[OtherEric]

Once I scan the paper we'll need the following pages as fills for Fantastic Comics 17, 18, 20, 22:

All four issues need all four covers.  (I did grab the FC and BC from heritage for 17, 20, and 22; but heritage didn't have great copies of any of those or ANY copy of the 18.)

17- Need outer wrap and centerfold.  (1, 2, 31-34, 63, 64)
18- Need outer wrap. (1, 2, 63, 64)
20- Need cover only.
22- Need centerfold (31-34)

Thanks!

[OtherEric]

Fantastic 20 is just waiting on the fiche fills to be posted.

[darkmark]

Sorry, Eric, I don't have those issues.  All the Fox I have has already been done.  Looking forward to your stuff, though.

[OtherEric]

Jon said Dell4C should have the missing pages for 3 of the 4 issues; I'll go ahead and do 17 next.  Even if it's incomplete there's a lot of good stuff to get out to people.

If the fills for 20 don't turn up by tonight I'll go ahead and post it, then update when the fills show.  It's a really nice looking book; other than the obvious flaw of no cover JVJ's copy was in excellent shape.

[JonTheScanner]

The fills are going to take a bit of time, Eric.  Dell 4C has the fiche but his scanner doesn't have the resolution to scan them.  He's mailing them to Ontology so they can be scanned.   

[OtherEric]

No worries, Jon (and Dell4C, and Ont).  Posting what we have now and we can add the covers when we get them.  I'll do 17 next since we won't be getting fills; then move onto some of the other books until we either get the fills or I hit the bottom of the pile.  And a huge thanks to everybody involved in getting the fills!

Everybody else, just enjoy the book!

[OtherEric]

And here's the scan of 17.  Missing the inside covers, first wrap, and centerfold.  Still a lot of nice material here, enjoy.

Coming next:  I dive into the batch of Eastern books JVJ just sent while I'm still inspired to scan like crazy after seeing how great some of the material is.  Hopefully I'll be VERY busy this weekend and next scanning.

[JonTheScanner]

Good luck, OE. 

* JonTheScanner considers slipping some caffeine into OE's food to keep him stimulated all week-end to scan.

[dhfh]

Coming next:  I dive into the batch of Eastern books JVJ just sent while I'm still inspired to scan like crazy after seeing how great some of the material is.  Hopefully I'll be VERY busy this weekend and next scanning.

What about Fantastic #18 & 22?  I know you don't have Blue Bolt V1#9, V2#5- 7, 9, 10, or 12, anymore, and that was a crushing, demoralizing blow as it is...   

As for this Eastern batch, are any of JVJ's early issues of Heroic Comics among them?

DHFH

[OtherEric]

The Fantastics are at least briefly on hold as I wait for the Fiche Fills, since I know they're on the way.  I will swap back and get the few Champion and Speed issues I have very soon, though.

Sorry, Heroic is the one Eastern title I didn't snag, at least in part.  But they will be in my next Eastern batch; which shouldn't be that far out.  Since JVJ has requested we work by publisher if possible, I'm going to rotate Eastern- Novelty- St. John until those publishers run out.  (I really should go ahead and scan my 10 or so issues of Famous Funnies and post them without the Buck Rogers pages, since we've decided to go ahead with partial books when only one feature is unusable.)

[JVJ]

(I really should go ahead and scan my 10 or so issues of Famous Funnies and post them without the Buck Rogers pages, since we've decided to go ahead with partial books when only one feature is unusable.)

I apologize in advance if this is a stupid question/suggestion, but is it possible to reprint the Buck Rogers pages with the name/logo removed? It sounds to me (with my limited attention span and focus) that the problem is "Buck Rogers" not the strips themselves. If this is true (Aussie? anyone?) then what's to prevent GAC (or anyone) from reprinting PD artwork with the TM name/logo absent?

Again, perhaps it's a silly question that betrays my abysmal ignorance of the rules. Still, I have to ask...

(|:{>

[OtherEric]

I think the current rule on the Buck Rogers material is more of a "we're playing it safe" than anything else, Jim.  One of the experts will need to explain exactly why.  The Famous Funnies issues are definitely PD, but the strips that the Famous Funnies issues reprint are not.  Which seems to be a gray area; I'm not sure exactly what all pertains there.

And, as I hoped, two more books for people tonight:  Buster Crabbe 1, and Personal Love 25.  As usual, I have trouble actually reading romance comics.  But I can look at the artwork for quite a while; a lot of them had some truly exceptional art.  The highlight in this one is a seven page Frazetta story described in Overstreet as a "Tribute to Betty (sic) Page".  While I'm pretty sure calling it that is standard "let's raise the price" hype, the character's look could have been based on Bettie.  Beautiful stuff as long as you just admire the pictures and don't try to read it.  I posted the story at 200 rather than 150 to show it off better; and for good measure I did the same with the one Frazetta page in the Buster Crabbe as well.  Enjoy!

Sharp eyed readers will notice the order of features in the Personal Love 25 doesn't perfectly match JVJ's card.  The book had a loose cover and split spine on the cover; it had been restored with a very careful glue job.  Presumably to keep the first page of the Frazetta story as clean as possible, the last two pages had been flipped around so they were at the front of the book, not the back.  I've restored the original page order in the cbz.

[John C]

I wasn't part of the Buck Rogers discussion, but licensed characters tend to be painful, since any instance could be a reprint or an adaptation of something still under copyright, which would make it protected as well.

Aussie and Serj both, I believe, wanted to be respectful to trademarks, presumably to make the point that the site isn't a threat to their work, but possibly for other reasons.

[JonTheScanner]

It is my understanding that if it were just a trademark issue we (or one) could distribute the Famous Funnies scans without alteration of the individual pages provided "Buck Rogers" was not used in an identifying way on the packaging.  This is just like DC can call their hero Captain Marvel inside the comic, but cannot call their comic Captain Marvel since Marvel now holds that trademark.

[John C]

You're (almost certainly) right, Jon, but there are legal limits and there's playing nice with people we may want to work with.  As I said, I wasn't part of the discussion, so I don't know the specific reasons.  I do, however, know that there are several titles Aussie and Serj reject to head off potential problems with trademark owners.

The more likely situation, though, is simply that the possibility of a derived work is too great to risk.  With all the comic strips, serials, and other media Buck has starred in, I doubt any of us could say for sure that the stories published by Eastern were 100% original to their writers.

[OtherEric]

Buster Crabbe #2 now ready for download.

I find it amusing that Eastern got the rights to the Buster Crabbe comic at roughly the same time they had lost the rights to Buck Rogers for a while.  One may be related to the other, in fact.

I got a clean cover from Heritage but left in a scan of JVJ's copy.  Even incomplete, I find the Shoe store ad/sticker interesting.

JVJ's tentative guess on the last page is H. G. Peters.  Personally, I doubt it; I just think the next to last panel is a swipe.  Actually, I think the whole page is a bunch of swipes; it looks like seven different artists to me!

[JVJ]

Buster Crabbe #2

JVJ's tentative guess on the last page is H. G. Peters.  Personally, I doubt it; I just think the next to last panel is a swipe.  Actually, I think the whole page is a bunch of swipes; it looks like seven different artists to me!

You could be right, Eric, but Peters WAS there and I'll stick by my guess: I think he did everything here except for the portrait of Buster Crabbe.

ps. Can you PM me a list of which comics of mine you still have? I need to be reassured that I still have some system of keeping track of what's where. Thanks.

(|:{>

[OtherEric]

Buster Crabbe #2
JVJ's tentative guess on the last page is H. G. Peters.  Personally, I doubt it; I just think the next to last panel is a swipe.  Actually, I think the whole page is a bunch of swipes; it looks like seven different artists to me!

You could be right, Eric, but Peters WAS there and I'll stick by my guess: I think he did everything here except for the portrait of Buster Crabbe.

I trust your ID more than I trust my own, Jim.  But I will bring up the subject if I have doubts, and the page does look to me like a mish-mash of styles.  The only two panels that are particularly distinctive to my eyes are the Buster Crabbe portrait and the next to last one; and like you said the BC portrait doesn't look like Peters.  That's the first appearance of that portrait in Buster Crabbe, though, so unless it showed up in an ad or somewhere else it's new.  Which makes it odd that they would do it just for a filler page, at least to my mind.

Like I said, I trust your answer more.  But at least I'm starting to teach myself some of the questions!  (And I've got some on the next book I'll upload, as well.  But that can wait until later today when I actually upload it.  )

[OtherEric]

Personal Love #24 now ready for download.  This one has an 8 page Frazetta story; so once again I highly recommend it even if you don't like romance comics.  Just enjoy the incredible drawings. 

As promised, I had a question on one of your identifications on this one as well, Jim.  You say Bill Everett did the third story, and it doesn't seem impossible based on the art in some panels.  But it seems odd that he wouldn't sign the story if the publisher was allowing it, yet it's the only unsigned story in the book.  Of course, it's possible he didn't want Atlas to know he was moonlighting or there was some other reason.  And at least some of the art- the splash panel in particular- just screams Jim Mooney to me.  I would call it an outright Supergirl swipe if it didn't predate Kara's first appearance by several years.  (I don't know enough about Mooney's early career to know if he was even drawing at this point, for that matter.)

[JVJ]

Personal Love #24 now ready for download.  This one has an 8 page Frazetta story; so once again I highly recommend it even if you don't like romance comics.  Just enjoy the incredible drawings. 

As promised, I had a question on one of your identifications on this one as well, Jim.  You say Bill Everett did the third story, and it doesn't seem impossible based on the art in some panels.  But it seems odd that he wouldn't sign the story if the publisher was allowing it, yet it's the only unsigned story in the book.  Of course, it's possible he didn't want Atlas to know he was moonlighting or there was some other reason.  And at least some of the art- the splash panel in particular- just screams Jim Mooney to me.  I would call it an outright Supergirl swipe if it didn't predate Kara's first appearance by several years.  (I don't know enough about Mooney's early career to know if he was even drawing at this point, for that matter.)

Jim Mooney goes back to 1940, Eric, and I am 100% certain that this story is by Bill Everett - signature or no. My major advice to folks trying to learn a style is NEVER to judge any story based on ONE face or ONE panel. Art styles involve so much more than a face or two: how the artist tells a story, how they position a figure, STRUCTURE a face, the proportions they use to create a figure, etc. I wish I could explain it better, but it's an art and a skill and I just have it. How and why I have it is simply beyond me.

As to why Everett was working at Eastern, in 1953 is beyond me, too.

Peace, Jim (|:{>

[OtherEric]

Like I said, what seemed odd was the lack of signature.  Everett had one of the most distinctive signatures in comics and he didn't hesitate to use it.

Did Everett do anything else at Eastern, or was it just this one story?

[JVJ]

There are a couple of Everett stories there, Eric,
I don't have the data immediately to hand, but I believe there are two or three others.

Peace, Jim (|:{>

[JVJ]

Like I said, what seemed odd was the lack of signature.  Everett had one of the most distinctive signatures in comics and he didn't hesitate to use it.

Did Everett do anything else at Eastern, or was it just this one story?

I have Everett at Personal Love #9 (with a more sedate signature) in 1951. At Heroic #44,60-64 (with a signature on the last one), and Movie Love #6 (also signed). I don't think he used his familiar signature at Eastern.

There may be more examples, but he seems to have been working here on and off from 1948-1953. Odd, now that you mention it...

(|:{>

[OtherEric]

He did early issues of Heroic as well.  It's definitely something to look forward to when the next Eastern batch rolls around.
Thanks for all the information; even if I never get close to your level of ID skill I can learn more about how to do it.  I think these are just some of the first books which have artists I know enough about to venture an ID but aren't obviously or famously assigned to the artist already.

[OtherEric]

And one more before I go back to work tomorrow:

Buster Crabbe 7 now ready for download.  Only one page Frazetta in this one, but as is usual with Buster Crabbe it's a fun (if odd) book.  I have no idea what reality the stories are supposed to take place in but it's nothing like ours.  A bizarre mix of Old West and "Contemporary" which is now nearly as far removed from our time as the real old west was from the time the books came out.  Like I said, getting the new batch from JVJ inspired me into a scanning frenzy.  And lots of good things still to come:  more Frazetta, some Toth, Gil Kane, more Carlton, and a lot of other neat stories.  Eastern is really a very underrated publisher.