THOR 134 story - Will it realize less complete on OCAL!

[comix4fun]

Those are nice examples.

 

 

The one that stuck out in my mind when looking at this story was this panel...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sweet Jeebus!!!! What happened to Thor and why does he look like a bobble-head?

[Terry Doyle]

Those are nice examples.

 

 

The one that stuck out in my mind when looking at this story was this panel...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sweet Jeebus!!!! What happened to Thor and why does he look like a bobble-head?

 

Nice balancing act, Chris!

 

Sure, there are lots of bad examples of Vinnie's inking of Thor to post, but I wanted to display some of his better efforts to underline the fact that Colletta was capable of producing some really good work (for the consideration of those posters with a blanket dismisal of his entire Thor output).

 

 

[comix4fun]

I love that splash page you posted. My complaints will normally only come with the inking distorts the facial features of known characters to the point that they look like different people.

 

That splash you posted is gorgeous and there's nothing to distract from it.

[glendgold]

One of the things we might never fully know about Vinnie's work is how much of the best stuff (or the worst) was done by his assistants. He had a lot of them and Erik's Thor 155 story -- which is the terrific looking piece of work you've been posting examples of -- was done to some extent by someone who wasn't Vinnie. The machinery and the character outlines was done in a much bolder, Dan Adkins-like hand. Whoever it was did an amazing job on some mid 160s Thor books with Ego.

 

I like the results of a lot of Colletta's work but some of it is truly disastrous.

[Terry Doyle]

I like the results of a lot of Colletta's work but some of it is truly disastrous.

 

I wouldn't disagree, Glen. I'm not exactly Vinnie's biggest fan, and a lot of his earlier Thor assignments certainly leave a lot to be desired, but when he settled into the inking role there's a run of work from the # 130s onwards that I really like.

 

 

 

[drdroom]

I think that today, for you guys buying Kirby OA, Collettas work galls you because he has messed up a collectible opportunity, right? All you can see is a piece of art that otherwise would be valuable and desirable..I can see that. You want a Kirby page, but not one in which Kirby's work is obliterated.

 

 

I guess this will sound crazy, but for me, neither my childhood reading experiences or my collecting opportunities are the important thing here. I regard Kirby as actually being an important American artist of the 20th century. His work is a legacy that I believe will be regarded highly long after everyone who read the original comics off the newstand is gone. You know how Orson Welles intended version of Magnificent Ambersons doesn't exist, and all we have is a truncated version that weakens his intent? It is bittersweet to watch it because we can glimpse the masterwork lost. I think of Thor sort of like that.

[Silver Surfer]

Chic Stone inks

 

Love Chic Stone's inks over Kirby.

 

Back to Vinnie, some images from various CAF galleries that (for me) represent his better efforts . . .

 

 

 

This and the Mangog splash, talk about dream pieces.

[bluechip]

The Conventional Wisdom on art values often turns on things that are not entirely rational. A superb Colleta Thor page (and they do exist) should not be worth less than a bad Stone or Ayers page (and they do exist). Any more than a lame image twice-up page should be worth more than a superb standard size page. And a superb page with all great images and all the right characters and artists should not be worth less than a contemporary page, just because it appeared in a different title (like an Annual instead of the monthly book, or in a guest shot within a different book) Yet all those things weigh heavily into valuations to the point that I often see sales and say "someone paid how much for that?" and then see another, better page that makes me say "why was that valued at a fraction of a clearly lesser page?"

 

he love or hate for an inker often takes on too much meaning. I remember looking at an FF page inked by Stone and really liking it, then getting talked out of buying it by someone who said the value would never hold because the CW condemned Stone inks as "too cartoony." Then he showed me some pages with inks by more approved artists -- including Colleta's run on FF -- and I balked from buying any because I couldn't see how if the stone page was only worth X that these other pages, which I didn't like as much, were worth 3 of 4X. In situations like that, either nothing is actually worth the price attached, or they are all worth more than price attached. As it turned out, the latter was true. But fear of the former kept me from buying any of the pages. Later got a Kirby FF page that was underpriced because of other CW which also had nothing to do with how good the page actually was.

 

 

[drdroom]

The Conventional Wisdom on art values often turns on things that are not entirely rational. A superb Colleta Thor page (and they do exist) should not be worth less than a bad Stone or Ayers page (and they do exist). Any more than a lame image twice-up page should be worth more than a superb standard size page. And a superb page with all great images and all the right characters and artists should not be worth less than a contemporary page, just because it appeared in a different title (like an Annual instead of the monthly book, or in a guest shot within a different book) Yet all those things weigh heavily into valuations to the point that I often see sales and say "someone paid how much for that?" and then see another, better page that makes me say "why was that valued at a fraction of a clearly lesser page?"

 

he love or hate for an inker often takes on too much meaning. I remember looking at an FF page inked by Stone and really liking it, then getting talked out of buying it by someone who said the value would never hold because the CW condemned Stone inks as "too cartoony." Then he showed me some pages with inks by more approved artists -- including Colleta's run on FF -- and I balked from buying any because I couldn't see how if the stone page was only worth X that these other pages, which I didn't like as much, were worth 3 of 4X. In situations like that, either nothing is actually worth the price attached, or they are all worth more than price attached. As it turned out, the latter was true. But fear of the former kept me from buying any of the pages. Later got a Kirby FF page that was underpriced because of other CW which also had nothing to do with how good the page actually was.

 

 

Agreed. I've never made a purchase decision on a page on any basis other than how good I thought it was, including my Mister Miracle page inked by Vince Colletta.

[Bronty]

The Conventional Wisdom on art values often turns on things that are not entirely rational. A superb Colleta Thor page (and they do exist) should not be worth less than a bad Stone or Ayers page (and they do exist). Any more than a lame image twice-up page should be worth more than a superb standard size page. And a superb page with all great images and all the right characters and artists should not be worth less than a contemporary page, just because it appeared in a different title (like an Annual instead of the monthly book, or in a guest shot within a different book) Yet all those things weigh heavily into valuations to the point that I often see sales and say "someone paid how much for that?" and then see another, better page that makes me say "why was that valued at a fraction of a clearly lesser page?"

 

he love or hate for an inker often takes on too much meaning. I remember looking at an FF page inked by Stone and really liking it, then getting talked out of buying it by someone who said the value would never hold because the CW condemned Stone inks as "too cartoony." Then he showed me some pages with inks by more approved artists -- including Colleta's run on FF -- and I balked from buying any because I couldn't see how if the stone page was only worth X that these other pages, which I didn't like as much, were worth 3 of 4X. In situations like that, either nothing is actually worth the price attached, or they are all worth more than price attached. As it turned out, the latter was true. But fear of the former kept me from buying any of the pages. Later got a Kirby FF page that was underpriced because of other CW which also had nothing to do with how good the page actually was.

 

 

bah. name recognition has value. Otherwise bad kirby pages (aren't many, but they do exist) would sell for less than good pages by no names... but they don't, or at least sometimes don't.

 

Obviously name recognition is less an issue with inking than pencilling, but its still an issue.

[Aman619]

Those are nice examples.

 

 

The one that stuck out in my mind when looking at this story was this panel...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sweet Jeebus!!!! What happened to Thor and why does he look like a bobble-head?

 

Nice balancing act, Chris!

 

Sure, there are lots of bad examples of Vinnie's inking of Thor to post, but I wanted to display some of his better efforts to underline the fact that Colletta was capable of producing some really good work (for the consideration of those posters with a blanket dismisal of his entire Thor output).

 

 

the whiteness on Thor's arm looks to me like the bullpen had to do some edits after the art was turned in. Changing the faces too it looks like. No way the inker who inked the cape would leave faces like these. They are way too tentative for a pro like Vince, even with his "paid by the line" stylings.

 

[bluechip]

The Conventional Wisdom on art values often turns on things that are not entirely rational. A superb Colleta Thor page (and they do exist) should not be worth less than a bad Stone or Ayers page (and they do exist). Any more than a lame image twice-up page should be worth more than a superb standard size page. And a superb page with all great images and all the right characters and artists should not be worth less than a contemporary page, just because it appeared in a different title (like an Annual instead of the monthly book, or in a guest shot within a different book) Yet all those things weigh heavily into valuations to the point that I often see sales and say "someone paid how much for that?" and then see another, better page that makes me say "why was that valued at a fraction of a clearly lesser page?"

 

he love or hate for an inker often takes on too much meaning. I remember looking at an FF page inked by Stone and really liking it, then getting talked out of buying it by someone who said the value would never hold because the CW condemned Stone inks as "too cartoony." Then he showed me some pages with inks by more approved artists -- including Colleta's run on FF -- and I balked from buying any because I couldn't see how if the stone page was only worth X that these other pages, which I didn't like as much, were worth 3 of 4X. In situations like that, either nothing is actually worth the price attached, or they are all worth more than price attached. As it turned out, the latter was true. But fear of the former kept me from buying any of the pages. Later got a Kirby FF page that was underpriced because of other CW which also had nothing to do with how good the page actually was.

 

 

bah. name recognition has value. Otherwise bad kirby pages (aren't many, but they do exist) would sell for less than good pages by no names... but they don't, or at least sometimes don't.

 

Obviously name recognition is less an issue with inking than pencilling, but its still an issue.

 

Don't disagree. Just think that some collectors try to boil everything down to metrics -- page by so and so worth x; page inked by inker a is worth x+y; panel page is worth XX percentage of splash, which is worth xyz percentage of cover, and twice-up is that much percent more than standard. It's an attempt to quantify something that is highly subjective. What gets lost in the calculation often is the significance and uniqueness (or lack of it) in a piece, and sometimes even the eye appeal gets slighted. That's where the "bargains" appear, when you see something that doesn't add up to as high as it should, because the accepted metrics are causing something about it to be overlooked.

 

As a result we see some Thor pages going for less than you a person would think, if he came at the OA market from the outside and judged based on art, eye appeal, the cultural significance and popularity of the character, and the comparative value of other Kirby pieces, etc... and he wasn't coming at it with a pre-existing disdain for anything related to Colletta.