'PLANET COMICS' (is deserving of its own thread) 29 29

[Artboy99]

such great Planet Comics books you guys have been posting!

I was hoping to get my "Christmas present" to myself by Christmas, but unfortunately Heritage is extremely backed up in their shipping department. Oh well, it is coming eventually. 

[kelholt]

On 12/21/2021 at 12:32 PM, Ricksneatstuff said:

White pages 

 

White pages are impressive, I am equally impressed by her red shoes 👍🏻
I love seeing this issue with much colour.

 

[Spyder!]

On 12/22/2021 at 7:25 PM, kelholt said:

White pages are impressive, I am equally impressed by her red shoes 👍🏻
I love seeing this issue with much colour.

 

For real. I was actually pretty happy with my copy before, haha. My copy has a brown dragon and orange shoes. Rick’s is way sweeter.

[Flex Mentallo]

Rick's reds are redder'n mine as well!

[Artboy99]

On 12/23/2021 at 12:10 AM, Spyder! said:

For real. I was actually pretty happy with my copy before, haha. My copy has a brown dragon and orange shoes. Rick’s is way sweeter.

Fiction House colors are all over the place, who knows what colors were actually intended on so many of these books.

Your copy has wonderful blues and yellows.

 

 

[Finhead]

On 12/22/2021 at 10:46 AM, Artboy99 said:

such great Planet Comics books you guys have been posting!

I was hoping to get my "Christmas present" to myself by Christmas, but unfortunately Heritage is extremely backed up in their shipping department. Oh well, it is coming eventually. 

Wow amazing looking book, congrats.

[Sarg]

On 12/21/2021 at 12:32 PM, Ricksneatstuff said:

White pages 

 

Most vibrant color of Planet 29 I've ever seen. For Fiction House books, that probably should figure into the grading process somehow, since faded inks are more common. 

 

[Sarg]

Side by Side comparison of the above. The magenta ink fade on the top copy is severe, most noticeable on the monster.

Edited December 25, 2021 by Sarg

[Artboy99]

On 12/24/2021 at 6:19 PM, Sarg said:

Side by Side comparison of the above. The magenta ink fade on the top copy is severe, most noticeable on the monster.

I am not as convinced it is ink fade as opposed to printed that way. Fiction House was notorious for lack of standards and the magenta ink could have been running low/out but they kept printing. The top book has very strong blue and yellow inks.

[Spyder!]

On 12/26/2021 at 9:00 AM, Artboy99 said:

I am not as convinced it is ink fade as opposed to printed that way. Fiction House was notorious for lack of standards and the magenta ink could have been running low/out but they kept printing. The top book has very strong blue and yellow inks.

I agree. The colors on my copy are actually very similar to the colors on the Church copy, which I do not believe is faded. Just another example of printing color variation on FH books.

[Sarg]

On 12/26/2021 at 1:15 PM, Spyder! said:

I agree. The colors on my copy are actually very similar to the colors on the Church copy, which I do not believe is faded. Just another example of printing color variation on FH books.

Perhaps so, but look at the fire coming out of the monster's nostrils on both copies. It looks like the magenta has deteriorated badly. Maybe these were the end of the press run and they were determined to not stop the press in order to refill the magenta ink tray? On many "faded" FH covers it seems like the magenta is the reason for the variance; Fight #31's decapitated head with orange blood, for example. 

[Finhead]

On 12/26/2021 at 5:50 PM, Sarg said:

Perhaps so, but look at the fire coming out of the monster's nostrils on both copies. It looks like the magenta has deteriorated badly. Maybe these were the end of the press run and they were determined to not stop the press in order to refill the magenta ink tray? On many "faded" FH covers it seems like the magenta is the reason for the variance; Fight #31's decapitated head with orange blood, for example. 

IMO @Artboy99 is correct. It's pretty obvious that it's not a fade if you look at the shadow surrounding the lettering you can clearly see there is and was never any Magenta (or very little)  on that print. You can see it in the skin tone as well, there is no way it would fade out all those areas and not even touch the Blues, yellow or greens. In fact all those colours are are stronger on the "Faded" copy, I just don't buy that it's a fading issue.

[Sarg]

Would it be better to describe the phenomenon as ink deterioration? Meaning that all the color variation we see on FH covers almost always happened during the print run. One could still call this "fading," I think, but it confuses the issue with fading from prolonged exposure to light over subsequent decades (the more common use of "fading").

[Spyder!]

On 12/26/2021 at 6:05 PM, Sarg said:

Would it be better to describe the phenomenon as ink deterioration? Meaning that all the color variation we see on FH covers almost always happened during the print run. One could still call this "fading," I think, but it confuses the issue with fading from prolonged exposure to light over subsequent decades (the more common use of "fading").

Agreed.  I think that’s more or less how I view the distinction. Fading is a word often associated with light exposure, and while not inappropriate to describe the printing process, to avoid confusion I think it makes sense to specify it’s a printing issue.  I also agree with you that a shortage of magenta tends to be the main FH printing issue.  A book like Rick’s Planet 29, so loaded with magenta, makes me absolutely green with envy! 

[Finhead]

On 12/26/2021 at 7:05 PM, Sarg said:

Would it be better to describe the phenomenon as ink deterioration? Meaning that all the color variation we see on FH covers almost always happened during the print run. One could still call this "fading," I think, but it confuses the issue with fading from prolonged exposure to light over subsequent decades (the more common use of "fading").

That clears up what your trying to say but I would still not use the word fade as it implies a loss of colour over time, printing issue would mean it simply was never there or in very limited amounts.

On 12/26/2021 at 7:10 PM, Spyder! said:

.  A book like Rick’s Planet 29, so loaded with magenta, makes me absolutely green with envy! 

[Flex Mentallo]

The inference is that magenta was the last color to be added. As far as I can glean, the color itself would have been color-fast, so no more likely to fade than other colors. But there also seem to be many examples of FH books where the other colors also vary in intensity. And there are of course examples where the magenta is unevenly applied.

NB where were FH books printed? Does anyone happen to know? I would surmise it was not Eastern Color Printing, or we'd see similar problems with the majority of GA comics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Color_Printing

 

Or did they print their own, like Charlton?

https://comicvine.gamespot.com/charlton/4010-125/

 

If Fiction House hired an external print company, were they aware of these quality control issues? Did that company print comics for other publishers? And so on.

[Sarg]

On 12/27/2021 at 2:13 AM, Flex Mentallo said:

The inference is that magenta was the last color to be added. As far as I can glean, the color itself would have been color-fast, so no more likely to fade than other colors. But there also seem to be many examples of FH books where the other colors also vary in intensity. And there are of course examples where the magenta is unevenly applied.

NB where were FH books printed? Does anyone happen to know? I would surmise it was not Eastern Color Printing, or we'd see similar problems with the majority of GA comics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Color_Printing

 

Or did they print their own, like Charlton?

https://comicvine.gamespot.com/charlton/4010-125/

 

If Fiction House hired an external print company, were they aware of these quality control issues? Did that company print comics for other publishers? And so on.

Those are good questions. We don't see nearly the color variance on other comics than we do on FH. 

Since all comics were published in huge quantities, it stands to reason that the ink trays would need to be refilled several times during the run. All other comics printers didn't seem to have a problem managing ink consistency over the run. It's especially strange in the case of FH since they obviously put a lot of thought, time, and artistry into their brilliant covers and ink separations. 

[kelholt]

Here is my 29. I don’t own a scanner so I took it outside and took a pic on my IPhone earlier today. 

On 29, the red is limited to just a few areas and maybe that is why it pops on 29. Her shoes, her belt area, her hair, fire breath, weapon on aliens back, and 2 shirts of men bottom right.

[Spyder!]

On 12/27/2021 at 6:08 PM, kelholt said:

Here is my 29. I don’t own a scanner so I took it outside and took a pic on my IPhone earlier today. 

On 29, the red is limited to just a few areas and maybe that is why it pops on 29. Her shoes, her belt area, her hair, fire breath, weapon on aliens back, and 2 shirts of men bottom right.

Your copy also has lovely reds Kelly. Just wow!

[pacino408]

Finally got my hands on one of my favorite covers in the run 

 

Edited December 30, 2021 by pacino408