Be Nel Yomtov! Options

[MonsterFromMars]

Yeah, I never noticed it at that age but now im kind of noticing. How it seems like other comics of that time had more care put into the art than TF comics did. And, I don't like saying that. Especially since I actually like Delbo's art and a lot of the other art contributions in the TF comics.

But, Nel Yomotov really pisses me off on the whole. I don't know if the attitude I have is rational but i've never been too happy with his colors. Except for G2 which seemed a bit better.

[Walky]

I wonder how many of those comics featured 60 different characters every other panel, many of which looked nigh-identical.

[Walky]

But, Nel Yomotov really pisses me off on the whole. I don't know if the attitude I have is rational but i've never been too happy with his colors. Except for G2 which seemed a bit better.

Yomtov didn't do G2. That was Sarra Mossoff, who did all but one issue.

[Detour]

I would have to know what you're talking about to respond to your accusations directly, but I'm pretty confident that any claim of "laziness" is really friggin' difficult to support. You don't know his schedule and you don't know the context of his work.

Well, according to the Comic Book Database:
Until 89 when his workload picked up, Yomtov was doing between one and five titles a month... Many times, especially in G1's early years, it was the only title he was coloring a month.
By contrast the two most prominent colorists of A Real American Hero:
Both George Roussos and Bob Sharen were both doing four or more title each and every month that included a GIJoe title in it.

So yeah... that's not the whole context, obviously, but it does compare each colorist's montly workload.

I wonder how many of those comics featured 60 different characters every other panel, many of which looked nigh-identical.

GIJoe had every bit as many "nigh-identical" characters.

[Monzo]

Another pair of pages! One from a Furman issue, and one... with half of the Roadjammers. Oh well.

http://obscuretf.com/Jose%20Delbo%20Transf...0Pages%2003.jpg

[Bass X0]

Quick, someone kidnap Walky and get him to color in these too!

We really need to start thinking about that kidnapping plan.

[Monzo]

So hey, remember this thread?

I've been scouring through the Heritage Auction archives, and have turned up more black-and-white Delbo material. I don't want to upload it all at once, though, because I'm not sure about my overloading my server. So here's a sampling!

http://obscuretf.com/Jose%20Delbo%20Transf...0Pages%2004.jpg

Nebulans! Road Jammers! APEFACE BEATING SOMEONE WITH HIS OWN ARM!

http://obscuretf.com/Jose%20Delbo%20Transf...0Pages%2005.jpg

Starscream! Skullgrin in a giant chair! Uh.. Carissa Carr!

Hop to it, colorists.

[ZacWilliam1]

You make weep profoundly that I have no skills as a digital colorist. I'd give anything to see all these done well with modern coloring tech.


-ZacWilliam, I'd do every page, maybe every issue if I was a colorist. Just to see the book I really loved as a kid come to life. Anyone up to the task? Please?

[Kalidor]

Hey Zac -- I can't speak for every artist.. but I know that a lot started out with that same desire. To say "You know what I'd like to see?" and then make that thought a reality.

This could be a really good time for you to take the plunge and try to push yourself to do just that.

[D.M]

I wonder how many of those comics featured 60 different characters every other panel, many of which looked nigh-identical.

Marvel UK TF comics had better coloring. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-hotrod.gif)

[Walky]

I wonder how many of those comics featured 60 different characters every other panel, many of which looked nigh-identical.

Marvel UK TF comics had better coloring. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon-hotrod.gif)

Marvel UK comics had high-quality color rendering, yes. That doesn't mean it was free from error. It was not. To name one quick example, in "Second Generation!", Vortex showed up colored as Blades. (Soundwave later made up an excuse for this on the letters page.)

When there as many new characters introduced every other issue as in Transformers, there are going to be mistakes. Lord, "Man of Iron" can't even keep its Seekers straight.

[Kalidor]

There's room for mistakes, and that's forgivable, but that doesn't really excuse "There are 15 guys in the background, I've decided they will all be solid red in the first panel and solid dark blue in the next"

[Walky]

I disagree. When you're working with such a limited palette, and all your characters are a patchwork of colors, it's helpful for reading comprehension for guys in the background not to confuse or detract from the important guys in front. Today you can just give people at different distances a different saturation or slightly different hue, but that wasn't feasible then.

Yes, coloring individuals in crowds exactly to model makes us geeks happy, but a colorist's first duty should be to storytelling and readability.

I'm not saying Yomtov was never lazy. I am saying many of his choices are not inexcusable.

EDIT:

For example, coloring everyone in this groupshot in their proper colors results in a huge gross mess:



This post has been edited by Code of Walky: Oct 22 2011, 08:57 PM

[Detour]

I disagree. When you're working with such a limited palette, and all your characters are a patchwork of colors, it's helpful for reading comprehension for guys in the background not to confuse or detract from the important guys in front. Today you can just give people at different distances a different saturation or slightly different hue, but that wasn't feasible then.

Yes, coloring individuals in crowds exactly to model makes us geeks happy, but a colorist's first duty should be to storytelling and readability.

I'm not saying Yomtov was never lazy. I am saying many of his choices are not inexcusable.

Hey now, he abused block coloring extensively. At times entire panels were block colored, and other times the primary focus of the scene was block colored while one random guy in the foreground was properly colored.

Also, I'm sorry, but the lack of block coloring for that scene works much better, since no specific Autobot is the focus, but rather the entire Autobots as a group. It's nowhere near as messy as you say it is.

[Walky]

Highlighting the characters in front draws attention to the grinning Dinobots. Their gleeful thuggishness in support of Grimlock was a character focus of that story. Sludge, Slag, and Swoop there are the emotional content of that panel. There is a focus. It's not just a crowd.

Coloring everyone in the crowd "accurately" also flattens the composition. It no longer has a foreground and background, but instead it's just a sea of random, ultimately homogeneous color.



This is another example from the same issue of using block coloring to illustrate depth. The people in front are in color and the guys behind them are in blue -- which is REALLY GOOOOOOD, because otherwise it'd just be a flat, confusing mess of color.

I have access to a much wider palette than Yomtov did, and I still use similar tricks.

(IMG:http://www.dumbingofage.com/comics/2011-10-12-badfriends.png)

Note how in the first and second panels, I lighten the lines of the people who are not important so that we can more easily pick out those who are important. The story requires a busy crowd, but I don't want to lose the important characters in that crowd, or the sense of depth. If I had only Yomtov's selection of colors, I would have just block-colored those folks. Coloring those characters accurately is not more important than clear storytelling.

This post has been edited by Code of Walky: Oct 22 2011, 10:38 PM

[Detour]

Except Ratchet, Gears, Cosmos and Air Raid are also colored, which takes the focus away from just the Dinobots.
The block coloring choice also results in Sludge's shoulder kibble actually blending in with his block-colored brethren.

Now on that second example, the block coloring works.

[Detour]

I have access to a much wider palette than Yomtov did, and I still use similar tricks.

(IMG:http://www.dumbingofage.com/comics/2011-10-12-badfriends.png)

Note how in the first and second panels, I lighten the lines of the people who are not important so that we can more easily pick out those who are important. The story requires a busy crowd, but I don't want to lose the important characters in that crowd, or the sense of depth. If I had only Yomtov's selection of colors, I would have just block-colored those folks. Coloring those characters accurately is not more important than clear storytelling.

See, Nel Yomtov had access to a similar technique to this. He even uses it for Razorclaw's mid-transformation, and he used it occasionally as far back as Transformers #2:
(IMG:http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t285/Detour84/TF/issue2_page03.jpg)

[Walky]

Yeah, but if you used lighter colors even on a big sea of people, it's still going to look like a big impenetrable mixmash of color, same as coloring it in the bolder colors.... just with a separation between foreground and background. Transformers en masse do not "read" when rendered with a smaller palette.

But, look. I'm not going to convince you. For years I've been trying to impress upon you that artists have motivations other than being evil lazy jerks, and I'm not gonna win one now.

[Kalidor]

Regardless of the motivations of any artist, Nel Yomtov sucked. Motivations alone can't make your work good or people want to look at it.

[Detour]

But, look. I'm not going to convince you. For years I've been trying to impress upon you that artists have motivations other than being evil lazy jerks, and I'm not gonna win one now.

Same back at you, Walky. I've been using contemporary GIJoe issues, even comparing one issue colored by a different colorist with the following issue colored by Yomtov.

Here's a comparison between similar scenes from Joe 74 and Joe 75, the former colored by Bob Sharen and the latter by Nel Yomtov:
(IMG:http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t285/Detour84/Joe/m074_22.jpg)
(IMG:http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t285/Detour84/Joe/m075_03.jpg)
Notice how the former features the DEMONS in the foreground properly colored, and the background figures block-colored in a manner that makes them pop from the background, while the latter features the foreground DEMONS block-colored in green, while all the DEMONS in the background basically blend in with the sand, while the block-colored AGPs blend in with the sky.

I'm not saying block coloring is evil, I'm saying Yomtov abused and misused those techniques.

Also, yeah, what Kal said.