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Special Feature
The Dark Half
By Adam McGovern
Published: 2008-03-28
With a new awards program, comics inking is ready for the red carpet
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Inking is perhaps the most influential yet invisible element of the
comics artform — arguably even more so than lettering, since,
while that too is underappreciated in its nuances and skill, the
absence of words would surely be noticed, whereas the often
indispensable process of emphasizing, elaborating on and sometimes
contrasting and improving a star penciler’s work with darkening
media is often overlooked in the shadow of the marquee artist’s
name. This is remedied with the new Inkwell Awards, supported by a
who’s-who of comics talent and spearheaded by inker Bob Almond.
Almond is perhaps best known as one half of an art team with penciler
Sal Velluto, lending sleekness and solidity to Velluto’s
state-of-the-art yet personality-packed pencils. This
industry-standard yet strongly distinctive work makes Almond a good
spokesperson for the subtleties and specialness of the inking artform,
and he talked with CCdC about why the Inkwells’ time has come.
ComicCritique.com: Tell us a
bit about the Inkwell Awards: what they are, what made you feel the
time was right for such a program, who are the professionals involved,
who can vote, and what the categories and nomination process will be.
Bob Almond: The Inkwell
Awards is an awards event to celebrate the art of inking, open to all,
fans and professional community alike. The awards recognize the work
of the often unappreciated and uncredited ink artist. Going against
traditional practice, many collected works are no longer crediting on
the cover the ink artists that were involved. The same omission has
become a practice in solicitations and reprinted sample art where just
the penciler is credited. Also, inkers are sometimes omitted from
convention guest lists and some other awards don’t give inkers
their own category.
Often I would hear frustration from
other professionals about [such] matters but no one would ever come
up with an action plan. So I figured why not, as long as you can do
it in a positive and inspiring manner? So, in my scenario, to
balance this pulling back of the attention toward inking I started
some proactive efforts like contacting venues to assist in properly
crediting artwork and I started my “Inkblots” column
in SketchMagazine. After writing over a dozen
topics I came up with the idea for an inkers-only awards event to
reward our own. My editor Bill Nichols encouraged me to collect
input from my peers and from there I gathered a legion of talents
who shared my resolve. Commercial and ink artist Tim Townsend,
writer Daniel Best, inker and site designer Jimmy Tournas, Bill and
myself make up the core committee group where most of the decisions
and heavy lifting are realized. But we also have in our court the
support of some notable folks like Marvel and now DC editor Mike
Marts and artist supreme Adam Hughes. They oversee the process and
assist if there’s a need to vote or decide on something. But
most importantly, their involvement lends a nonpartisan
respectability to our message.
The categories are as follows:
• Favorite Inker:
a) Retro (golden, silver and bronze age
artists)
b) Modern (’90s to present)
• Favorite Finisher/Embellisher (known for doing finished
inkwork over the layouts or breakdowns of a pencil
artist):
a) Retro
b) Modern
• Most Adaptable Inker (showing exceptional ink style
versatility)
• Most Prolific Inker
• MVP award (the go-to, troubleshooter ink artist that can
save/boost almost any job)
• Props award (inker deserving of more attention; from any
age, mainstream or small press/indie)
• The Call of Duty award (special consideration for an inker
for donating their time and effort to the public and/or the comic
community)
• The Joe Sinnott award (a Hall of Fame designation for a
career of outstanding accomplishment – choose one):
Dick Giordano
Tom Palmer
Joe Sinnott
Al Williamson
Wally Wood
Other than the Hall of Fame award,
all categories are write-ins so as to allow the highest amount of
artist consideration and little bias. Some categories are
“shop-centric,” leaning toward the professional and
comic-art community. But anyone can vote for one or all the
categories. There’s also creator database links at the
site’s “Nominees” page to assist in searching for
eligible inkers via their name or work. Voting will begin April
1st, when the ballots will appear at the site, and voting
wraps on May 30th. Tabulating will follow, with results being
announced within a month thereafter.
CCdC: Inking
arose as a necessity for rendering pencils printable, and was
charged with the function of submerging its identity within the
penciler’s style. However, many famous complements (and
several notorious style-clashes) arose among artist-inker teams. Is
the penciler-inker relationship meant to be a
collaboration?
BA: That’s the ideal plan, yes.
“Inking” was a printing necessity. And the
“inker” as a separate artist [was established] in the
early days of comicdom from a need to achieve quantity by allowing
prolific, popular pencil artists to take on more work and speed up
the production process. Then, and now, it’s been a deadline
factor. But, over time, it’s developed into a craft and,
thus, a quality factor as well. Sometimes along the way some
editors have brought together some mismatched combinations, which
has hurt the look of the overall art. But, in contrast, some
partnerships have been the stuff of legends.
(Continued on Page 2)
—CCdC— Read all of ComicCritique.Com’s columns, old and new,
at our columns archive!
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