Comic Book Grading

We were watching CNN who offered an opinion on how investing in comic books is one of the best investments that can be made. So, my husband took me on a series of adventures to old thrift stores, book stores, and around to small towns in Nebraska and Iowa...in search of comic books.

Then began my quest to understand how to grade a comic. For weeks I obsessed on the Overstreet Guidelines, CGC information, blogs, websites, and as much information as I could find to understand how to accurately grade comics. I purchased already graded comics to see if I could match their scores. Finally, understanding. Finally, accuracy. I finally got it!

The hard part was making certain that I was consistently taking into consideration each of the categories that need to be reviewed. So, I created a tool. A tool that walks a grader through each of the criteria needed, and each of the options available. A tool that calculates the overall grade of the comic based upon the answers to the questions. A tool that consistant and accurately grades comics based on the Overstreet criteria. http://www.comicequalizer.com/.

So, now the purpose of this blog...comprehensive explanations of the criteria in the guidlines. The Overstreet guidelines use words like minor, moderate, some, and other terms that are rather vague. The measures are often qualitative vs. quantitative. With a background in finance, and a Six Sigma Black Belt, I like numbers. I like to get very specific and exacting around definitions, and comic book grading is more of an art form and less of an exact science. So, in order to become the Master Comic Book Grader of the Universe, I'm going to research every darn term and share it here.

TheEqualizer