Keskustelujen arkisto

I wanted to speak about a matter in a very complex universe such as
Disney's one, which is complex because of the many different cartoons,
films, comics, and other stuff, which has been created, and whose creators
didn't know about other creators' point of view. I'm going to tell you how I
do to come through with that; here is how I class my priorities:
- the Duck universe before the Mouse universe, and the Mouse universe before
the forest's universe.
- Barksian Facts, then DonRosa's facts, then Gottfredson's facts, then
Scarpa's facts, then Talliaferro's facts, then Vanhorn's facts
-old comics before today's comics, excepted for DonRosa's comics
-comics before drawings and paints
-dawings and paints before cartoons
-cartoons before films
-films before series
-DonRosa's, Barks', Scarpa's... drafts
-drafts before videogames and others...
-original versions before censored versions

>>>>about the colors :
all that is Black in a comic is black
for the other colors, consider first the paintings' colors, then the film's,
cartoon's and series', then the others...
if, in the original script, a character say that a thing is red, but that
ythe thing is green in the comicbook, its real colour is red

I consider the hidden Mickeys as real things, even if DonRosa says it is a
joke
When, in the early Gyro Gearloose's stories and others, I see that
Mousetonians (Morty and Ferdie) are used although Barks first wanted to put
Ducks instead
but wasn't allowed to by his publisher,
, I consider them as Mousetonians, and the same thing for DonRosa: Fethry IS
Eider's son. Nobody has said how Ludwig and Donald were related, that's why
I believe DonRosa about Ludwig being Matilda's husband.
But I don't say the stories which don't agree with Barks', DonRosa's... are
apocryphal. I think cartoons and other are films shot in Duckburg with
Mousetonians and Duckburgians actors (not necessarily Donald and Mickey:
sometime it's them, sometime it isn't... I think only the films until 1942
are done with THE Donald, and all the films until 1953 are with THE Mickey
Mouse, but I'll speak again about that later...), and that comics
adaptations of cartoonsand comics which take place after 1967 or comics
which interfere with Barks'.... are comics or roman-photo (here, a french
word. I dunno how you call that in english and if you have those things in
America. Those are like comics, but with photographs. Those are photographs
with speaking bubbles...), drawn by Duckburgians artists.

I wanted to ask to DonRosa: why did you keep the name "Fanny" for gus'
mother? (not a complaint, here, I am happy you did so, it was enough
complicated like that :-) ...)
I also wanted to ask him, and to the others who only believe in Barks/Rosa
universe, if he/they believe that the letter Barks sent to Scarpa with a
picture of Scrooge and Brigitta, giving him ideas for the story "The Money
Perfume", should be considered as a Barksian Fact.

Good Week!
Gilles MAURICE

OLAF SOLSTRAND, 16-04-2001:

> I'm quite sure my next story will be a story where $crooge, Donald and
> HD&L goes to Oak Island to search for the treasure which is hidden there
> (I need some more research on that story, I'm not 100% updated on the
> Oak Island mystery),

I'm told that a Duck story about the Oak Island theme already has been
published. I have no idea where and when, though. (Is there someone here
who remembers having read that story? I've never seen it myself.)

This was at the time, possible in 1995/1996, when I suggested the Oak
Island mystery as story idea to Dutch scripter Frank Jonker. As the Dutch
weekly mostly seems to be interested in Dutch stories of about 4 to 10
pages, I don't know if Frank still considers Oak Island as a story idea.
(I even don't know if Frank knows that there already seems to be a
published Oak Island story.) I can ask him about it, if you're interested.

I look at the Oak Island theme as being a very difficult one, because the
island's history itself already seems to be a comic book story. In the
early 1990s, I read about Oak Island in a Dutch 1970s book about unsolved
mysteries. As the book already was about 20 years old, I thought that the
mystery must have been solved in the mean time, but then I saw a TV
documentary which very much surprised me. According to this documentary
the island was STILL full of competing frustrated treasure hunters having
claims on the island! So, I'm very curious how this situation is today,
about ten years later.

According to the 1970s book there has never really been proof of a treasure
actually being hidden on the island. At least until that time, treasure
hunters only have managed to find one small piece of gold (from a
neck-lace?).

As most treasure hunters got bankrupt, my story idea suggestion was about
Scrooge loosing a fortune in his endless attempts to find the mysterious
treasure. Like a gambler, who keeps on believing that his next coin might
be the one that finally gives him the jackpot. (Resulting in a LOT of coins
being that very next coin, but NONE of them resulting in getting the
jackpot.)

Maybe there are internet sites with up-to-date information about the
history of Oak Island? Sites about unsolved mysteries or lost treasures,
for example?

Best wishes,

--- Daniel

Hello.
Mats from Sweden here.
I am baying and selling Carl Barks litho.
Go to my webpage at.
http://home3.swipnet.se/~w-31333/Carl%20Barks%20Litografier.htm
If you want to sell or bay any litho please let me know.
The litho on my webpage is for sale mail me for price.
Have a great day.

>Hmmm...... all this reference to a postal code for
>Duckburg is too much for the philatelist which I am to
>resist delving into. (Any other Disney
>comic-collecting philatelists out there on the list?)

 
I used to be a philatelist...but I was getting stamps far faster than I had time to organize and mount them, so in the end I put that hobby away and focused solely on my comic collection (I once put together a donald duck stamp exhibit for a show). Phillotellics is a hobby for people with far more spare time than me.....
 
Rebecca Ridout
 
See you, Space Cowboy..... Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com

(If you're not interesting in scanning pictures, you might want to skip
this message.)

DONALD MARKSTEIN to OLIVIER, 18-04-2001:

>> [Gottfredson?] (Yes, I intend to scan a few strips, but it takes a lot
>> of time to scan them-- the image rarely runs parallel to the paper so it
>> take several scans to get it right-- and to clean them up-- as sharp and
>> as true b&w as possible , not fuzzy dark gray & yellowish white)

If a scan of b/w (monographic) or greyscale art looks slightly yellowish,
it might be useful to turn the scan into greyscale with the software. In
the result, the yellowish paper will look white, while the b/w or
greyscale art still looks the same.

> Get newer software! Most graphics software nowadays allows you to rotate
> the image in fractions of a degree, so you can straighten it out without
> taking the time to re-scan it.
>
> As for cleaning up the images -- I take the point of view that the
> computerized image never contains truer information about the original,
> than when it first comes out of the scanner.

Agreed. I think that if a scan of a rare publication is retouched, it
should be *mentioned*. A retouched scan doesn't give true information
about how an original comic really looked.

But, I also look at *rotating* as cleaning up the image. If the scan
doesn't have enough detail ("dots per inch"), mismatching lines can
be seen in the rotated result (depending on the software and the
options used).

In general, this is how I make scans:

First, I clean the glass, which is THE way of avoiding the most
unnecessary specks: the ones created by the scanner itself.

- A loose paper: I put the paper on the scanner's glass, keeping it on
it's place with a thick *white* carton. (Coloured carton will shine
through the paper.) When I close the lid, the air between the glass and
the lid will not move the paper, because of the white carton's weight.

- A thick book or comic album: I put the book/album on the scanner, with
another heavy book on it. I *don't* close the lid. While scanning I
manually push the material against the glass. If the book used as weight
is heavy enough, this pushing will not move the image while it is
scanned. I avoid looking at the scanner being at work. The times
I didn't weren't very pleasant experiences for my eyes. :-)

If scans are put on internet, it's also important to pay attention to the
scan's compression (the type and the software used for it).

Though GIFs are often being used for scans of comics, these comics are
mostly reproduced more faithfully with a good *JPEG* compression, because
these scans have more in common with a full colour picture than with the
GIF format which is limited to only 256 tones (trying to simulate the
pallet's in-between colours when the dithering-option is checked).

My experience is that with comic book scans, a good JPEG compression gives
a smaller file-size with a better result than a GIF-compression.

GIF compression works best if areas of colour *really* (absolutely) are
the same. If they are and match with the GIF's pallet, making dithering
unnessesary, then the compressed result is identical to the original
(but with a smaller file size).

If a monographic (line art) or 256 tones scan is being shrunk in (image)
size with software, then first give the scan a full colour property
(before shrinking it). Otherwise the shrunk image art will look distorted,
having mismatching lines, etc.

> Everything else -- brightening it up, adjusting the contrast,
> de-specking, etc. -- is something YOU add. Of course, you want it to
> look as good as possible, but if you concentrate on just getting the
> material out, the person downloading it can do the add-ons for himself,
> to his own taste.

Depending on available webspace (and spare time) it's also possible to
use a cleaned up image for website presentation, with a link to the scan
as it came out of the scanner (or, if found on internet, as it was
downloaded).

Best wishes,

--- Daniel

THIERRY FERNAND to OLIVIER, 19-04-2001:

> At this point I think this is a matter of wordings and what people mean
> by "the real father of Donald Duck". Donald's fathers are of course the
> authors of the first Donald cartoons (I don't mind about the earlier
> ducks that appear here and there in children books and such).
>
> Carl Barks began to "build" his Donald Duck in 1943 ("Donald Duck
> Finds Pirate Gold" doesn't count IMhO, this is a cartoon recycled
> product).

In a 1978 article, Barks said about "Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold":

"'Pirate Gold' proved to the publishers that Donald didn't have to be in
constant turmoil in order to be interesting. His bungling mistakes and
his blissful innocence of danger and of being outrageously victimized
proved just as amusing as his tantrums. He came off great in a
sympathetic role, and his brattish little nephews came off equally
great as the 'brains' of the family.

The comedy situation of Donald the reckless bungler getting into hopeless
troubles from which he is extricated by his sharp-witted, suspicious-
natured nephews was competently developed in this story, and it has
carried on into many tales of high and not-so-high adventures ever
since."

Quote is taken from Carl Barks article(?) "Foreword", published by
Walt Disney (page 13-14). These are all the credits I know at the
moment.

> If you except those versions, Barks' is THE version of Donald Duck
> that artists followed. In my opinion, it does not mind that Barks
> started to draw stories even 10 or 20 years after the character was
> created, because he imposed his version like no other artist / author
> ever did.

Donald was created in 1934. Shortly after Barks started working at the
Disney Studio, his barber gag for the 1937 "Modern Inventions" cartoon
already had a big influence on Donald's popularity. This is explained
in The Carl Barks Library, set 7.

So, if even though Barks isn't Donald's father, he at least has been
one of the persons standing beside the cradle.

Best wishes,

--- Daniel, who still hasn't the slightest idea about the quote quiz below.

"Don't worry! *We* ' ll get you out!"
(Barks story; hint: not a 10-pager. Quiz submitted by Olivier.)

>HARRY + PETRI:
>
>
>> I have the impression that it's mostly Martina who wrote stories
>> like that. [...]
>
>That might be, and let me give you perhaps the worst/best example that
>supports this theory:
>
>I TL 604-A, "Zio Paperone e il biliardo da un miliardo" written by the
>same Martina and drawn by "master of quarrels" Giulio Chierchini.
>
>In this story Scrooge, Donald and Ludwig litteraly *steals* gold coins
>hidden within an old billiard table. The Beagle Boys take photos of the
>event and try to blackmail the ducks, but that's about all the illegal
>thing they do. At the end the Beagles go to jail, and Scrooge gets "his"
>gold coins.

This story appeard in Germany in : Lustige Taschenbuecher No. 20.
If anybody can read German I have a double issue to give away as a gift
for a Disney fan. Please contact me privatly.

best wishes

Helmut