This Is A Job For...Digital Comics!

While I'm not a fan of the unauthorized downloading of brand-new comic books (I don't believe it is fair to the creators) there is an area where digital copies are very useful, even vital: preservation and research. As the oldest and rarest comic books increasingly become too valuable to touch (much less read) and are locked away in mylar coffins digital copies offer a way to maintain access to vintage material for both casual and serious readers.

Two sources of complete public domain comic books that I've encountered are Wowio.com and Golden Age Comics. I've downloaded three comics from Wowio and quite a number from Golden Age Comics. As it turns out both places offer copies of Exciting Comics #36 so I'm using art from that issue to illustrate what each site offers. In fact, they both have scans of the exact same copy of Exciting Comics #36 (an imperfection in the paper just below the letter "o" on the title page of the first story gives it away).



WOWIO.COM
I know very little about Wowio. It's a fairly new service that provides free digital books (on a variety of subjects) as well as comic books (both newish and old). Wowio gets advertiser's to sponsor the digital books so that the reader doesn't have to. Consequently each file you get comes wrapped in advertising.

Pros: Free. Attractive interface that's easy to use. The Hero Initiative (formally known as A.C.T.O.R.) gets a donation for each download of selected public domain comics.

Cons: Limited selection. Limited downloads: only 3 publications a day. Sign-up process wants too much personal information (important to the advertisers but the only reason I bothered to go through any of it was to do this review -- I would have declined otherwise).

Scan Quality: Garish to my eye and uneven (see image above -- looks a bit better at this reduced size but at actual size the color looks blotchy).

File type: PDF (file is personalized with "markers" to help trace each copy in an attempt to discourage unauthorized duplication)



GOLDEN AGE COMICS
A fairly basic message board set-up run by anonymous but clearly dedicated readers/fans of old comics.

Pros: Free (though donations are welcome). Easy sign-up. Generous downloading (1 GB of files a day). A broad selection of titles -- there's some really wonderful stuff there. Infused with the kind of largely positive energy and sense of community that die-hard fans can bring to an effort.

Cons: I can't quit put my finger on it but it bothers me that I often don't know the source of the digital files (of course, that info simply may not exist). Some files that have been offered at the site have apparently come from "for profit" efforts -- public domain or not that seems a bit unfair to me though in at least one instance the problem was largely resolved (this exchange in one of the forums gives some background).

Scan Quality: Varies. Overt Photoshopping is generally frowned upon (a good thing) but some scans are quite good. The more the scan looks like the comic book as it actually exists the happier I am. The Golden Age Comics copy of Exciting (see above) lacked a bit of contrast but was perfectly readable (and enjoyable). All of the files I've seen made from fiche were pretty awful but I avoid those files anyway (and they tend to be clearly marked, which is helpful).

File type: Most often .cbr and .cbz.


Postscript: For what it's worth I took the file from Golden Age Comics and fussed with it for a minute or two in Photoshop to see what I could come up with (result below). I can't image taking the time to "fix" scans for an entire 64-52 page comic. Ugh. As far as these old, hard to get comics are concerned I'm thankful for the efforts of the scanners whoever they are.