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Amazing Fantasy #15 cover mystery

Started by spidercrazy,

17 posts in this topic

spidercrazy

spidercrazy

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One thing has puzzled me for many years: Whenever Marvel publishes the cover to Amazing Fantasy #15, it doesn't matter if it's a Marvel Milestones reprint or something else of lesser importance, they don't use the original cover but a "retouched" cover which differs from the original in many ways. (Look at the cloudline, for example). See pictures below for comparison. Why they do this, I have no idea. I don't like it, I think they should always use the original cover, not only because it looks the best but also because providing the other cover is simply false information. So... can anyone bring some clarity to this mystery?

 

(Original to the left, new cover to the right)

 

1514_4_15.jpgaf15-retouched.gif

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spidercrazy

spidercrazy

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The new cover is used everywhere, not just on comic reprints. A Franklin Mint plate that was issued some time in the mid 90's has the new cover - how could a porcelain plate ever be used in a fraud?!? And, if they wanted to make clear it was a reprint, they could have simply changed some of the background colors, not do the unnecessary extra work of redrawing the cloudline, changing size of the letters in "Spider-man", etc.

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Point Five

Point Five

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This is really interesting...never noticed it before. Even the word balloons and figures appear to have been redrawn...looking closer, I really can't find any details in the reprint cover that accurately match the original. Maybe the original art for the cover was damaged somehow, or even lost completely, and they had to recreate it from scratch? confused-smiley-013.gif

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Davenport

Davenport

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The new cover is used everywhere, not just on comic reprints.

I had to go back and look... There was a high quality hardcover page-for-page reproduction of Amazing Fantasy 15 that came in a Birth of Spider-man boxed set.

Looks like they used the original cover art. thumbsup2.gif

 

BirthAF15.jpg

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Aman619

Aman619

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Most of the early Marvel art was redrawn. Either they couldnt find the art, or the stats used in the original printing, or they just decided to make a "clean version" by having somebody in the bullpen TRACE the art from a printed comic. And the next time it was reprinted, they used these remade copies since they were the new "clean" reliable versions. If you look at all the early Marvel stroies in print you'll see lots of variations like this.

 

Just simple cheapo business economic and the technology in use of the time.

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Aman619

Aman619

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well, because 100% accuracy was never part of the assignment. Im sure Brodsky never placed them side by side and compared and told the guy to move the price and issue boxes a bit lower etc. It looked like the cover and that was good enough.

 

My guess too i sthat each piece was statted from existing current stuff in production at the time. Like the type that says Spider-Man. If it were traced it wouldnt be stretched out. So the easiecst thing would have been to find a "Spider-Man" that was on 2 lines that would fit the space. Easier than drawing the words depending on who was doing the recreation.

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adamstrange

adamstrange

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The background buildings on the left and right are inked more heavily on the original version which makes them more noticeable. I suspect that when they re-did the art like aman suggested that they also tried to emphasize the foreground Spiderman figure.

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