Nice while it lasted.
So I came across this flyer sent out to retailers in 1995: DC Comics describing the new paper stocks and formats for their books:
(You can click that to make it larger, if you so desire.)
I remember a time when I was really into the whole “paper stock”/price levels thing, particularly back when I was fan prior to ascending into Comics Retail Heaven. “Sure, the standard DC Comics are now 75 cents, but look at this nice white Mando paper on these Atari Forces!” And of course there was Baxter paper for DC’s $1.50 (or occasionally more) books, but that extra expense was well worth it for the thicker paper and better, clearer printing and bright coloring (which took ’em a bit to figure out so that it wasn’t too bright.) (And let us not speak about Flexographic printing.)
Now by the time we got to the mid-1990s, I wasn’t paying that much attention to paper stock names and such, aside from missing the good ol’ days of just plain ol’ Baxter and Mando paper. A couple of these paper/format types I either forgot or just didn’t know in the first place. But “Miraweb” is a name I already knew:
…though I associated that with Frank Miller’s Ronin from a decade earlier, but I might be remembering that incorrectly. But I do recall these comics, particularly the Superman books, suddenly getting printed on really shiny paper (and priced at $1.95). It was an attractive package, with clear and colorful printing and felt like it was worth the price.
Okay, I didn’t remember the name “Fracote” gettin’ thrown around:
…but I honestly can’t recall any significant difference to the texture or printing of these titles. Granted, I wasn’t reading a lot of these specific books at he time (I did have those Babylon 5 books), but I don’t recall ever thinking “wow, look at this paper stock!” or anything.
“Rebax” feels new to me too:
…and I don’t believe I thought anything about the paper stock here either. I mean, aside it was nice and presented the art well, but at some time between being a fan in the mid-1980s and working behind the counter in the mid-1990s my concern with what these things were being printed on dissipated beyond “is this readable and colored well?”
Right now, I couldn’t tell you the paper stock of any comic book being currently published, unless something is just obviously printed on newsprint. I do wonder occasionally, like that recent G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero omnibus is massively thick but incredibly light. That paper has no weight to it, and yet seems sturdy and presents the artwork quite well.
What I notice more nowadays is the paper being used for covers. The real nadir of this was Gladstone using “self-covered” comics, where the cover was the exact same stock as the story pages inside. Like torn covers? This is for you!
And a number of comics today, particularly from the Big Two, have cover stock that is…not the most durable. I mean, sure, DC will ding you an extra buck for the cardstock variants, but for most comic covers the quality can vary. Sometimes the paper is slick, sometimes it’s barely slicker, sometimes it feels like it should be interior page stock (though still a little thicker, but not much more so, than the pages inside the specific comic)…it’s just all over the map.
This is an interesting artifact of the time, one you don’t see today, of retailers ballyhooing their printing quality. Comics look quite nice now, certainly much improved over what our caveman ancestors had to tolerate. But I kind of like not knowing stuff like the specific manufacturer name of the paper used. Just make it legible and somewhat durable, that’s all I ask.
And by the way;
…no, comic retailers are never satisfied. It’s just our nature.
This is jus the kind of comics publishing minutia that I adore. My awareness of what the big 2 was up to had kind of petered out when these marvels of pulp technology were unleashed. Reading through the Milestone books a couple of years ago, I can confirm that they did spend at least 1 editorial column praising the lines paper and color processes.
I think you may be confusing Miraweb with Ronoweb (sp?). My recollection is that Ronin tested several versions of Ronoweb over its run. One of those paper stocks ended up becoming the Dark Knight/Prestige format paper. I think it was Ronoweb 4. Dick Giordano wrote about it in a “Meanwhile” column at some point. I would guess that column came out around the time that “prestige format” was codified with Longbow Hunters.
All of this is from ancient memory and my efforts at fact checking while writing this have come up with nothing.
IIRC, it was around this time that Marvel started printing two different editions of certain X-books (e.g. Uncanny #319), with different paper quality and price points (the higher cost editions were labelled as ‘deluxe’). It didn’t last too long, as customer dollars seemed to prefer the higher cost coupled with better paper.
Thank God Sovereign Seven was printed on the best paper available at the time.
I remember being so impressed with the Prestige format books at DC that I vowed to collect them all. That plan was short-lived mainly because I hadn’t thought through how expensive it would be.
Patrick Joseph – it was “[something]web,” so you’re right, I’m probably confusing the names.
Dave Carter – I also seem to recall the “delxue” X-books hitting the shops about a week or two ahead of the “standard” issues, so that probably helped skew the vote a bit.
@Thom H: “Thank God Sovereign Seven was printed on the best paper available at the time.”
LOL
Which paper made comics virtually impossible to read because of all the glare? I was not a fan of that particular glossy stock. I’m sure the colors looked better, I just couldn’t see them.
Miraweb, Fracote and Rebax sound like the names of rejected Legion of Super Heroes characters
A little print vocabulary for anybody who is interested. “Web” in these names refers to web printing. That means printing from paper on large rolls, which is standard for high volume printing. Pretty much all professional comic book publishers are using web printing. So these other books are probably also printed on web presses, but the company selling the paper decided to not use that as part of the product name.
“Graph” refers to the plates. The infamous flexographic process is unique because of the plastic plates that were cheaper to produce. It is still used for food packaging. Newsprint was honestly a bad choice of stock for those printers (too much grain).
I’ve been reading the Classic X-Men Omnibus recently and I think the fancy new paper stock in that is terrrrrible for the old colouring.
I recommend anyone interested in paper stock/colours check out José Villarrubia’s image album “From a colorist’s perspective” on Facebook which has hundreds of examples (both good and bad) of old comics that have been reprinted on different paper stock and look considerably different. Relevant to this blog in particular: there are several Swamp Thing examples.
I know I am probably in the minority but I prefer comics on newsprint and at a cheaper price point. I love buying and reading comics, but not saving and collecting them. Newsprint looks right to me. But clearly the industry disagrees and there;s no going back.
Around the summer of 1998, DC changed their strategy from ‘better paper = higher price’ – something they’d been crowing about in pieces like this since the early 80’s – to ‘lower sales = higher price’, regardless of the paper used (see for instance the last 4 or 5 issues of Power of Shazam, which jump from $1.95 to $2.50 for no discernible reason).
Not coincidentally I’d guess, they also stopped listing the paper stock of their titles in their Previews listings at the same time.
I can’t think I’ve seen them go back to singing the virtues of any new paper stock since then and, like you say, these days no-one has any clue what stock these things are printed on.
Bring back Baxter paper I say, those books still look great decades later (though they’d probably all be $10 apiece nowadays)
My understanding of modern newsprint usage is that reduced demand makes it less economically feasible for limited print runs. It’s only cheap when we’re dealing with the circulation of major newspapers but a niche product like comics can’t really bring the price down enough to justify it.
“Mando paper… Baxter paper”.
Is it weird I know different paper types ONLY because of comic books?
“Flexographic printing.”
Was flexo used for anything else? I’ve never seen anything look as LOUD as that. Though think I liked it at the time.
” It is still used for food packaging”.
Ahhhhhhhh. That adds up.
” Reading through the Milestone books a couple of years ago, I can confirm that they did spend at least 1 editorial column praising the lines paper and color processes.”
I guess they had to praise SOMETHING, since the books weren’t worth reading!
“Marvel started printing two different editions of certain X-books”.
Also with the Hulk.
“I remember being so impressed with the Prestige format books at DC that I vowed to collect them all. That plan was short-lived mainly because I hadn’t thought through how expensive it would be.”
And then there was the eventual drop in quality. “This could have been a REGULAR issue of the X-Men!”.
“My understanding of modern newsprint usage”.
That’s my understanding, too. Less profit in mass-producing something that’s not really a Mass market product anymore.
@ Anthony S
If that is the case, I wonder how Alterna Comics –I think that’s the publisher’s name–printed more or less old school style comics on newsprint a few years ago and only charged about 2 bucks a pop for them? Then again, maybe they folded due to publishing costs?
I really wish that old school comics on pulp paper would be revived–even if only for reprints and facsimile editions.
@ Snark Shark
Yeah, prestige format DC comics quickly devolved…I don’t think Omega Men, Vigilante, etc. really needed the Baxter paper–they weren’t that great. And ironically, right around the time New Teen Titans and LOSH went to Baxter paper, they lost Perez and Giffen after only a few issues and those titles were never as great as they had been.
I would like to know what the paper is called that early issues of Marvel Fanfare were printed on–that was some nice
paper!
I did like Mando paper …I think that is what Red Circle/Archie Adventure Series was using for their superhero revival comics of the early ’80s –those had some sharp art by industry legends and really nice coloring by Barry Grossman.
“I don’t think Omega Men, Vigilante, etc. really needed the Baxter paper–they weren’t that great.”
I would bet that was mainly done to set them aside as “mature readers” books, before they had the actual MR label. Make them look different from JLA & Superman, at least.
@ Snark Shark
I believe you are right–the content of Omega Men (most likely meant to compete with The Micronauts), and Vigilante (meant to compete with The Punisher) was very grim and gritty…but I don’t think the stories or art were that great in those series overall, after the first few issues.
Oddly enough, I’ve read the entire runs (possibly minus one or two issues) of both!
Like em, don’t love em. That’s two series (Especially Vigilante), that looked cooler in the DC house ads than the books actually were. Part of my like for them is nostalgia, of course.