[Drahken]

Up through the late 80s nearly all american comics were still being printed on low quality paper, with very flat colors and printing quality so low that you could see the dots from 15 feet away. Then suddenly, in the very early 90s, the entire industry seemed to simultaneously make a huge leap forward in quality. Paper stock shot up in quality, printing became infinitely smoother, and coloration got much more depth via smooth gradients & shadows. I didn't take notice of the suddenness of it all at the time, but looking back at comics of the era it really stands out.
While quality improvement over time is to be expected, it's normally very gradual. Does anybody know why thisleap was so sudden, and so industry-wide? (One would expect one publisher to leap forward, then another to say "damn, we're losing sales, we'd better improve quality too", yet this change seemed to happen with almost all publishers at the same time.)

[positronic1]

Up through the late 80s nearly all american comics were still being printed on low quality paper, with very flat colors and printing quality so low that you could see the dots from 15 feet away. Then suddenly, in the very early 90s, the entire industry seemed to simultaneously make a huge leap forward in quality. Paper stock shot up in quality, printing became infinitely smoother, and coloration got much more depth via smooth gradients & shadows. I didn't take notice of the suddenness of it all at the time, but looking back at comics of the era it really stands out.
While quality improvement over time is to be expected, it's normally very gradual. Does anybody know why thisleap was so sudden, and so industry-wide? (One would expect one publisher to leap forward, then another to say "damn, we're losing sales, we'd better improve quality too", yet this change seemed to happen with almost all publishers at the same time.)

Not really. It's probably a little-known fact that Marvel acquired Malibu Comics in the 1990s specifically for their digital coloring technology, which was in advance of what Marvel had available at the time. Fans definitely appreciated quality production elements like publication design (as proven by leading-edge stuff like The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen in the late 1980s) and better paper and coloring. Yet even these things weren't exactly new to comics -- Britain's The Eagle, and various European comics, had quality paper, printing and coloring decades before any computer tech was available. The beginnings of the internet circa 1990 had a definite effect though, driving sales of personal computers like crazy, and this in turn was pushing the cutting edge of print technology. By no means did we just find ourselves living in a world where the quality of comic book coloring and printing across the industry changed within the space of a year or so. You can find tons of crap quality black and white comics printed on paper just barely above the quality of toilet tissue from 1990. But at the same time, it was independent publishers (First, Eclipse, Comico, Malibu) of the late 1980s that were driving the competition against the big boys, DC and Marvel. It was a gradual rise in the average quality across the board, but competition of course always drives consumerism. DC and Marvel could market and promote their prestige projects in a way the independents couldn't. There were certainly dozens of examples to point to prior to 1990. Besides, with aggregate numbers of comics sales continuing (apart from the speculator boom soon to come) to gently spiral downward all the time due to the shrinking of the newsstand market, the average cost of single unit comics absolutely needed to go UP for the industry to remain economically viable. Fans were willing to part with the cash as long as the product quality was there. It did take some time for the quality of art & writing of the average comic to rise up to the quality of production which was newly available.

[paw broon]

You have it about right positronic. But I'd like to add that as far back as the 1930's, Micky Mouse Weekly was printed on glossy paper. 
However I have to admit to not liking gloss paper on American comics, preferring newsprint. Even really badly produced, off-register printing as from Charlton, for instance, adds to what I consider the charm of old comics.  Some of the glossy paper feels nasty and fingers can mark it. It also makes the comics and the collections much heavier. I do understand the reasoning behind glossy paper but I blanch at the price for 20 pages of work.
There was a recent 5 part series, Tinsel Town, from Alterna Comics printed on matt stock and it was treat to open the comics, feel that lovely paper, inhale the "real" smell of comics and all before reading and thoroughly enjoying a well written and drawn tale.
A completely different experience from that of reading Who Killed The Watcher/Original Sin. I was curious, wanted to know whodunit and yielded to temptation and bought it. The weight of the tpb was a first problem, but I persevered and quite enjoyed the opening chapters, but I slowly but surely became more and more confused with the very complicated plot and timelines. At least I think that was what was happening.
Although none of this has much bearing on glossy paper, apart from the sheer weight of the thing, it does relate to the point about the quality of art and story rising to meet the paper stock.  This was flash, fighty, colourful, violent and very confusing and not a patch on the simple pacing and quality of the storytelling in Tinsel Town.
I've only been reading comics of all sorts for around 65 years and I admit it could be me at fault, but I think not. A lot of comics historically have been poorly written and drawn but an awful lot have been superbly executed, and on newsprint.  It wont come back and I mourn it's passing. Newsprint every time, please. 

[positronic1]

I agree with you, Paw. I like a nice white paper (what they used to call Baxter or Mando), but not the high-gloss, slick paper. Something with a matte finish that absorbs flat colors. Hate it when the paper stock leaves a fingerprint when being held for just a short time. Gloss black paper borders are the absolute worst! That said, the gloss paper is probably a requirement for painted art with full-process color. MARVELS EPILOGUE came out this week, and so did History of the Marvel Universe #1. First time I've bought two Marvel floppy comics in the same week in ages. History didn't need the slick stock though with flat colors. Wish they'd get a better cover stock -- the 'self-covered' comic is super-annoying.

[SuperScrounge]

Well, in 1985 DC was introduced to the Flexographic process which they fell in love with and began printing their books with, although the process wasn't perfect and they couldn't use the old methods of coloring. I seem to recall a Dick Giordano Meanwhile... column mentioning that the old printing process wasn't as bright so if a colorist wanted 75% red he'd ask for 100% red, whereas the new process if you asked for 100% you got 100%.

I think they stopped using Flexographic for a while until the bugs got worked out or another process came along to replace it, so I imagine colorists began stepping up their game and began looking at whatever new coloring/printing processes were coming along.

As for improved paper stock, I think that had to do with Comic Shops and appealing to collectors. I remember DC going to a "hardcover/softcover" plan with three of their books. For around a year Legion, Titans, and Outsiders would have two titles with new stories, then after a year the newsstand versions would reprint the comic shop exclusives kind of like how book publishers would have a fancy hardcover and a year later the same story came out in paperback. I believe the comic shop versions had the more expensive paper stock.

[positronic1]

Well, in 1985 DC was introduced to the Flexographic process which they fell in love with and began printing their books with, although the process wasn't perfect

As I recall, it was pretty much universally reviled by the fans, and they stopped using it after a couple of years. Water-based inks and plastic plates. Lots of funny effects with uneven spreading of the ink and parts of the plastic plate not contacting the paper.

[crashryan]

I remember the Flexographic days, also known as "Every company a Charlton."

[SuperScrounge]

Something I hadn't considered before was the home computer. By the late '80s/early '90s we had computer coloring studios showing up in credits, so clearly computer art programs was a factor in the jump in quality.

[The Australian Panther]

In OZ, we had British and American and what was left of the Australian Comic Industry all on sale at the same time. Often of the same title. The British Comic Papers were, printwise, generally superior to the American. Many were in colour and on better paper. The Disney books which were Dell in the US were reproduced in Australia in colour and on Magazine quality paper and were much superior in visual quality to the US Dells. I had a copy of a Stan Pitt 'Silver Starr' printed on this paper. Beautiful Job - one of the few comics I seriously regret not having anymore.
Some of the new inks and papers in the late 80's and 90's left me cold. Too garish. No subtlety. 
But, the real innovation has been the ability of colour comics to show many variations in hues and colours. Regardless of the paper.     
And, yes, Computer Technology probably helped. Colouring has become a real art-form as the current generation of colourers have learned and honed their craft. But Paw, I know where you are coming from with the uniqueness of comics from the era that we have on CB+. The loud, garish, single palate colours  of the Golden age is part of their charm.                         

[paw broon]

I should admit that I don't see colours all that well. I'm not colourblind, more like colour ignorant.  I know there are colours on a page but I don't know what some of them are, nor do I particularly care.  Perhaps that's why I enjoy b&w comics so much. I also get red and green confused and all that stuff about blue and purple; yellow and orange? What is all that about?

[SuperScrounge]

Colouring has become a real art-form                     

It was always an art form, it's just the tools that got better. 

I think Carl Gafford was the first colorist I was aware of, as his work on some early issues of DC's The Warlord really impressed me and he was working back in the old 4-color days.

[Drahken]

In OZ, we had British and American and what was left of the Australian Comic Industry all on sale at the same time. Often of the same title. The British Comic Papers were, printwise, generally superior to the American. Many were in colour and on better paper. The Disney books which were Dell in the US were reproduced in Australia in colour and on Magazine quality paper and were much superior in visual quality to the US Dells.

Umm... Nearly all mainstream US comics were produced in color, other than low budget reprints like marvel's "essential..." line. Color has always been an essential characteristic of comics here (mainstream ones at least), which is likely why b&w became a calling card of indpendant & underground comix "we don't need your fancy colors, nor your establishment", though comics printed in magazine format (larger & generally on higher quality paper, targetting a non-kid audience & bypaassing the comics code) such as mad magazine & heavy metal magazine were also in b&w.
The del disney ones in particular were always in color (other than the single page gags inside the front & back covers). It sounds like maybe some compnay (either the original publishers or some 3rd party company) was reprinting american comics on b&w for export to aus?

[The Australian Panther]

Nearly Right,

All the American content ( principally DC) was licensed by local companies for publication in OZ. It would have been the local companies choice to reprint them as cheaply as possible. That's why the DC stuff was printed in 100 page black and white anthologies. They just didn't care. But hey, you got a good 100 page read for 2 shillings. Some of them were reprinted in colour in the 50s', but that was pretty cheap colour. The best local reprints were the Disney titles which were printed on Magazine paper and in colour. Which is why the Australia Disney books would be worth collecting. Oh, and the Archie books were the US original versions too.
I think Atlas books were probably banned because of our stringent 50's censorship, I never saw a Marvel comic till the early 60's. And they were US imports, and then only some titles, which is why I took out subscriptions to titles I couldn't get in my first year of paid work. [Unfortunately Marvel sent out subscription copies folded in half, which meant their value as collectors items was limited.
We also had to put up with the Black and White English imports, which were also marketed here, probably 'dumped' actually.     

[paw broon]

As all of you will know from our files here, many British comics were b&w, or 2 colour. American comics were rare unless you were close to a US military base or your relations in N. America sent you the odd book. Companies such as T&P and Alan Class and others had reprint rights to American books and published them in 68 page comics, sightly smaller size than American comics which slowly thinned down. There were anthology titles and dedicated titles, e.g. Mr. District Attorney and Gangbusters. All in b&w.
Just like Panther, we had access to lots of American material, just not in colour.
Dell reprints in the UK were published by WDL and every page was in colour unlike Dells where the ibc was in b&w, and on thicker paper. 
As for Marvel and DC, we also had spotty distribution.  You didn't know if the next issue of a title would appear in the newsagents. These were the american originals in some cases stamped with a British price or overprinted in the USA with the sterling price.
Almost all of our pocket libraries were b&w - again you'll see that from our files - but a few titles, Radar for instance, were printed with alternate pages in colour and b&w.  Radar was an original Italian title.  Many of the smaller pocket library publishers reprinted Spanish and Italian stories.

[positronic1]

comics printed in magazine format (larger & generally on higher quality paper, targetting a non-kid audience & bypaassing the comics code) such as mad magazine & heavy metal magazine were also in b&w.

Not entirely accurate. The early MAD started out as a US standard-format color comic, then switched to a b&w magazine format (thus escaping the scrutiny of the Comics Code Authority) for most of its publishing history, but after officially becoming a DC Comics publication, it switched to color (and later started carrying -- BLECCH! -- advertising). And of course, as with the color comic book format MAD, the b&w magazine also inspired a hoard of imitators, most notably SICK (edited by Joe Simon) and CRACKED (the longest-running of all the MAD wannabees).

HEAVY METAL (and its Marvel counterpart, EPIC) were in full color on quality paper from the very start. I suspect you're confusing those with the Warren Publications comic magazines (CREEPY, EERIE, VAMPIRELLA, THE SPIRIT, 1984, THE ROOK, GOBLIN, and others) and/or Marvel's attempt in the 1970s to take a bite out of Warren's market with such titles as SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN, DRACULA LIVES, MONSTERS UNLEASHED, DEADLY HANDS OF KUNG-FU, and UNKNOWN WORLDS OF SCIENCE FICTION (among others), which were in b&w, and on very cheap newsprint (but perhaps a little heavier paper than those later 1970s/1980s color comic books). But even the Warren magazines were known to carry color insert sections on occasion. HEAVY METAL continues (still in full color magazine format) even to this day, although with sales greatly diminished from its glory years, the early 1980s, and now under the editorial aegis of Grant Morrison.

As for Marvel, moving from the 1970s into the 1980s, most of their b&w magazine line had been cancelled, with the notable exception of the seemingly-unkillable SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN. The NBC TV series THE INCREDIBLE HULK starring Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno inspired Marvel to launch the b&w RAMPAGING HULK magazine, but with issue #10, this was converted to a color magazine with the shortened title THE HULK! -- in which format it lasted to issue #27. After EPIC magazine, Marvel's b&w line was diminished to just SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN, and the occasional short-lived experimental title. MARVEL PREVIEW, a rotating showcase-style b&w title which had begun in the 1970s, was changed to BIZARRE ADVENTURES in 1981 with its 25th issue, but with the (Feb. 1983-dated) 34th issue (and the first to be in full color), the title was cancelled. Marvel seemingly had better success in the 1980s with a line of color one-shot movie adaptations under the sequential banner of MARVEL SUPER SPECIAL, and the MARVEL GRAPHIC NOVEL series which were essentially squarebound, cardboard-covered magazines with no advertising or editorial matter, featuring a single long story of 50 pages or so (but still sequentially numbered and maintaining a regular publication schedule). Oddly or not, Marvel chose not to use the Graphic Novel line to showcase its most popular characters or titles (with some few exceptions), instead concentrating on a mixture of 2nd-tier characters and entirely original one-shots. It seems like they were probing to see which characters in their catalog that had met with relatively lesser success as a standard-format color comic might not prove to be more successful with an older audience that had more spending money.

[Drahken]

I'm aware that mad started out as a color comic, but it was a very short run, for the vast majority of it's existance, mad has been a magazine and during it's magazine days it was in b&w.

As for heavy metal, I was partially mistaken. Heavy metal had a fair ammount of b&w comics in each issue, for some reason my memory was playing tricks on me and making me think the whole thing was b&w.

These days my comic reading is 90% manga, which is almost exclusively b&w. Manga have the occaisional full color splash page, a very rare few are published in color, and then there are manga webcomics which are often in color, but are otherwise exclusively b&w.

[positronic1]

These days my comic reading is 90% manga, which is almost exclusively b&w.

I'm a big manga fan now too. I always liked it, but lost track somewhere along the line in the mid-to-late 1990s when formats and genre content began to morph radically from the earlier days. About 5 or 10 years back, I really started to tire of the same-old, same-old Marvel/DC stuff and started getting back into manga pretty heavily. I'd read more if more were available in English (especially the older, classic manga creators). To a large extent, content from Japan is being pre-filtered by editorial choices, so that I can't always get the kind of stuff I'd be dying to read. Reprints of Osamu Tezuka's work and certain more modern stuff like One-Punch Man  and Tiger & Bunny is what got me hooked on it again. I'm now of the opinion that the Japanese do their version of superhero comics better than current American comics do, plus there's lots of other good stuff out there.

[Walter Loyd Lilly]

...I presume the OP here knows of how basically ALL American (and exclusive Canadian-market? Mexican? Not sure. Rooted pre-NAFTA, certainment.) standard comic books' interios were printed by one press, World Color Press in Illinois IIRC ~ who also printed every/pretty much Sunday comics section, likewise.
  World Color closed down in 1990 or sor
, do you remember that DC put out several " Goodbye To World Color " specials? ~ Including a previously not-USA-printed stuff SUGAR & SPIKE #99.
  I have lots more to say on this, but, perhaps this will help spark up conversation here!!!!!!!!!

[paw broon]

That's true to a great extent but - and I could be wrong here - Charlton did their own printing in Derby, Connecticut.  And I think Dell comics were printed by Western at Racine Wisconsin and Western also printed comics at Hannibal, Missouri. 
I have to admit that I don't know what "OP" means, unless it's Old Punters

Going back to Drahken and positronic and manga, I'm not a big fan.  There have been a few titles that I enjoyed and followed.  Currently the only title I read is One Punch Man. The manga version of Sherlock was very enjoyable. 

[Andrew999]

Has anyone considered the impact of moving from cheap paper, monochrome or two-tone comics of the sixties and seventies (in the UK at least) to the higher quality stock and full colour comics from the late eighties onwards?

I'm inclined to think that the value-added approach has priced comics out of the hands of younger kids and destroyed the future market for paper-based comics (perhaps that was inevitable anyway). As I child in the sixties, in a working class family, I would buy maybe four-five comics a week with my pocket money and still have a bit left over for sweets - but these days with some comics coming in at around

[paw broon]

I couldn't agree more.  Also, as has been pointed out a few times, there aren't that many British comics produced nowadays.  Where once there were huge numbers of all different sorts of comics available in nearly every newsagents, nowadays they've virtually disappeared.  Actually I can't remember the last time I saw a Commando in any of the local supermarkets.  At least Commando has stuck to non-glossy paper and kept printing in b&w.
But I don't think it was only the move away from newsprint, as young people just seemed to stop buying them.
Perhaps also the move to more realistic or harder, more violent stories actually turned readers off.  They might have preferred to go to the cinema or watch tv.  There is a world of difference between for instance, Flip McCoy, The Floating Boy and the stuff in 2000AD.  Old fashioned but quite beautifully drawn by Paddy Brennan.
Actually I loved some of the stories in Warrior - b&w again - and early Marvelman is one of the all time great superhero strips as written by Alan Moore and drawn by Garry Leach then Alan Davis.  Quite superb and up there with Planetary, imo.  More "realistic" and violent, but I could put up with that.  But that all came to nothing and nowadays what is left?  Not a lot.
I think I might have gone a bit off topic.  Sorry.

[Johnny L. Wilson]

I saw this and thought Positronic would find it interesting. For what it's worth, Malibu co-founder Tom Mason stated in an interview: Marvel didn't buy Malibu for its coloring department. After Marvel bought the company, they tried to dismantle the coloring department immediately by bringing in a group of consultants to crunch numbers to prove it was too expensive to maintain. Marvel had a long-term agreement with a coloring house in Ireland and preferred to send books out of house instead of using in-house technology. Also, the head of Marvel's manufacturing department at that time was from the old school and had no idea how computers worked.

Always nice to see a different perspective.

[The Australian Panther]

'Young people just seemed to stop buying them' - One reason not considered here is economics. In Oz, the magazine distribution is a nation-wide monopoly, the distributor has no interest in titles or individual magazines, just overall numbers. That's been the case since the 70's. So the newsstand prices of comics were ridiculous, way higher than US prices and that put them out of the hands of children's ability to buy them. At the same time the comic exclusive shop was born, hardcore fans stopped buying comics at Newsagents and so distributors looked at the numbers and comics virtually disappeared from Newsagents. Except for FREW comics, which is a different story. They controlled their own prices and remained competitive. 
In the present day, the generation that is in their teens and goes to comic book movies, doesn't read print. I have a Nephew who is a computer engineer and he won't read a book if I suggest one to him. He will say " If you want me to look at an area and learn something, recommend a podcast, I won't read a book." And he has a University Degree and is quite literate. In the 60's the print run for a US comic was between 200,000 and 300000, which given the total population of the US, and the fact that some of that print run was destroyed and some was distributed outside of the US, is not a great number. Huge tho, if you compare those figures to current print runs.
'Going back to Drahken and positronic and manga, I'm not a big fan.  There have been a few titles that I enjoyed and followed.'
Seems to be a generational thing. Manga seems to be bigger than conventional 'Western Comics' for the current generation. Check out the new release Titles each week on ComicVine, (the one thing comicvine is still good for), there will be several pages of Japanese comics. The art and design style doesn't appeal to me, but when I'm introduced to a series from other media (TV or Movies) I will take a look at a printed version. I particularly like 'APPLESEED' and 'INITIAL D' which I was introduced to (yes) by the excellent movies.           

[Ed Love]

I wonder if the change could be related to what was going on with newspapers at the time. With the USA Today newspaper competing with almost every newspaper across the board and with it's better printing, better paper stock, and massive use of colors - newspapers had to up their game. Which meant transferring from being printed on newsprint on letterpresses to being printed on either offset or flexographic presses which required a slightly better, stronger stock of paper. About the same time that newspapers were undergoing this revolution, you also had photoshop coming into its own as a photographic editing and toning software, quickly becoming the industry standard. The software and the printing combination allowed for more to be done with color and more easily than before such as subtle gradations in colors. I was working in pre-press at a daily newspaper and was in the thick of these transitions between the old way and new ways of printing as well as being part of one of the first newspapers to publish the daily paper online in addition to print. For those that lament of the good ole days, this means that there are fewer printing presses out there that are able to print on the older newspaper stock and fewer suppliers of said newsprint.

I am always curious about the problems DC had with flexographic printing. That's what my newspaper went with in the early 90s. The resolution quality was a little less than offset and didn't allow to the edge of the paper printing. But, those differences would have been minimal especially for comics at the time. Also, the inks were water based so more environmental friendly in terms of waste and clean-up, the pages dried faster and more complete and you didn't get that gray residue on your fingertips when handling the newspaper (the easiest way to tell the difference between a newspaper printed on a flexo vs offset press). I could only figure DC's problems meant that people were doing something wrong, and had less to do with the printing press and more on how they were handling the computer separations.

[SuperScrounge]

Was indexing my issues of Comics Scene at the GCD and in issue 49 they have an article on colorist Steve Oliff (Olyoptics) and his career. He mentions that DC was a champion for full-color 1986-1989. In 1988 he started working on Akira and within six months World Color Press was using a computer coloring system, but it was Image that made every other publisher start using the full-color process (rather than the old 4-color process).