Add Some Color to Your Comic Art Collection with Color Guides from Sketch Maven

SANTA CLARA, CA, October 01, 2010 (Press-News.org) Long before the days of Photoshop, a special breed of comic book artist would meticulously hand color every panel of every page of art, bringing that black & white drawing to life. These artists were comic book colorists who created their own masterpieces, color guides. Yet Marie Severin, Jack Adler, or Glynis Wein never received the household name recognition among comic book fans that their penciling counterparts, like Jack Kirby, John Buscema and George Perez, did. While comic book colorists are still integral in the comic book creative process, the time honored tradition of hand coloring every page has long since past.

"Color guides are a gateway to a simpler time," comments Mike Todasco, founder of Sketch Maven, the World's Greatest Original Comic Art Marketplace. "Since colorists, like Steve Oliff, led the revolution to computer coloring starting in the late 1980s, hand colored color guides have disappeared. It is an art form that has been lost to the digital world."

To make a color guide, the penciled and inked original art is first photocopied. Then the colorist colors that page using special inks and dyes, adding depth and shadowing while also making the page more vibrant. It is called a color guide because it does just that, it "guides" the engraver to what colors to use when creating the printing plate for the comic. Most of the pages will even have the "color codes" written in the margins to depict the actual colors used for that part of the page. For original comic art collectors this is the closest piece of artwork to what was finally published in the comic book.

"Color guides present a unique opportunity to collectors to own a piece of one-of-a-kind artwork featuring art by their favorite creators, at an affordable price," says Todasco. "Buying the penciled and inked original art for John Byrne on the Fantastic Four, Dave Cockrum on Uncanny X-Men, or Frank Miller on Daredevil could cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. But color guides of pages from those same creators often cost just $20-$100 on Sketch Maven."

There are thousands of color guides available from the 1970s-1990s on Sketch Maven; prices start as low as eight dollars per piece. Users can buy, sell and learn more about original comic art, color guides, cartoon art, and sketches by visiting http://www.sketchmaven.com.

Sketch Maven, Inc. is the premier online marketplace for original comic artwork, color guides, cartoon art, and sketches. Created by collectors for collectors, Sketch Maven, Inc. is the easiest place to buy and sell original comic art. The Sketch Maven team is committed to expand the hobby beyond the current core market to a broader audience. To find out the latest news about Sketch Maven, follow them on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/sketchmaven), Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/sketchmaven) and http://www.sketchmaven.com.