The shock for both of us seeing in the original print run of how the K tones jarred against the colour and had none of the subtlety I had intended in my colour guides, then to find out in later years when we were first thinking about digitalizing the colour, that the K tone had also affected Dave’s black plate line work was such a disappointment. When I worked in DC’s offices finalizing the colour files, before the Absolute edition went to press. I could see the dedication from everyone involved it was never just another job for you guys you all cared passionately. It is important that you have done this column to show how much preparation had gone into the Absolute Watchmen from everyone involved.

You made it possible for me to finally show how the Watchmen colour should have looked. Thank you.

As there were only for separation films available, the tones were burnt onto the k film. That’s what caused the problem.

SO, when it was shot and scanned, those tones turned 100% black as well, which created the moire patterns. Everywhere you see an effect of shading in the old reprints, that is what came out as moires. It was not color in the sense of red, blues, greens, and yellows, but a black tone on the b/w art itself.

In essence, the b/w art was line work mixed with gray tones. Those tones turned into dots and lines when digitized. Hope that helps your understanding…

corey

I’m confused though… where did the dots come from originally? Were they part of the inking process? Or the coloring? Were they replaced with new, un-moired dots in the new version or left out?

It has been a career highlight for me, and I’m sure, Emily, Aaron, Hank, Alison, and everyone else involved in the process of doing the Absolute Edition and future reprints! I look back on the time working on the book, and although it was grueling, it was worth EVERY minute, as the final product can attest, and just to be able to say I worked on it was more then enough gratitude we deserved.

I’m glad I was able to finally share what went into the process on our end, and in response to Milo, yes, we at DC LOVE our jobs and we will do EVERYTHING in our power to make ANY comic shine with little to no mistakes. We LOVE these comics as much as the fans, if not more, and we try our best to make sure everything we put out there has our full effort on the production side of things (it’s NOT just a job to us, but a labor of love). But honestly, the artists like Dave make our job very easy and more importantly, FUN, because they are the stars, and they are the most talented artists in the world.

Geoff- I didn’t do the scans myself (that was our film library and scanning department in Pre-Press- who did an amazing job as well), but you are 100% on the money there, yes.

Thanks again for reading the column, everyone (and thank you dad, LOL)!

All my best, and I should have my next column up by TUESDAY!

Until then, take care!

-Corey