valiant comics scanning project?

myron · Post by **myron** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 10:37:34 am

sweet

thanks!

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 10:51:29 am

Now Myron, by downloading the books, you have to promise to tell me what you think. Should I keep doing side-by-side, or split them into individual pages?

This goes for all of you as well! =)

-Dave in IL

magnusr · Post by **magnusr** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:21:25 am

sydcomebak wrote:Now Myron, by downloading the books, you have to promise to tell me what you think. Should I keep doing side-by-side, or split them into individual pages?

This goes for all of you as well! =)

-Dave in IL

First off, very nice work.

For your question I see the choice between the perfect fit you have accomplished (do you have an A3-scanner?) and the freedom of viewing individual pages if wanted. I tried CDisplay also and both there and in Acrobat reader I appreciate the two-page format. I wonder how much of a standard CDisplay is. If there's an advantage in following CDisplay I suggest you do, otherwise I personally liked your PDFs a lot. Then the question remains if the ads are needed or not. Actually I prefer the pure story, but they might be necessary to keep double page images together, so I vote for them.

Thanks,

Magnus

myron · Post by **myron** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:23:08 am

I do like the side by side pdf format...fits almost perfectly on a 17in monitor at 100% size for the reader. Just like having the comic sitting in front of you.

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:47:12 am

magnusr wrote:For your question I see the choice between the perfect fit you have accomplished (do you have an A3-scanner?) and the freedom of viewing individual pages if wanted. I tried CDisplay also and both there and in Acrobat reader I appreciate the two-page format. I wonder how much of a standard CDisplay is. If there's an advantage in following CDisplay I suggest you do, otherwise I personally liked your PDFs a lot. Then the question remains if the ads are needed or not. Actually I prefer the pure story, but they might be necessary to keep double page images together, so I vote for them.

Nope, I use an a4 scanner, fladbed and crop the images and paste them together in photoshop.

The ads... I dunno, I do archiving of historical texts, and people ask me whether I scan every blank page I come across in a manuscrtipt, and my answer has always been "yes." On the one hand, it preserves the book in its entirity, on the other hand, it makes the pdf that much bigger. Kinda neat to see the "coming soon" ads for other comics and for N64 games =)

myron wrote:I do like the side by side pdf format...fits almost perfectly on a 17in monitor at 100% size for the reader. Just like having the comic sitting in front of you.

I know how you feel, I'm in front of a 19 in flat CRT! Perfect!

magnusr · Post by **magnusr** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:57:09 am

sydcomebak wrote:Nope, I use an a4 scanner, fladbed and crop the images and paste them together in photoshop.

I'm very impressed. If it would be possible in Acrobat (and not more work - maybe easier?) to put the cropped images side-by-side as two seperate images still showing up as nicely on the screen, then I'd like that.

Best,

Magnus

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 12:22:31 pm

New scan!

Harbinger#26 - 4.83 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading this file

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 12:25:00 pm

magnusr wrote: I'm very impressed. If it would be possible in Acrobat (and not more work - maybe easier?) to put the cropped images side-by-side as two seperate images still showing up as nicely on the screen, then I'd like that.

actually, that would probably work, but there would be no way of making sure that the 2 pages would line up correctly, and there would be spacing issues as well. I'll play with it though.

qrnd · Post by **qrnd** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 1:18:25 pm

As already mentioned in this thread, I think, the use of CDisplay is perfect for displaying comics.

http://www.geocities.com/davidayton/CDisplay

I use it for all my scans and if you have a mouse with a scroll wheel, than thats all it takes to turn pages, 2 displayed at a time, full screen.

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 3:13:50 pm

Harbinger#00 - 4.19 MB
Harbinger#25 - 4.46 MB
Harbinger#26 - 4.83 MB

New scan!

Harbinger#27 - 5.06 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading these files.

I'll keep the files on the server until Sunday night. After that, I'll have to pull them.

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:10:23 pm

Some of you may have seen the thread about the Weekly comic reading lists over on another room. My thought is to combine it with the scanning project. That way, we can easilly keep people on the same page each week in the valiant universe. It will also enable everyone to eventually download the entire 700+ comics!

The problem is that the first few comics are the ones that are kinda expensive. For example, week 1 is Magnus 0-4. Who wants to break out a perfectly good Magnus #0 and ruin it by flattening it on a scanner and running it over a few dozen times? noone.

my suggestion is to pool our resources. I will gladly take charge of scanning books, and I have several comics to donate to the "ruin a book for all to read" cause. What I don't have is enough. I don't even have a full set, I'm working on that through E-bay and some LCSs.

If you have a comic that you have doubles of, and is in crap shape and or missing a coupon, or whatever, considder donating it to the cause. If we want to, I can give credit for the source of the books as we put them up every week (altering the back cover scan to show the name of the donator)

I really think this can work, people. Think about it. Whether you own all the books or not, this is our chance to get all the storylines out there for the true fans to read. No one is expecting you to donate an entire run of books, but look through your runs for a crappy group of doubles.

Toss your name up here and let's get this party started!

dino · Post by **dino** » Sat Feb 21, 2004 12:36:46 am

Some of you may have seen the thread about the Weekly comic reading lists over on another room. My thought is to combine it with the scanning project. That way, we can easilly keep people on the same page each week in the valiant universe. It will also enable everyone to eventually download the entire 700+ comics!

Sounds like a great idea! I have tons of EW issues in terrible condition that I can donate, including an EW 50 that I would particularly like to get rid of.

skot · Post by **skot** » Sat Feb 21, 2004 9:17:45 am

greg. if you can make a "sticky" about this....
i think it would be nice if we all had a universal templet. so all the books are scaned the same. if not we can just have a free for all. the ones that are done all ready could be converted if needed. so before lets get together and scan.

skot

R Daneel · Post by **R Daneel** » Sat Feb 21, 2004 2:07:05 pm

sydcomebak wrote:
Jaknife wrote:why doesnt this scanning thing become part of the site. i always thought it would be cool to be able to read the comics on the forums, much like what was done with the rai #0 here. like, rereading the valiant universe could actually be a place to read the issues.
I agree, I'll gladly scan my issues and donate them if we standardize the format.

-Dave in IL

Yep, a detailed style guide would be essential to people's time not being wasted!

R Daneel · Post by **R Daneel** » Sat Feb 21, 2004 2:08:30 pm

comicguy wrote:Copying items for one's self is never a problem.

Copying items to give away to other people is not a problem.

Copying items for the purpose of making money is a major problem.

Copying items and getting reimbursed for the material(ie cost of copies) in not a problem.

Tell that to the RIAA and the MPAA!

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Sun Feb 22, 2004 12:41:44 pm

OK. Here's how to get in on the project:

1) Take out a comic of yours that is in what I call "Readable" shape. Kiss it goodby, because it's going down by about 1 grade by doing this

2) Place it on your flatbed scanner several times, scanning EVERY page (including ads) at 75 dpi.

3) Save all pictures in .jpg format naming the files in order.

If you do not have adobe acrobat, you can attach all these files to an E-mail and send them to me: sydcomebak@aol.com

If you do have acrobat, merge facing pages together in a photo editing program, and insert them into a pdf. E-mail the finished pdf to the above address.

If you do not have a scanner, but have lots of crappy copies of books that you can donate to the scanning cause, Send them in any 8.5x11 envelope, with 1 board behind and one in front to keep them from bending tooooo much to:

Comic Scanning Project
175 Saratoga Ct
Vernon Hills, IL 60061

I will scan them in ASAP, unfortunately, I will not be bothering to send them back. I will be labeling them "Scan copy" and placing them in their own longbox.

ALSO: I will be making up an inventory of scanned books and submitting it to the database on this site. That way people will be able to see what has been scanned and what hasn't. It will give people a progress report on the 703 books we need to eventually have done.

BTW, at ~4MB a book, x 703 books = 2812MB worth of books or ~4-5CDs

This is a project the likes of which I have never seen in my archiving history. Good luck to us all!!!

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Mon Feb 23, 2004 12:22:36 am

New scan!

Harbinger#28 - 5.11 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading this file

graybola · Post by **graybola** » Mon Feb 23, 2004 12:28:13 am

Great Scans !!!!! THANKS

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Mon Feb 23, 2004 12:33:09 am

thanks, graybola, one more for you.

Harbinger#29 - 5.41 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading this file

Stay tuned for Harbinger #30 this week!

The Spider · Post by **The Spider** » Mon Feb 23, 2004 1:18:35 pm

sydcomebak wrote:OK. Here's how to get in on the project:

1) Take out a comic of yours that is in what I call "Readable" shape. Kiss it goodby, because it's going down by about 1 grade by doing this

2) Place it on your flatbed scanner several times, scanning EVERY page (including ads) at 75 dpi.

3) Save all pictures in .jpg format naming the files in order.

If you do not have adobe acrobat, you can attach all these files to an E-mail and send them to me: sydcomebak@aol.com

If you do have acrobat, merge facing pages together in a photo editing program, and insert them into a pdf. E-mail the finished pdf to the above address.

If you do not have a scanner, but have lots of crappy copies of books that you can donate to the scanning cause, Send them in any 8.5x11 envelope, with 1 board behind and one in front to keep them from bending tooooo much to:

Comic Scanning Project
175 Saratoga Ct
Vernon Hills, IL 60061

I will scan them in ASAP, unfortunately, I will not be bothering to send them back. I will be labeling them "Scan copy" and placing them in their own longbox.

ALSO: I will be making up an inventory of scanned books and submitting it to the database on this site. That way people will be able to see what has been scanned and what hasn't. It will give people a progress report on the 703 books we need to eventually have done.

BTW, at ~4MB a book, x 703 books = 2812MB worth of books or ~4-5CDs

This is a project the likes of which I have never seen in my archiving history. Good luck to us all!!!

I haven't scanned in a while, but I did get the following scanned a long while ago: Final issues of X-O, Turok, Magnus, and Bloodshot; several issues of Troublemakers and Shadowman VH2.

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Thu Feb 26, 2004 11:27:43 pm

All of these come off my site on Sunday night to make room for the next 4.

Harbinger#0 blue - 4.19 MB
Harbinger#28 - 5.11 MB
Harbinger#29 - 5.41 MB

New scan!

Harbinger#30 - 5.28 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading this file

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 27, 2004 1:02:16 am

New scan!

Harbinger#31 - 5.26 MB

Once again, I suggest the Rt. Click "save target as" method of reading this file

dino · Post by **dino** » Fri Feb 27, 2004 1:11:24 am

sydcomebak! Dude! you are kicking *SQUEE* with these scans

sydcomebak · Post by **sydcomebak** » Fri Feb 27, 2004 2:32:29 am

dino wrote:sydcomebak! Dude! you are kicking *SQUEE* with these scans

Haha! yeah, 8 down, 695 to go?

Hmm... If I scan an average of 2 books per day, I can have all of them scanned in a year with 14 vacation days =P.

ZephyrWasHOT!! · Post by **ZephyrWasHOT!!** » Sat Feb 28, 2004 4:09:44 pm

I'd be happy to contibute scanning, but I'm worried about the legality. Since these books aren't public domain, and someone still owns the rights to reprints, etc, copying and making the items available to the general public without paying royalties could very well result in Napster-like lawsuits. Is it likely? Probably not. COULD it happen? You bet.

And....with regards to Valiant being cool with Fan projects in 1995....that was 1995, and likely they'd never conceived of people scanning in the books and sending them out to the world....for free. Scanners in 1995 were mutli hundred dollar units that every phil, pete, and aric didn't have sitting beside their PCs, and were mostly just commercially used.

Sorry to be a wet blanket and all, but I'm fairly certain it's illegal to do this without written permission from the copyright holders.

Thoughts?

ValiantFans.com Board - Since 2004

valiant comics scanning project?

YW

Re: YW