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A bit of further internet nosing has turned up a reference to a Gillott's Inqueduct Nº G-1 Nib, so I think it would would be fair to say that the G2 mentioned in the Chronologie is a nib in the same series?

In answer to the question what was the size of the artwork for page 42 of Destination Moon, the original ink drawing is 365x489mm (ref Chronologie d'une Oeuvre Tome 6) which is somewhat bigger than A3.

mat

Ah, thanks for that, Mat! The final pieces are falling into place!

It has to be remarked that while as you say this is a bit larger than A3, it is also a good bit smaller that A2, so the final detail would be the dimensions of the art on the board - and my guess would be that it turns out to be the same size as pages 41 and 43, which is really what is at the heart of the question.

Given that as I said recently elsewhere the sizes of Hergé's pages wander around the A3 size without quite hitting it dead on, I wonder if he was buying his boards in large A0/A1/A2 sheets, and cutting them down? As long as they were more or less the same size, and large enough to contain the art he wanted to draw on, the actual edges of the board probably didn't matter so much.

I think you are probably right jock123 - page 48 is 368x526mm, page 25 is 374x515mm and the border round the outer frames varies accordingly. Of course these inked drawings were then reduced photographically to near the final album size 199x260mm, printed out and hand coloured with watercolour. Even these printed pages seem to vary, but I guess the outer frame was a set reference.

mat

I was wondering about the creative process of The Adventures of Tintin, specifically what tools were used to ink the pencil line art, and what tools were used to color the inked art. Does anyone know?

Moderator Note: Rather than start a new thread here, you might like to read the following discussions, which cover much of what you are looking for; any further queries could be added to them as appropriate:

Hergé as an artist
How to create a comic book?
Who inked the lush calligraphic lines?

This is only what a brief search of the forums revealed; there may be further information in other threads if you look again using key words of interest to you.

The Happy Tintinologist Team

Hi all,

I've read a few Tintin art books over the years, but as far as I can recall they have never gone in depth into what tools Herge used to draw the books. I know he obviously used pencil, but beyond that, what pens did he use? Did he ink directly onto the pencilled paper or use a lightbox? And later on, how did he and his studio share the work exactly with the page, beyond Herge drawing the characters mainly, and others drawing the backgrounds? I've never seen this studied in detail, unless I'm forgetting.

Any information on this would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Moderator Note: Hello, and welcome! We have touched on some of the points you ask about before, for example in this thread (to which your post has been moved).
The Happy Tintinologist Team

It may be time to have a little round-up of what we know (or think we know!).

We know that his pen of choice (at least for some part of his career) was a dip-pen, fitted with a Joseph Gillott Inqueduct G2 nib. It took him some time to come up with the ideal combination, and it doesn't seem certain when he did so.

He usually worked on art-board, possibly manufactured by Schoeller-Parole, at about A3 in size, seemingly cut from larger sheets.

Initially he appears to have penciled directly onto the art-board, and then inked that - this as much a time-saving device as anything; while he did apparently do preparatory work for Tintin, and tried to work ahead, due to the pressures of doing that and editing the rest of Le Petit Vingtième, he also was known to do his two pages of Quick & Flupke in a couple of hours the afternoon of the day that they were due.

Later on, after the war, he seems to have moved on to a more structured system, producing thumbnails and roughs in pencil, felt-pen or biro, often on plain office stationery, from which he worked up more complete roughs, refining as he went.

He seems (according to Pierre Assouline's biography) to have had an intermediate stage between roughs and final board, where he worked up a complete, full-sized pencilled page on paper made by Steinbach, which was squared off, and transferred to the board for inking.

The working area for the artwork on the page of artboard (itself around 510mm x 360mm) was measured off at 400mm x 295mm, which in printing parlance is "working 2-up", or twice the size of the finished page printed in the book.
He would then rule the working area into four tiers of panels, each 95mm x 295mm, separated by a gutter (the area of blank space) 65mm deep.

He used a large library of cuttings he kept and maintained himself (the only other individual allowed to work on the archive was his father) for reference. Additionally he himself, sometimes with other studio members, or, at others studio members on his direction, would go to a location to photograph and sketch material as specific reference - old concrete war-time coastal bunkers for the gun-emplacements in Flight 714, for example, and probably most famously, Bob De Moor's trip to the U.K. to update The Black Island.

Hope this goes some way to answering your questions - I'm sure there is more to be said, as it's a big subject!

Hi!
I've just joined Tintinologist, and wanted to post a question about how the Tintin comics were made (of course before digital times). I've looked this up on google and on youtube but there really isn't anything about the specifics of Herge's process.

More specifically, I was wondering how Herge and the team (?) inked up the plates; did they use watercolours, Gouache, or something like that? And how about for the lines themselves, was it in pen or with a brush? Also did they draw the comics at the published size or were they done larger then shrunk down to a publishable size?

Sorry for the many questions within that! Can't wait to hear if anyone knows :)

All the best,
Jules (UK)

Moderator Note: Hi, Jules, and welcome!
To fully answer your question would probably require a book - and fortunately it does (or rather they do) exist!
Comment nait une bande dessinée - Par-dessus l'epaule d'Hergé by Philippe Goddin is one, the rare and often hard to find Comment naît une aventure de Tintin – Cinquante ans de travaux fort gais by Hergé himself is another, the latter covering the same ground as the somewhat easier to find Le musée imaginaire de Tintin , both examining the creation from start-to-finish of an "extra" page which fits into the Picaros storyline
There are also several threads about what we know of his working practices in the forums.
This one to which your post has been moved is a start, and these next also may be helpful:
How to create a comic book?
Who inked the lush calligraphic lines?
The Involvement of Assistants in Hergé's Drawing Process
There may be further information in other threads if you look again using key words of interest to you.

The Happy Tintinologist Team