I (along with a few other fancel artists on my 
fancel forum) have bought airbrushes recently, 
which so far has been looking good when it comes 
to stepping up what we can do with cel art.  I 
know people like airbrushing stuff, because 
that's used in the series as FX, but I'm curious:

I'm always trying to work some new special 
effects into my cels to make them look just a 
little cooler, especially when it's not an 
obvious thing.  Like a chibi sakura cel I did 
recently I primed the white fluffy parts of her 
dress with holographic paint that's transparent 
except for a sprinkling of soft pink 'confetti' 
which matches the pink in the dress perfectly and 
you'd never suspect it to sparkle or do anything 
fancy like it does unless a light source happened 
to be shining over your shoulder in just the 
right way.

My favorite special effects paint is this 
metallic white I picked up that gleams like the 
purest silver (I painted the ears and hair pieces 
with metallic and non-metallic white on the above 
chobits pic-you'd never guess from the scan, 
would you?) and once again, it's a very subtle 
effect until you notice it in just the right 
lighting and then go 'ooooo'.  A good thing about 
these effects is they scan through nicely, which 
is sometimes a problem with the more flagrant 
special effects I've seen from time to time on 
some ebay artists special effects fancels (like 
using holofoil paper glued to a background 
instead of paint to make a character's earrings 
gleam, etc).

So from a collectors point of view (because I 
know most fancel artists are always looking for 
something new) what do you guys think of special 
effects cels?  Are you purists or don't mind the 
occasional non-traditional emellishment or think 
that subtle surprises are cool?

...or are you wary of cels like that because you 
don't quite know how they look until you see them 
in person (which is my suspicion)?

^_^