[azukizero]

Hello,


Is this a term from the x-acto era of design? Can anyone define comping for me?

Appreciate it!

[art_director]

Comping is putting your ideas together to present -- in essence to communicate what the piece(s) will look like when finished. For example, if it's a direct mail piece you'd show how it folds. If it's a package design you'd make the package so it could be held rather than a picture of it.

If you believe there was an x-acto era that's passed you're missing the bigger picture. Sure, computers have changed the business but comp rooms, x-acto knives and foam core are still present in design shops and ad agencies.

[azukizero]

Thank you for the clarification.

You misunderstood me. I was refering to the days when ALL design was created with x-acto, glue, etc, and if the term 'comping' was from that time.

Thanks again for defining this.

[rjenkinson]

"compositing"?

-r.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by azukizero

Hello,


Is this a term from the x-acto era of design? Can anyone define comping for me?

Appreciate it!

Whoa... X-acto era!? Any true designer used a razor! Ever spec type? LOL

Comping is a term that described the action of rendering or assembling a tight "comprehensive" layout. Considered the next step after "roughs", "comps" traditionally were created using markers (for you real old fogies, pastels). They featured rendered illustrations, hand lettering, transfer type (Prestype anyone?), and rendered greeking (squiggles or straight lines to indicate text/body copy. Comps were primarily used for presentation purposes and as a final approval step before commiting to go to production "mechanicals" (keylines, paste-ups etc.). Comps were used for ad layouts, brochures, packaging and 3D assembled mock ups. Additional techniques involved using different kinds of color papers (pantone), foils, zipatone, treated acetate, photostats (what are photostats!?), even transfer systems such as Chromatec. Don't forget inks, paints (gauche, tempra) or dyes. Also, die transfers, C prints... oh, I could go on.

Today, where would we be without Photoshop! Comping usually involves creating a PDF using manipulated low res images or stock photos. Additonal visuals are scanned and positioned, and for greeking: jabberwacky. If a physical version is needed, it's usually a hard copy printed off from some little Epson.

[yugyug]

nice explanation. I remember staring bewildered at a cupboard filled with Letraset stock I discovered in the basement of my design school.... "what is this stuff.....??"

I'm sure some of those old tools and materials could be great for new ideas. I remember in the back of dan clowes 'eightball' how clowes lamented the end of zipatone when the last manufacturer shut down....! that would have been maybe 8 years ago?

isn't a photostat just another term for photocopy i.e xerox?

[art_director]

Westbo:

Thank you, now I don't feel like a lone fossil. Truth is I avoided the full explanation of 'comping' based on assumption that it would be lost on the younger folk. You set me straight, and, while I hate to admit it, brought back many a fond memory of keylines, type specing and color breaks.

Can anyone here actually spec a long copy ad? Doubt it, we're talking about a lost art.

Thanks, Westbo, you made my month!

[budster101]

Comping is when you eat somewhere and the comp your meal for you.. pay for it.

[art_director]

Big Effing B-i-n-g-o-!

[MacDog]

Can you say Rubilith???

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by yugyug

nice explanation. I remember staring bewildered at a cupboard filled with Letraset stock I discovered in the basement of my design school.... "what is this stuff.....??"

I'm sure some of those old tools and materials could be great for new ideas. I remember in the back of dan clowes 'eightball' how clowes lamented the end of zipatone when the last manufacturer shut down....! that would have been maybe 8 years ago?

isn't a photostat just another term for photocopy i.e xerox?

No, very different from photocopy. A photostat or "stat" was actually a black and white photoprint. There were different processes i.e, a paper negative to paper positive and later, direct paper positive. All involved photo developing chemistry; developer. hypo etc. Originals were sized and then shot with a graphics camera aimed at the original mounted on a fixed copy board, exposing the image on photosensitive paper or film then developed in a dark room environment or in a self contained "box" on the camera where you inserted your arms and viewing down thru red plastic (Anyone remember PosOne?). Stats were great for enlarging (max 200% per shot) or reducing logos, line illustration or "FPO" photos.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by art_director

Westbo:

Thank you, now I don't feel like a lone fossil. Truth is I avoided the full explanation of 'comping' based on assumption that it would be lost on the younger folk. You set me straight, and, while I hate to admit it, brought back many a fond memory of keylines, type specing and color breaks.

Can anyone here actually spec a long copy ad? Doubt it, we're talking about a lost art.

Thanks, Westbo, you made my month!

Hi AD

You ain't no fossil, dude and many a youngin' has benefited from your advice here.

Yep you are right! Type specing is a lost art. Characters per pica? I still have a couple of type books with type fitting charts (why i do not know- should toss them). Before the invention of Compugraphic, AlphaType and Photolettering, type (linotype, ludlow etc) had to "fixed". HAIR SPRAY was an exceptable substitute when you were out of Fixative. Speaking of Compugraphic, it was a good idea to shoot Compugraphic type and use a stat as the original would turn brown LOL.

Here's a brain test: Do you know what "buffalos" were?

Regards, W2

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by MacDog

Can you say Rubilith???

Faster than I can say Benday! Orange or red... LOL

[art_director]

YES! Benday! "They want a new word for NEW!"

Whoppers™ as payment...genius, pure genius.

"Buffalos" ??? Don't know that one.

In college I worked for our school paper. That sounds like a small operation when in fact it had a daily circulation of 70,000. It was there that I became intimately acquainted with the stat camera. When I got my internship and they discovered I knew how to use one (stat camera) it made for a summer in the dark. By the end of that year I was a stat camera pro.

Characters per pica, wow. That brings back many a memory and a headache. My experience straddled the end of that era and the beginning of the computer age of design. As a result I was only good enough to spec type for simple layouts before that came to a screeching halt. Still I miss it. There's nothing like getting the first gallies back and seeing how well you hit the target.

I also remember taking the keyliners handiwork back to my office and cutting up the type. Dang, that used to take forever. When you cut out every single letter in a long copy ad and kern they type by hand you know you're anal. You can also assume typos are not taken lightly. Christ, what would todays "we need to see the copy in the layout" clients do? That's one area where the computer has hurt this business -- showing all the copy in the layout early on. The time saved by using technology is wasted on tweaking prepositional phrases and the like. There are some clients that I strawdog with every layout. I figure if they can "find" broken words and what appears to be sloppy type they'll leave the layout / concept alone. You might be surprised at how well it works, especially with those clients who insist upon leaving a thumbprint on every ad.

"Can you say Rubilith???"

I'll never forget waving goodbye to the last role in the agency. That was a fine day.

[art_director]

Didn't they just catch a Rubilith off the coast of Argentina?

[mydog8mymac]

Originally Posted by MacDog

Can you say Rubilith???

and mean it!

[birdman]

Being an admitted junior designer at the mere age of 25, I often wonder how I'll be wisting about the olden days of QuarkXPress 4 and InDesign 2 and whatnot. "Why, when InDesign first came out, it couldn't even print to non-PostScript printers! And back in my day, Quark wouldn't collect your fonts; you had to copy them to your CD-R yourself, uphill, both ways! That's right: 'CD-R.' You kids have it easy with your newfangled BluRay 3.0! Font collecting is a lost art."



-birdman

[art_director]

Originally Posted by birdman

Being an admitted junior designer at the mere age of 25, I often wonder how I'll be wisting about the olden days of QuarkXPress 4 and InDesign 2 and whatnot. "Why, when InDesign first came out, it couldn't even print to non-PostScript printers! And back in my day, Quark wouldn't collect your fonts; you had to copy them to your CD-R yourself, uphill, both ways! That's right: 'CD-R.' You kids have it easy with your newfangled BluRay 3.0! Font collecting is a lost art."



-birdman

You know, when I was your age we had to save our files to 2.5" disks. It took 3,452,987 disks to hold a single black and white logo.

[th3ph17]

"You know, when I was your age we had to save our files to 2.5" disks. It took 3,452,987 disks to hold a single black and white logo."

and those were Ice disks, mind you, so they had to work in sub-zero temperatures.

Some concepts just can't translate without a good comp. I love making comps. While my professional career only goes back about 10 years, 20+ years ago I was laying out junior high and then high school newspapers.

Packing comps are a very complicated and $$$ biz these days...a friend in a NYC studio would get really offended when i'd refer to packaging prototypes as comps.

anyways,

here is a picture of some old school design tools, props to all the old timers.

http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=215077

[micahgartman]

http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=215077

What? No french curve???

[th3ph17]

actually, in the same box I found several french curves. Pristine condition. Lettering templates, too old to use lettering....lots of fun stuff. All for about 10 cents.

[birdman]

I bought a french curve once, I think because my typography prof told us to, but never once used it. Exactly how are you supposed to use them? You just hope that every curve you'll never need to use is on this piece of plastic?

-birdman

[art_director]

I know a lot of comp artists use them to make fast, curved lines -- generally outlines to hold marker ink. Other than that I've never even seen one used in the wild.

[th3ph17]

i use a french curve or my bendy curve thing for pencil lines to outlined areas to fill with marker or gouache...but that is for art, not advertising.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by th3ph17

i use a french curve or my bendy curve thing for pencil lines to outlined areas to fill with marker or gouache...but that is for art, not advertising.

A method certainly used in advertising. I had one of those bendy things as well. Frustrating thing, never got the curve I wanted LOL.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by th3ph17

"You know, when I was your age we had to save our files to 2.5" disks. It took 3,452,987 disks to hold a single black and white logo."

and those were Ice disks, mind you, so they had to work in sub-zero temperatures.

Some concepts just can't translate without a good comp. I love making comps. While my professional career only goes back about 10 years, 20+ years ago I was laying out junior high and then high school newspapers.

Packing comps are a very complicated and $$$ biz these days...a friend in a NYC studio would get really offended when i'd refer to packaging prototypes as comps.

anyways,

here is a picture of some old school design tools, props to all the old timers.

http://www.dpchallenge.com/image.php?IMAGE_ID=215077

Jeez-1977!? That's only 28 years ago. I've been doing this since 1969. Guess that makes me older that dirt... LOL.
I like the photo, th3ph17. Gotta do another one. You need to include a T-Square, rulling pen, Rapidograph (.01 please), "buffalos" (AD, they were a brand of water based markers), pointers, pica rule, kneaded eraser, rubber cement pickup, magic markers or AD Markers, burnisher (to rub down your PresType).

BTW, If comprehensives were referred to as "comps", should prototypes be called "protos"?

[th3ph17]

I think i actually have a few sheets of PresType from 1981....think it would still work? Hated that stuff in jr high...would always shift it as i burnished.

[Westbo]

Originally Posted by th3ph17

I think i actually have a few sheets of PresType from 1981....think it would still work? Hated that stuff in jr high...would always shift it as i burnished.

It was tedious wasn't it? That PresType is probably all dried and cracked. I always ran out of letters and would end up with several sheets missing certain letters or punctuations. (Anybody have an extra "e" in 14 pt. Helvetica). The other leading transfer type brand was Letraset Instant Lettering- same junk. This stuff ran about $8 -$10 PER sheet, and of course the larger the size, the less number of letters. Caps & lower case, caps only, lower case only, numbers... it got expensive. Format (another brand), had type and borders that were on self adhesive film requiring cutting and pasting (vs. burnishing) each letter.

You should all realize how thankfully spoiled rotten we are today.

[macforme]

I work at a screen/digital printing company. We still use french curves and rubylith occasionally.

Occasionally we get films for jobs that were originally screenprinted somewhere else, with no electronic art. We'll have to make films for blockouts or color tints, and ruby is the only way to do that. Tape the original on the table, lay the ruby on top, and go to town with your exacto. We actually have 1 company that sends us rubys that they make on a flatbed plotter, with no regular film at all.

The french curves came in handy for protoyping motorcycle fuel tanks that were handpainted. Not long ago we got a job for 2 full sets of cycle graphics, with 2 tanks, 4 fenders, and 4 side panels - all handpainted. That's some tedious work: apply clear premask/vinyl to the part, get a pen and your french curves and trace the pinstripes/flames/signatures, scan in the pieces of premask, redraw every part in Illustrator, color separate/bleed it/make films, watch it get printed/kiss cut/through cut/shipped to the customer, and wait to the customer to change their minds about the colors 7 times.

Good times.

[loki74]

well.. I feel incredibly stupid (young?) reading this thread as I have never heard of a lot of the things mentioned here. So I'm fairly certain the following is completely irrelevant, but I'll go ahead and mention it anyway:

In my experience, the term "comp" is short for "composite." I hear it used especially in the field of digital video--chroma-keying, matte generation, etc. The transparent parts show whats behind them, and thus you get a composite of the foreground and background. Then that composite can actually be composited as a foreground or background yet again, and so on and so on until you have a completed composite. I think this process is best illustrated by Apple's Shake.

Another form of compositing I am familiar with is in the field of 3D rendering. Different maps can be composited, each affecting a different property of the surface--bump, specularity, reflectivity, transparency, etc. Although I've never heard this actually referred to as "comping."

I know that taht is clearly not what everyone here is talking about, but it was a use of the word I figured I'd mention.

[yugyug]

my girlfriend uses heaps of that stuff in the photo - geometry templates, french curves, everything - she's a jeweller. my grandfather gave her his whole collection when he retired his architecture practise, so its not totally redundant.

[Don Pickett]

My dad's an aerospace engineer on the verge of retirement. He still has a lot of his manual drafting tools – curves, pencils, templates, slide rules, etc. – even though he hasn't used them in years.

Me, I learned how to trap from the guys in the stripping department. . .

[andi*pandi]

I remember ruby, and amber. Another lost skill was specing the size a photo had to be shot to fit in your ruby square... in fact, I don't remember what the process was called. Crop and scale, but catchier... all that bothersome trace paper over the image, figuring out the percentage with a circle thingy... crop wheel.

The freedom of just plunking an image in a text box and just manipulating it like wild has to be appreciated when you recall crop wheels, trace, and ruby.