Hanken cels

One of my pieces (For the 100th time, it's not for sale) - And yes, it's A1 bitches! hahaha

I used to be a collector of cels. Well, I guess since I never actually gave up collecting, I am still a collector. However, I took a break after...well, the entire industry went digital and "cels" were no longer painted by hand but rather done in photoshop or photoshop-like digital environments.

This is a shame because these cels were amazing. Of course, the quality depended on the "frame" and whether it was an A, B, or C cel but I always appreciated the fact that in the slave labor like environment, a human took the time to dip paint/ink and draw on some plastic for the world to see for a fraction of a second.

In any case, my dream was to collect 1 or 2 super high quality pieces from various series so that I can look back 30 years from now and reminisce. I never collected these things so that I can make a profit. I just thought they were really interesting and I figured this hobby would expand my understanding of the world a little more. I would have purchased more cels but the problem of course was money.

These fucking things were really expensive. My friend always brings up the time when I asked him for 400 bucks out of the blue. It was a shame because he only had 300 bucks. Still, I managed to find the money and buy the fucking thing. AND, i managed to get it signed by inoue kikuko. (Guess which cel I got? heh)

The most coveted cels in my opinion were Hanken cels. These were ultra-rare cels that were hand painted and were depictions of key frames/poses of characters and scenes from a series. They were usually created to make covers for albums, dvd boxes, stickers, and other merchandise. Therefore, the detail and quality of these original one of a kind pieces were superb...and super expensive. Also, these were almost never released to the public. The only way you can get these things required unusual circumstances....which I imagine involved some sort of sex act. But once in a blue moon, you could get them because, i imagine, some desperate employee sold them to buy more sexual favors or to buy ladies of the night.

I was surfing the web today and I found some old school hanken cels for sale. Guess what, each piece costs >$6000 bucks. Seriously, one fucking cel costs over 6 grand. I remember these things selling for 500-1000 bucks back in the day but now....it's ridiculously expensive.

I guess I'll never own any more of these things. Most have been bought up by collectors years ago or have been destroyed. Other interesting ones, like the Disney "hanken" will never ever be sold again. I have a few Babs and Buster bunny but who cares about that shit right?

Sigh. Anyway, I guess I felt like thinking back to the good ol' days...