Aesthetics.

       I was going to call this post "A for Aesthetics" but I want to keep this thing simple (and I would never want to endorse Sue Grafton novels, directly or otherwise).  Everyone seems to be down with the concept of this blog and I appreciate all the well wishes and encouragement.  But I also want to assure you all, there is more to all this than just slapping nine cards in a page and calling it a day.  Each page needs to not only represent the player, set, or concept, but it has to look good doing it.  At least, that is the goal.


Here is a page of Stan Musial modern retro vintage cards:
 
All very different looking cards; some are very busy and modern, some are more staid designs and/or reprints.  All of them live together well on the page.  All the photos make sense where they are placed. 


Here is a page of Wally Joyner that illustrates this concept even better.  Different sets and photos all arranged well:


If he's looking up, he's on the bottom.  If he's looking right, he's on the left, and so on.  To look good is to feel good. Its got a couple of rookie cards and some OG Upper Deck in there too.  So in my binders, at least, Wally Joyner is the equal of Stan Musial, if not greater.


I do like the break up the monotony of page after page of player after player with some themes.  


Nomar is one of my favorite players of all time.  He has an astounding four pages in my retired binder.  I went with an all fielding page here:


I really like to do this with catchers.  As a failed former catcher myself (with the bad joints to prove it), I like to highlight the tools of ignorance, behold the recently retired Jason Varitek.


I do have binders that collect sets as well as players.  I find Allen and Ginter to be both awesome to rip open and collect, yet hard to work with in my nine card structure.


I mean, these '09s look nice, but page after page of similar looking A&G cards gets tiresome, so I tried to break it up with some bat-on-shoulder solidarity in '06...

...and some horizontally-oriented '07s.




I'll do this with players too.  I have two or three pages of Cal Ripken Jr. and since he has a little under a bazllion cards, I was able to cobble together a longways page:



I am certainly the demographic Topps is after with all their old timey sets and players, because I can't get enough of them:
 
Though it is a sad statement that this is the least busy of all the Topps Triple Threads sets.

While I am on the subject, it is soapbox time.  I try not to complain too much about cards since this is my hobby and all, but I cannot ignore Topps and their recent quality slip.  It is not just the monopoly that has led to this sad state, they were well on their way down before that.  I have a fantastic example here.  These are the 2002 Topps 206s:


Great pictures, well colored, the subject pops off the background, high quality stuff, pays homage to the original set, looks great.


And these are the 2009 Topps 206s, a mere 7 years later:
 
Mediocre pictures, horrible photoshop effects, awful over saturated backgrounds, inconsistent and lazy coloring of subjects, looks like a high school art project...and what the hell is going on with that Lou Gehrig?  He had ALS, not Down's Syndrome. Whatever happened in those seven years, design and quality control took a long looooooong step down. 
 
/soapbox


As a palate cleanser, here's one more good example, from the HoF binder; Goose Gossage in all his goosey-ness, lots of teams represented, lots of sets represented, mustache very well represented, the pictures all nicely arranged:



And here...well, here is one of my Hank Aaron pages, it's all over the place...

...it needs a little work, though Night Owl should appreciate the original well-loved 1975 cards from my brother's collection.  

       And to those who asked, I will be working on the wantlists and gotlists sometime this weekend, or next month, I am in no rush, but thanks for inquiring, I am aware they need to be posted.  And once again, thanks to everyone who has come to look at my little blog and especially those who have taken the time to comment.