Best way to store cels?

Bagsunlimited.com is good place for poly bags. Their lobby card bags work well for cels, and if you board your cels, they have a .125 archival foam board that works well for shipping / short term storage of cels.

For Itoya portfolios, if you live near an Aaron Brothers Art store, they carry Itoya products, and on Aaronbrothers.com they typically have a 40% off coupon.
MacKettric
Kett's Cel Gallery
Jun 09 at 9:40 PM
Does anyone know if it's safer to frame cels or to keep them in their bags? I was told framing was safer but that even with the best glass they would slowly be damaged by sun over time...which makes me think that either they need to be stored in a dark room or in a container...where I'll never see them....meh...
sophcollegegirl
Aug 06 at 3:00 AM
Here's a discussion by some experienced curators over the framing issue:

http://www.anime-beta.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=27461

The gist is that framing is tricky, unless the person doing the framing is familiar with the issues of possible damage from allowing the cel to stick to a backing mat or exposing it to destructive levels of heat/humidity. There is a way to frame and preserve cels in a museum-quality archival way, but it's likely to be expensive. Taking it to your local art store and having it framed like a poster or diploma is likely to be a recipe for short-term damage.

In general, yes, light from any source (sun, lamps, especially fluorescent bulbs) will slowly damage cels. This is because the materials are unstable and tend to react with each other, with light being a catalyst. However, short-term scanning and viewing is tolerable. My advice would be to keep them in a good archival-quality portfolio (Itoya Profolios are inexpensive and stocked by many art stores) and to look at them when you want to see them.

Sadly, when cels are damaged by light, it's not the light used when you look at them and admire them, but rather the hours and hours and hours of light they have to absorb when nobody is looking at them. So really storing them in a dark place or portfolio isn't ignoring them; it's saving them up for precious moments.
60something-sensei
Sensei's Anime Gallery
Aug 06 at 9:05 AM
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