Fiche Scans

[nwpassage]

I aked once in a thread about fiche scans, where they come from, how they are obtained, but no one replied, so I thought perhaps a quick thread might answer my questions. Are they part of library collections? Who collected them and donated?

 

I ask because I am a poor man, who loves comics, and I've extensively used the GoldenAgeDownloads site to satisfy my craving and curiosity about early comics I have no business owning, and a lot of the early comics seem to be available only on fiche.

 

Why is that?

 

Thanks to anyone who responds. I'm off to work the graveyard shift, so if I don't respond to you kindness, it's not because I don't want too.

 

 

[Scrooge]

Let me give a try.

 

The way I understand the situation is that:

 

1) before scanning and computing power and high-speed internet access existed, there was a company that decided to produce fiche of comics to make the material cheaply available to a) library collection and b) individual collectors who also had or had access to a fiche reader and then

 

2) scanning and sharing became more prevalent, those with access to fiches scanned those as they were the only copies they had available, hence the poor quality of the scans since we're now that much farther removed from the source material and now,

 

3) as time goes by and people with access to the source material in low enough grade to be safely scanned, the .cbr files are updated to better and crisper files.

 

Hopefully that's what you were looking for.

[Scrooge]

Also, now I remember one of the companies that provided the fiches to the market was microcolour.

 

You can find their old title list here (in PDF) and the main website here.

[nwpassage]

Perfect. Kind of what I thought. Thanks for taking the time. No idea a company might be involved though.

[Scrooge]

Perfect. Kind of what I thought. Thanks for taking the time. No idea a company might be involved though.

 

IIRC, they used to advertise in Comic Book Marketplace in the '90's so it stuck in my mind (thumbs u

[markseifert]

I got a bunch of the Marvel and DC material on fiche a long, long time ago and absolutely loved it (got their reader also). Of course, DC and in very recent years Marvel, have done a good job of getting golden age material out in archive form in recent times. But before then, it was great to have these.

 

I kind of regretted not finishing up my DC/Marvel sets before they lost the rights to do those, keep meaning to try picking them up on ebay, as there's still plenty of un-Archived/Masterworked material.

 

They do still have some material available from some other pubs, fwiw: Micro Color International Golden Age comics.

[Crowzilla]

Rich Halegua also runs an electronic download site - Electro-Comics though it looks like he is ready to sell if someone is interested.

[Yellow Kid]

Before the commercial production of microfiche, a small group of collectors all donated their own books for scanning by the group leader, Pat I., and in return we all got fiche of everyone else's books. Many of our books were never done commercially, but between them and the commercial ones, I have a fiche copy of most of the great books and series. Using a reader isn't that bad, because you see a page at a time blown up larger than life, although it is best to read them in the dark to see the best colors. Personally, I think they're great.

Richard

[BB-Gun]

Back in the sixties, Jerry Bails started a project to save all of the superhero comics on microfilm. I purchased a copy of the Batman series and enjoyed reading the first five issues at the university library on a Saturday afternoon back in Ypsilanti. Many years later he donated the collection to Michigan State University. As an alumni, I was familiar with the library and since I was working on a bit of pop culture research, I was given a tour and allowed to go through their stacks in search of golden age comics and fanzines. When I asked for the Marvel Mystery issues, they set me up with their microfiche collection. I found it interesting but I enjoyed looking at the originals more than looking at the reader. A couple of years ago, I was looking for scans of Martin Filchock's character, the Owl. I found that the fiche scans were available from Microcolor which was located in northern New Jersey near where I worked. They sold me specific issues that I wanted and I made photos with a microscope and a digital camera. My photos were not in color since that lowers the resolution but they were OK. Other people scan the microfiche at 3200 dpi to make copies but they lose a lot of resolution that is in the original. A lot of material is available for free from GA.UK but I would recommend purchasing the MLJ series from the Shield, a fellow boardie who scanned most of the comics in that line. Below are a couple of microfiche pictures that I made using a microscope and digital camera. I was also testing new software that controlled scanning with the motorized microscope.

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