American manga: I drew Superman in the Great Depression

"Good morning, Colin..."

Positive World, Courier Newspaper.

"Good morning, Jack, good morning, Harry."

Nodding to the two people in the newspaper office, Colin took off his hat, glanced at the drawing paper on the table that was mostly printed with colored ink, and asked with a smile: "How is it, how is the progress?"

"It's almost finished." Sitting in front of the workbench, handing the still-dry ink sketch to Colin, Jack rubbed the corners of his sore eyes and replied, "We have deleted some of the content of the frame and let the entire

The plot of "Superman" has become more compact, and professionals have been hired to color these works. Although this greatly increases the cost of printing, it also makes the entire comic work look more attractive..."

Putting comic strips from newspapers into magazines is not just a matter of printing them.

For the sake of convenience, comic strips are generally in the form of strips, which are the fixed form of four-frame comics.

Now, since it has been decided to move the story of "Superman" to a magazine, the original form of the comic strip will naturally have to be changed. In the past few days, Jack and Harry have been staying at the Courier newspaper for the purpose of bringing the story to the magazine.

The comic content was changed from the original comic strip form to the comic book form.

Reaching out and taking the drawing from Jack, Colin looked at the crude drawing in his hand that still smelled of ink and glue.

Flipping through the manuscript paper, looking at the comic content that had been re-energized after coloring, Colin's eyes finally stopped at the picture at the top of the manuscript paper, which was re-colored by the artist and was wearing a blue tights.

, wearing a red cape and a big "S" mark on the shield logo on his chest, holding a car high above the cover of Superman.

The professionals hired by Jack and Harry were quite skilled in painting, and they also restored the coloring of the comics very well, basically replicating the image of Superman in Colin's impression.

However, when looking at the Superman on the cover in front of him, Colin always felt a little inconsistent in his heart. He always felt that there seemed to be something missing about him on the drawing paper.

"What's wrong?"

Noticing the expression on Colin's face, Jack immediately asked.

"Is there something wrong?"

Without answering Jack's question immediately, Colin flipped through the manuscript in his hand again and carefully confirmed every Superman image depicted on the manuscript paper. Then he closed the manuscript again with a look of surprise and pointed at the cover.

Superman's crotch asked: "I remember that in the comic Superman's appearance, in addition to the blue tights, he also wore a pair of tight shorts, but the artist who colored it didn't seem to draw it on the newly colored Superman.

On the body."

Hearing Colin's reminder, Harry quickly picked up the cover of The Courier and compared it with the colored version in Colin's hand. Indeed, he could vaguely see the shadow of a pair of tight shorts on Superman's crotch. However, maybe

Because of the black and white printing, the appearance of this shadow is not very clear, so the artist ignored this detail when coloring.

"Sorry, I was negligent."

A mistake was made and Jack immediately apologized.

"Do we have to keep this design? I think Superman looks appropriate without wearing tight shorts?"

Comparing the situation of the two covers, Harry on the side put forward different opinions.

Is Superman still Superman without wearing red underwear?

In later generations, Superman wearing underwear has already become synonymous with his image.

However, whether Superman must wear these underwear has always been the focus of debate among readers.

Not everyone likes the look of Superman wearing underwear outside, just like Harry in front of him.

"That's because what you are seeing now is a drawing that has been carefully color-matched by the artist. Naturally, you won't think there is any problem with losing the design of the tight shorts. However, once these comics are put into the factory for mass printing, it will be very difficult.

This ensures that the colors in the later stages will still maintain this quality.”

After hearing Harry's suggestion, Colin didn't wait for him to speak.

Jack, who was on the side, took the lead in rebutting his friend.

During this period, printing methods were generally divided into two types, one was black-and-white printing, which was the method used by The Courier, and the other was color printing, which was limited to the development of technology and cost considerations. The so-called

Color printing, also called four-color printing, uses four colors: yellow, red, cyan, and black to color characters.

Affected by the Great Depression, in order to save costs, factories often chose to use some poorer paper to affect printing.

This approach also leads to a result, that is, the finished products of magazines and periodicals are often much worse than the printed samples. This problem is not obvious in the text, but it becomes particularly obvious once it comes to the characters.

up, especially after a large print run.

This is why early comic characters often have colors overflowing from the outlines of the characters.

In order to cope with this situation, painters at the time would often add shadows or colors to the turning points of the characters, such as the waist, hands and feet, to help readers better understand the character's posture. The red tight shorts on Superman also

It is for this reason that it emerged.

In this way, not only can some character dynamics be shown, but also some unnecessary troubles can be avoided.

After Jack's reminder, Harry realized that he had taken it for granted.

Indeed, once mass printing began, Superman's overall blue shape did give people a sense of incongruity, as if his crotch had nothing at all.

"I'll call the painter over right away to re-edit and color it."

After wanting to understand this, Harry did not hesitate and started immediately.

"No need to bother."

Reaching out to stop Harry's move, Colin picked up a paintbrush dipped in red paint from the table and sketched the iconic red tight shorts on Superman's crotch on the cover.

"Don't forget, I'm also Superman's painter."

Putting down the brush in his hand and looking at the figure of Superman wearing red underwear on the drawing paper, Colin nodded with satisfaction, turned to the two people beside him and said.

…

"...Later, Harry Donnerfield told me that he occasionally thought that if he insisted that Superman not wear those tight shorts at that time, maybe what we saw next would be a completely different Superman.

Image. Of course, we all know that this is impossible, because Colin Looper will definitely stick to his own approach, he is always so confident and determined..."

"To this day, I still regret that I did not witness the scene where Mr. Colin Looper colored Superman, but I am equally proud because I was the first person after Mr. Colin Looper and others to paint Superman.

The person who saw Superman in color never thought at that time that the golden age of American comics would begin..." - Excerpted from "1932 The Golden Age of Comics"

Author: John Walker