Hey, thanks for sharing that process with us. I will stop and look at a cover and think that looks awesome, but never really think about the huge amount of deliberation and design that goes into them. I guess the best ones don’t pull you out of the moment. Thanks, Jonny.
The process for Five Triangles was more intuitive than usual. The back cover and end papers are very much thought out, mind you.
I agree with you and I don't think covers should necessarily indicate what's inside, so much as inviting that, 'what the fuck?' reaction. It's just about getting someone to pick up the comic.
Interesting read, Johnny. You mentioned Jordi Bernet. Have you read any of the 'Torpedo' books? I believe your boy, Toth had a hand in the earliest iteration of the character.
Aye, I read the early volumes and there's an interesting history to the character. The Toth In-depth podcast discuss that a wee bit. From memory, Toth pretty much quite because he felt uncomfortable with the main character being so evil, particularly the sexual violence.
I assume you have Steranko's CHANDLER: RED TIDE book? I've got a Spansih version that's printed in stark black and white further emphasizing its Noir esthetic.
I've tried to get hold of it over the years, but it's proved elusive thus far. I did manage to get his Outland adaptation, which is also dripping with sci-fi noir in a way that the film doesn't. Outland also makes me wonder if Steranko dug Williamson. On that, the Star Wars newspaper strip also has a sci-fi look. A lot of this is in the inks.
Perhaps the fabled reprint of RED TIDE will one day appear -- probably best not to hold your breath though. The original was done as both a digest size and an "album" format -- the latter of which was literally snatched out of my hands at a comic mart back in the 90s. The OUTLAND adaptation is terrific, and again we miss out on a nice hardcover collection that's available in foreign lands. Luckily the complete Williamson STAR WARS material is easily available in a variety of editions.
There's something odd about Steranko's back catalogue and publishing rights. He was a publisher himself for a while, so I assume he's on top of it all. He's a mysterious guy. Now that I think about there's a degree of fool’s gold about noir, the stylistic and thematic trappings are there across a range of genres, but perhaps it has to be firmly located in crime as a genre, not just a theme or framing device. I am a sucker for neo-noir too, Chinatown, The Conversation etc, but Blade Runner dropped it into sci-fi. I need to get Williamson's adaptation of that too!
Hey, thanks for sharing that process with us. I will stop and look at a cover and think that looks awesome, but never really think about the huge amount of deliberation and design that goes into them. I guess the best ones don’t pull you out of the moment. Thanks, Jonny.
The process for Five Triangles was more intuitive than usual. The back cover and end papers are very much thought out, mind you.
I agree with you and I don't think covers should necessarily indicate what's inside, so much as inviting that, 'what the fuck?' reaction. It's just about getting someone to pick up the comic.
Interesting read, Johnny. You mentioned Jordi Bernet. Have you read any of the 'Torpedo' books? I believe your boy, Toth had a hand in the earliest iteration of the character.
Aye, I read the early volumes and there's an interesting history to the character. The Toth In-depth podcast discuss that a wee bit. From memory, Toth pretty much quite because he felt uncomfortable with the main character being so evil, particularly the sexual violence.
Yeah, women don't have a good time of it. There's a lot of that in Spanish and Italian comics.
I assume you have Steranko's CHANDLER: RED TIDE book? I've got a Spansih version that's printed in stark black and white further emphasizing its Noir esthetic.
I've tried to get hold of it over the years, but it's proved elusive thus far. I did manage to get his Outland adaptation, which is also dripping with sci-fi noir in a way that the film doesn't. Outland also makes me wonder if Steranko dug Williamson. On that, the Star Wars newspaper strip also has a sci-fi look. A lot of this is in the inks.
Perhaps the fabled reprint of RED TIDE will one day appear -- probably best not to hold your breath though. The original was done as both a digest size and an "album" format -- the latter of which was literally snatched out of my hands at a comic mart back in the 90s. The OUTLAND adaptation is terrific, and again we miss out on a nice hardcover collection that's available in foreign lands. Luckily the complete Williamson STAR WARS material is easily available in a variety of editions.
There's something odd about Steranko's back catalogue and publishing rights. He was a publisher himself for a while, so I assume he's on top of it all. He's a mysterious guy. Now that I think about there's a degree of fool’s gold about noir, the stylistic and thematic trappings are there across a range of genres, but perhaps it has to be firmly located in crime as a genre, not just a theme or framing device. I am a sucker for neo-noir too, Chinatown, The Conversation etc, but Blade Runner dropped it into sci-fi. I need to get Williamson's adaptation of that too!
It turns out that I wrote about one of the Caniff strips before here: https://cannonhillcomics.substack.com/p/chekhovs-nun. I totally forgot that.