecting - i just wanted to have hard copies of the few of my favorite comic books i had read digitally: Watchmen, Locke & Key, Local. and i still almost never buy anything blindly, unless it's further volumes of the series i'm already following: Fables, DMZ, Chew, Buffy/Angel&Faith, Fantagraphics Disney collections. when i got what i came for, i looked around and saw all this beautiful shelfporn here, did some reading, and went on to collect some DC, Marvel, Image, Dark Horse essentials (again, almost never blindly), two of the three Humanoids books i had to have. there's still no rhyme or reason to my collection, except that i prefer more or less realistic stuff to capes and tights. i now have most things i wanted to get, i continue with the series i'm following and try some new releases from time to time. i might even say that i'm no longer hungry and yearning for anything new that comes out or old that comes up. i canceled all of my pre-orders on amazon, only keeping DMZ Deluxe 5, Chew Omnivore Ed. 5 and Fables Deluxe 12.

[SJNeal]

I can only dream of being so disciplined.

My collection is ridiculously unorganized, and my compulsive buying prevents me from putting any definitions on it...

[Balakin]

I'm a horrible impulse buyer and interested in almost anything and want to have at least a taste of everything. My collection is all over the place but I think life is more interesting this way than restricting myself to a publisher or a title. And it's not ocd or collector mentality that I HAVE TO have these I just want to try everything.

[victorxd1999]

I'm a horrible impulse buyer and interested in almost anything and want to have at least a taste of everything. My collection is all over the place but I think life is more interesting this way than restricting myself to a publisher or a title. And it's not ocd or collector mentality that I HAVE TO have these I just want to try everything.

Exactly the same here. Though I guess I do have certain phases, so if I were to set aside my collection every two months or so you could possibly put some loose definitions on them, but definitely not as a whole. I even tried themed shelves, but didn't even came close to enough shelves. Most shelves now have two or three themes.

[Azrael]

I'm trying to buy less superhero books, but if something sounds interesting enough, I'll pull the trigger.

[GenericUserName12]

Compulsive impulse buyer here. I have a lot of everything, but I've slowly been reading through most of them. I've been able to curb my spending lately (since I already own nearly everything) so I've got that going for me.

[SJNeal]

Compulsive impulse buyer here. I have a lot of everything, but I've slowly been reading through most of them. I've been able to curb my spending lately (since I already own nearly everything) so I've got that going for me.

I was in the same boat... until I started tracking down floppies of material I already have collected in some form or another.

This hobby really is a sickness.

[PLEDGE]

I bought a lot of everything during sales and now I am just trying to get through it all. When it's all said and done, I might just narrow my collection down to classic silver age stuff like Stan Lee/Kirby/Ditko...and then characters like Spider-Man, Batman. Any other superhero books I get would have to be the cream of the crop. Space is an issue and collecting entire chunks of each major hero/team will eventually have to stop.

Aside from superhero books, I'd like to still keep most of the mid 90s Vertigo stuff, a few humanoid titles and some of the current Image titles. A lot of these will be based on creator teams.

[ChinBo37]

I just try to limit my spending to below 200 a month and just buy stuff I want to read. I haven't been into comics for like 12 years and even then I was just reading some batman here and there. So I have missed tons of classic runs and stories.

The last couple of years I caught up on a bunch of stuff digitally (johns green lantern, hellblazer, sandman, Y, lucifer, all the crisis/52/dc events, moore swamp thing, bunch of moore stuff etc.

Then i got the urge to get some physical stuff. I started by busting out my old TPB collection (mostly batman stuff). I then got Absolute a sandman 1 as a gift and it's been going from there. I don't have a huge collection, around 75 trades/ohc/absolute/omni and about 60 loose issues.

I just want to collect great stories in the best format if price allows it. And I like completing collections. I'm working on Moore Swamp thing OHCs, absolute spider man OHCs, and the Starman omnibuses

[pud333]

My collection rules:

- Usually only HC trades.
- SC trades only if no HC is available or no HC is forthcoming.
- Anything but Marvel. Just not interested in anything Marvel has to offer except X-Men but they pretty much are a universe unto themselves. This doesn't mean I won't pick up the odd Marvel book. It's just usually, I'm not interested. I get enough superhero fill from DC.
- Every year I purge and get rid of at least 20 books. I usually sell them to a used book store for quick turnaround.

[John Aston]

Over 30 years, my collection has grown and morphed as to the contents inside. It's split between six file cabinets filled with single issues and half a room of shelving for collected editions. My single issues are primarily comics that I can't part with, autographed or runs that have never been collected or runs that I'd rather to split between single issues and collections.

I used to buy a metric crap ton of single issues and over the last 15 years have moved to trades. This year, I used ebay to convert some single-issue runs to trades, trades of series I enjoy to hardcover or higher end collections.

For a long, long time I was a Marvel/DC/Vertigo guy. These days it's Image, Dark Horse, Oni, Fantagraphics with a bit of pre-52 DC trades. I follow creators, mostly. The only corporate characters I follow are Daredevil, She-Hulk and Wonder Woman. There are, of course, exceptions to everything.

Lately, I've been getting weird feeling like I'll run out of things to read in five years or so. I'm not really jumping onto a lot of new creators and holding steady of those works who I've enjoyed as they come out or discovering their previous works.

[Tony]

For me it's mostly rebuying things I loved as a kid+ the classics I wasn't alive for the first time around. I sold off most of the new books I had bought and add very little new. I think the only new stuff I own actual books of are the 10 Invincible OHC's, and Groo singles.

My collection I dub thee nostalgia!

Edit: I have always been a bigger DC (Superman, Justice League, Legion of Superheroes)fan with a healthy amount of Indie (Love and Rockets, Omaha the Cat Dancer, Miracle Man, Elf Quest) and Marvel (Thor, Fantastic Four, X-Men) books to round it out.

[AJpyro]

I indulged in the SUperhero medium but I'm trying to ween off them. But Its mostly x-men comics (teams or solos) some Marvel Showcases (Runaways, Daredevil, Guardians etc) and DC (that's not really as organized.)

Image and Darkhorse are gonna be making a big comeback soon.