Nowlan is a good artist. I've enjoyed his stuff. But if he wants to draw a comic Nowlan-style, he should draw the comic himself -- pencils and inks. Or have someone else do basic layouts and he can do the rest. Generally, I don't think inkers should overpower the pencils and superimpose their style.

And I disagree. If the penciler wants it done in his style he should finish it.

The step of inking was invented simply as a way to make the art more easily printed. The first "inkers" weren't even artists. With advanced in printing techniques, it's not even necessary anymore. So either it's a mechanical process or it's an art. I say the latter. In which case, the ink artist should have free reign and the pencil artist be damned.

I believe these are the words carved into Vince Colletta's gravestone.

Or they would have been if the stone carving artist hadn't felt he should have free reign and the epitaph writer artist be damned.

I don't accept your premise that it can only be either one or the other. It's an assembly-line process designed to expedite art for printing. Any relationship between two artists working on art together is never the same as another. Some work well together, the balance may be different in some pairings, who knows but the notion that one should always have "free reign" and the other should "be damned" is ridiculous on the face of it.

And secondly, what "advanced printing techniques" have made inking unnecessary?

Illustrations, including pencil illustrations were used in ads in newspapers, magazines and books the same time using the same printing techniques that were used for comics. No modern advanced techniques necessary.

Saying "advanced printing techniques" have made inking unnecessary, is like saying digital cameras made photographers unnecessary. There is software available today that can be used to do much of what inkers have done traditionally. But someone is still making the same decisions that a the inker did. Converting fairly tight pencils into crisper cleaner lines, that's just substituting one tool for another. And a digital colorist taking rough pencils and converting them to finished art is just making many of the same decisions as an inker does in the traditional method. We now have more options with photoshop, and the assembly line may look different sometimes, thats all.

I agree that it depends on the situation because doing your own thing, as an inker, regardless of the pencils can produce something less than great.

I loved Alfredo Alcala's work with Don Newton on BATMAN. But when he later inked McFarlane's work on YEAR 2 the end result wasn't very pleasing to the eye. When McFarlane started inking his own work on the last two issues it was a vast improvement.

Argh, I don't remember seeing Alcala inking McFarlane. That might just be a case where the penciler sucks so bad the inker — even possibly the greatest inker in the world — has nothing to work with.

That was a typo on my part. It should have read "advanceS in printing techniques." But if YOU don't know what advances there have been in printing techniques in the last century... make up your own punch line.

Will you please lay off Colletta. He was better than Sinnott.

Typo who gives a shit about a typo? Inking wasn't, "invented simply as a way to make the art more easily printed." There was no technology involved that prevented pencil drawings from being printed. Pencil illustrations have been printed in books and magazines before there were comic books.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halftone