Digital Prepress for Comic Books : The Definitive Desktop Production Guide [Paperback]

Kevin Tinsley (Author), Various (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1999

Digital Prepress for Comic Books is the ultimate reference used by professionals throughout the industry. With over 200 pages, 300 color illustrations, and detailed instructions, this manual will provide the answers and solutions you will need to successfully print a magazine. Whether you are planning to publish your own comics, or want to provide the best reproducible art possible, this item is a must-have for your professional library.

Editorial Reviews

Review

" It is a must have book- well written, easy to understand and filled with examples." -- Comics Corner April 2000

"An extraordinarily knowledgeable guide for getting your cartoon pages off of the drawing board and onto a computer disk" -- The Book Reader Spring/Summer 2000

"Recomended for anyone working in comics." Four star rating. -- Computer Publishing magazine 01/2000

About the Author

Kevin Tinsley is considered to be the leading expert on desktop comic book publishing. With over a decade of experience, he has played a major role in the transformation of the entire industry. He currently works as a prepress consultant and separator for several major companies.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Stickman Graphics (November 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0967542308
• ISBN-13: 978-0967542300
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.2 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,148,071 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars "Quark Xpress and Photoshop Four Comic Books", February 2, 2005

By 

TW (Austin Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Digital Prepress for Comic Books : The Definitive Desktop Production Guide (Paperback)

This book is more a specialized "how to" manual for specific software than a "definitive guide" for computer owners who want to make comics.

It is assumed by the author that the reader has three programs: Photoshop, Illustrator, and Quark Xpress. No other programs are ever mentioned, if you use anything else, this book was not written for you.

The author provides excellent information about how printing in color works, his hints on getting your colored artwork to look good on paper (as opposed to on your monitor) make "Digital Prepress for Comic Books" a worthwhile investment.

The book is, however, plagued with childish spelling errors--"there" instead of "their," "use to" instead of "used to" etc. Considering the cost of the book, it could have benefitted from a proofreading.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you read something read this!!!, August 11, 2003

By 

Andres Ontaneda Mena "the_comic_maker" (where im needed) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Digital Prepress for Comic Books : The Definitive Desktop Production Guide (Paperback)

Ok I'll be brief because my written English is not so good. If want to actually print your comics and you own or have access to Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop then this book is very useful to you. The book explains pre-press procedures so that you can understand how to get the juice out of your work. Now, the information is very technical so I wouldn't recomend this book to people that are not really interested in taking comics seriously. There is a fair amount of lettering tips in Illustrator and a huge amount of information about improving your scans and "retouch" your work in digital format. It also contains a chapter on Quark Xpress to achieve a good composition (having worked in comics myself I know this chapter is important).

Bottom line: If you are an independent comic book artist with a small staff and you want to do the pre-press yourself then this book is a must. If you are only interested in the area of color and lettering then "maybe" you should get this book, it will definitely help you, thats for sure. Please also note that this book will not teach you how to pait using Photoshop but it will show you how to balance and work with color FOR PREPRESS.

He could have used another penciller for the examples but thats just my opinion. :)

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic resource for a small niche audience, July 2, 2001

By 

Mike Mitchell (Houston, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Digital Prepress for Comic Books : The Definitive Desktop Production Guide (Paperback)

This book is a serious, long tutorial for people interested in printing their own comic books. Fortunately, the topic is fun and is jam-packed with illustrations and screen shots, so it's still fun to read.

Author Kevin Tinsley doesn't spend too much time dwelling on theory and generalities, but some people without a background in printing might think so. Trust me (I was a professional typesetter and commercial graphic designer for more than a decade), you NEED to know this stuff to get great results from your printers. Also, knowing this stuff will definitely save you money because you'll be able to do it yourself instead of having to pay someone to do it for you.

Step-by-step instructions are provided for every topic covered, so you'll need two costly peices of software to follow along and get the most out of this book: Adobe Photoshop 5.0 (or higher) and Quark XPress 4.0 (or higher). These are professional applications that are considered industry standards. Even so, the general concepts are so well covered that you should be able to complete the tasks with less costly software like Corel Draw and Microsoft Publisher. Just don't be too surprised if your results don't quite match those of the pros.

Without a doubt, one of the best chapters is about how to color artwork. Tinsley explains, in detail, how to scan in your artwork, place it on a top layer in Photoshop, and apply dramatic gradients to breath life into the art so it leaps off the page. This chapter -- and the one on ink and color -- makes this book a "must have" for anyone interested in comics. By the way, it's also one of the better introductions I've read for dealing with Process color, in general, so this book is valuable for anyone interested in doing their own typesetting and prepress work.

(By the way, there are a bunch of typos and this book would have benefited from a skilled editor, but nevertheless, this is an extremely niche publication and we're all lucky it exists at all.)

Mike Mitchell Houston, Texas