ha, I just sent the payment for my most 
expensive cel this morning.

Previously, my limit was $50, which was very 
difficult for me to spend at the time. I'm a 
college student, so most of money has to go for 
stuff like food....But it was a picture of Aya 
from Weiss Kreuz that I actually liked, and the 
general trend with cels from that show is they 
are either really crappy art not worth owning at 
all, or really nice art that is way out of my 
price range. Good art of Aya is particularly 
hard to come by (in my personal opinion) so I 
jumped at the chance to get this particular cel. 
I felt a bit guilty about the money until it 
came in the mail (as someone else mentioned) but 
the second I looked at the real thing, I was 
completely enamoured with it, and stopped 
caring. I liked it so much, that my price limits 
changed significantly after that. 

As of now, my most expensive cel (although it's 
not in my physical posession yet) is of Chichiri 
from Fushigi Yugi, which cost $145. That is *a 
lot* of money for me. I had to think about this 
for several days before I could commit to the 
deal. But, it's probably one of my favorite cels 
of him I've seen, and shots of him that I really 
like are getting harder to find (as well as more 
expensive). I never had specific screen shots 
picked out as 'dream cels' but one nice cel of 
Chichiri and one nice cel of Tasuki were my 
biggest goals, so my wishlist is now half 
complete. I think I'll ask my parents to frame 
it for me for my christmas present, and I know 
it'll make me really happy whenever I look at it.

My most expensive piece of art was actually not 
a cel, but an original drawing by Don Rosa (an 
American comic book artist). This was somewhere 
between 200-250 dollars, and I commissioned him 
to draw it specially for me. My parents paid for 
it for me without a second thought (it was my 
primary christmas present that year, I was 16 or 
17). But Don Rosa was practically a childhood 
idol to me, and the mere fact that he drew it 
*for* me added a huge difference to the value in 
my opinion. It would actually go down in value 
if I tried to sell it (never!!!) since it has my 
name written on the drawing.

My cheapest cel was....50 yen! When I was in 
Japan I bought several cels from the Mandarake 
(actual store location) and the most I spent on 
one was 600 yen (for a Maison Ikkouku cel). 
There is obviously a *big* difference between 
what the mandarake charges it's Japanese 
customers and online ones. A lot of them were 
from series I haven't seen, but they were cheap 
and I really liked the artwork, so I got them 
anyway.

The cels I've bought online usually range 
between $10-$30. But as you can see I'll break 
that for certain characters/series. But it has 
to be really nice art too. I won't buy a cel if 
I don't like the picture much, regardless of how 
obsessed I am with the character portrayed.