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Recording a connecting cover


Fred Slota

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Take Batman #467 - #469.

And Archie #666 - #666/E.

And Robyn Hood: Vigilante #4/E - #4/F

 

Connecting Covers.  Usually horizontal, sometimes vertical, possibly in a grid? (have there been any?).  Sometimes separate issues without variants, sometimes only certain variants.  Sometimes all in the same Title, sometimes runs across separate titles.

 

Ideally, each entry should contain sufficient information to identify:

  • number of covers
  • this item's sequence number
  • all the items involved
    • either simply listing the variants or issues if in the same title
    • providing a unique, descriptive searchable name to the resulting image

 

I think that this information should all be in the ItemDescription field.

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49 minutes ago, Fred Slota said:

providing a unique, descriptive searchable name to the resulting image

Good luck with that since that could get overly wordy (depending on what you are looking for here).  

In most cases, connecting variants are all from the same title or, if they span multiple titles, they are on books with the same/related storyline.  For the ones that are all in the same title, is there really a need to include a descriptor beyond "connecting variant"?  For the latter, would "Secret Crisis War connecting variant" suffice (where Secret Crisis War would be the name of the storyline)?  

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diptych, triptych...

Are we accepting of longer terms, like heptatych for Earth-X?  Or should we used "Connecting Cover" for over three?

 

I just found several (well four times several) reference to a quadtych.  (Which, technically, should probably be tetratych)  And Quadriptych.

 

-tych does make for a decently unique search term... (Well, excepting that there is a Marvel character named Triptych, apparently), and the resultant term is shorter than "connecting cover x/4"

 

Is triptych specific enough to not need to mention "cover", or should it be "triptych covers"?

 

#1 in triptych with #7/A - #7/C

#2 in 'hexatych with #666 - #666/E

#3 in "X-Men Mojoverse Triptych"

Edited by Fred Slota
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Just found Earth X, where it looks like 0-6 and 7-X each make separate 7-issue connected covers.

Just an FYI: the title Earth-X uses covers #0-12 and #13 (the X issues) to make a 7 over 7 composite image.

==========

Enter in Item Desciption that the cover is a *tych (diptych, triptych, or a generic polytych) can be part of the Cover Description.
But trying to define and explain what part of the *tych is it and the other related covers should be in the Notes.

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-ptych, plate, so diptych, triptych as in two plate or three plate...

 

diptych, triptych, tetraptych, pentaptych, hexaptych, heptaptych, octaptych, nonaptych, decaptych.

 

Had to look closer at Earth X (I had laid them out), and boy, are those crossovers from the top 7 to the bottom 7 subtle.  But they're there.  A tetradecaptych in all its glory.

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diptych, triptych, tetraptych, pentaptych, hexaptych, heptaptych, octaptych, nonaptych, decaptych.

These are why I am leaning towards the more generic polytych to cover the differing numbers (and so someone doesn't have to figure out what a tetradecaptych is...

It could be entered as 1 of 4 polytych cover (or 3 of 14 polytych cover) as examples.

(Technically polytych is 3 or more but stretching a little to include 2 (diptych) wouldn't be too bad.)

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Trying to get a consensus on a consistent, information-dense nomenclature...

technically, I think it should be 'polyptych', but that has an unfortunate spelling...

 

My preferences, in order

  • "x of diptych", "x of triptych", " x of n-ptych" or "x of n polytych" (4 or more)
  • "x of diptych covers", "x of triptych covers", "x of n-ptych covers" or "x of n polytych covers" (4 or more)
  • "x of n connecting covers" for all.  If we're just going with a generic form for all quantities, why use the unusual word.
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  • 11 months later...

Revisiting this topic.  Quick survey of some current Item Descriptions (199 found, but some are names)...

 

  • Cover forms diptych with Superman: Man of Steel #77
  • Cover forms triptych with #74 and #75
  • Cover forms quadtych with Fantastic Four #12, Iron Man #12, and Captain America #12
  • Robin, covers form triptych  (notes includes "Covers for #467–469 form triptych")
  • Prestige format one-shot, cover is part of quadtych
  • Cover is part of quadtych
  • Diptych Cover that combines with Ms. Marvel (2nd Series) #25-A
  • Jetpack Comics Diptych Left Variant Cover
  • Diptych cover  (notes includes "Covers connects with FF #22")
  • Triptych cover
  • Ghost Rider (Dan Ketch) Cover (diptych to cover of #28)

 

Would like to standardize to Item Descriptions of:

  • 1st of diptych covers
  • 2nd of triptych covers
  • 3rd of 4-ptych covers
  • etc.

with accompanying Notes like:

  • Diptych covers across #1-2
  • Diptych covers across Issue1 and Issue2
  • Triptych covers across #1-3
  • Triptych covers across Issue1, Issue2 and Issue3
  • 4-ptych covers across #1-4
  • 4-ptych covers across Issue1, Issue2, Issue3 and Issue4
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The notation in Item Description is short and contains information only relevant to that issue's cover.  The notation in Notes is more verbose, and would contain the same wording for all connected covers, allowing a user to search and find all connected issues for a given collection.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Update - having identified many of the connecting covers and looking at the provisional notations I've generated, I don't like what I've proposed.  There are several large connected covers that cross so many different titles, attempting to include even abbreviated references to all issues is unwieldy and really serves no purpose, you have to search on the unique string to get a search result that includes all the issues; including the issues in the string is a waste.  And, splitting the information across 2 fields is also a complicating factor.

 

Instead, I'm now leaning towards a single notation to be placed at the beginning of the Item Description field.  A brief, unique string identifying the collage image, containing the keyword 'ptych', and ending with 1/2, 3/5, 06/12, etc (or collage, to link the various wraparounds and gatefolds to the individual components).  Where multiple related sets exist (regular vs. adult, etc), modifiers will be placed after the common unique string (after the 'ptych' label).  Being at the start of the Item Description field, it will be sortable.    Search for "ptych" will return all connecting covers, sorted by cover and piece.  Search for the brief, unique string will return all the pieces of the particular cover set, sorted by piece.

 

For example, 

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych 1/2

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych 2/2

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych collage; wraparound cover

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych Z-rated 1/2

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych Z-rated 2/2

2022 SDCC Cosplay diptych Z-rated collage; wraparound cover

Earth-X 14-ptych 09/14

Earth-X 14-ptych 10/14

 

Bottom line: useful search, useful sort, useful information, compact

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Item Description is just a text field. If you have more than one item (separated by semi-colon), the only way to ensure a certain sequence is programmatically.

Which means someone (Pete) would have to write a process to try to identify a particular string, they manipulate the data to get a certain order.

Not saying it can't be done, but it may not be worth the time an effort.

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Again, I thought that was only automatically true in Notes, the only catch-all field which was less official and has a policy of not wanting to wipe out your personal notes when updating official additions.  I was under the impression that all other fields are fully replaced when updated.  For example, I've been correcting spelling and punctuation errors in Cover Artist and Storylines recently, and I haven't been seeing those mods stack..., they've been replacing, in the same order.

 

So, if I submit with a particular order and it gets accepted, then when it gets pushed out in an update, it will get pushed out in its entirety, in that order.  An editor could modify/merge and change the order

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