Bone knives and bearskins

[Gary Leach]

Cord:

> GARY, TIMO: Thank you for your very insightful information on the
> technology of pre-computer comic book printing.

Thank you for asking. Not many people seem to be very curious how 
things were done in the pre-DP (Desktop Publishing) days.

> I understand the stats were high contrast photopositives shot by a
> large, "stat"ionary mounted camera from the original artwork. What 
> sizes
> did these stats have? Oversized like the original artwork? Comic book
> size? Smaller?

There were many sizes, but Gladstone typically used 10"x12" and 
12"x18". Original art also came in many sizes, but process cameras were 
designed to size things to fit.

> And were they completely b/w or did they still have greytones?

These were strictly black and white images, with no intermediate 
values. Screening created patterns of black dots of varying size that, 
to the eye, could appear "gray".

> I also wonder how the printing plates were made from the stats. Were
> these real plates? Or was it rather some kind of cel? I suppose they
> were thrown away after printing the books?

The short answer: printing plates were once commonly of metal, but 
today they're usually sheets of chemically treated plastic or paper. 
Stats, however, were not used to directly create plates. Any sort of 
source material – stat, original art, pasteup, etc. – was used to 
create a film negative, which was the medium required to transfer an 
image – to "burn" it – to a plate.

Most plates are thrown away. Since they do the actual physical work of 
printing, they wear out. It's not uncommon for several plates to be 
burned, put on press, and then discarded in the course of a large print 
run.

> And what did foreign publishers receive who licensed the books? Did the
> get copies of the stats and had to make their own printing plates? Or
> did they get the stats themselves and hat to return them? Or did they
> get printing plates?

All of the above, depending on the era, the publishers involved, and 
the specifications of what these publishers agreed to provide.

> Are there efforts by Egmont or other Disney publishers today to 
> digitize
> all surviving stats?

There are, but many publishers can't devote much in the way of time, 
labor, or materials to it.

Gary