improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . learn how and when to remove these template messages the topic of this article may not meet wikipedia s notability guidelines for companies and organizations . please help to establish notability by citing reliable secondary sources that are independent of the topic and provide significant coverage of it beyond its mere trivial mention . if notability can not be established the article is likely to be merged redirected or deleted . find sources comicraft news newspapers books scholar jstor free images october 2009 learn how and when to remove this template message this article relies too much on references to primary sources . please improve this by adding secondary or tertiary sources . october 2009 learn how and when to remove this template message learn how and when to remove this template message comicraft type lettering and logo design industry comics founded 1992 founder richard starkings headquarters los angeles california key people richard starkings john roshell website http www.comicraft.com comicraft is a company which provides graphic design and lettering services to various primarily comic book companies . contents 1 history 1.1 active images 2 clients 3 bibliography selected 4 notes 5 references 6 external links history edit the company was founded by richard starkings in 1992 . starkings had been working for marvel uk for five years but left london for new york circa 1990 . 1 lettering large numbers of pages overnight for marvel editor gregory wright starkings decided to move away from the new york marvel offices to california partly hoping that the increased distance would bring increased deadlines . 1 a year later starkings now based in los angeles found himself offered the prestigious task of being asked to letter issues of marvel s premier title uncanny x men . 1 unable to meet the deadlines of then editor bob harras he turned his mind to think of ever faster methods of lettering and turned to computers . 2 digitizing his lettering in readiness and joining with designer john roshell starkings unwittingly found that the formation of image comics created a perfect opportunity for his innovative lettering practices . 2 the superstar artist status of the image founders and the money they were able to sink into production allowed image to woo many letterers away from dc and marvel creating a vacuum made all the more stark by the concurrent comics boom inspiring all companies to produce an ever increasing volume of output . 2 although meeting resistance in some quarters most famously from harras at marvel the higher paychecks offered by image allowed some letterers to produce less work further snow balling the demand for starkings services . 2 unsure of what to call themselves starkings recalled a friend s carpentry business being called proudcraft and the two settled on comicraft . 2 overcoming the reluctance of the comics industry with such titles as ghost rider 2099 astro city and generation x although unable to challenge the legendary todd klein for the lettering title starkings and comicraft nevertheless managed to win an eisner award in 1994 for best publication design for busiek and ross marvels . 3 the comics buyer s guide and wizard the comics magazine also went against the eisners and named comicraft the best letterer for 3 and 7 years in a row respectively . 2 active images edit a sub company active images was initiated in 1995 4 as an online arm initially to make comicraft s library of comic book fonts commercially available but in 2002 its role was expanded into the world of publishing . 4 active images publishes among other titles richard starkings own comics hip flask and elephantmen . 5 clients edit comicraft s work and fonts have appeared in hundreds of products produced and distributed by all four of the major american comics companies dc comics marvel comics dark horse comics and image comics ; as well as for magazines and books produced by active images mad magazine nickelodeon magazine scholastic and titan books . many of the company s fonts created by starkings and designer roshell are commercially available to individuals and institutions as software applications through the active images publishing company via their website comicbookfonts.com . bibliography selected edit comicraft has produced a 64 page book detailing the basics of lettering comics comic book lettering the comicraft way isbn 978 0 9740567 3 9 comics and books either lettered by or featuring fonts created by starkings comicraft include batman the killing joke dc by alan moore and brian bolland hand lettered by starkings pre comicraft when he was still in england . spider man blue marvel by jeph loeb and tim sale marvels marvel by kurt busiek and alex ross astro city wildstorm by kurt busiek brent anderson and alex ross battle chasers wildstorm image by joe madureira danger girl wildstorm by j. scott campbell batman hush dc by jeph loeb and jim lee superman for all seasons dc by jeph loeb and tim sale 6 almost every book published by monkeybrain features cover fonts licensed from comicraft . these include jess nevins annotations on alan moore and kevin o neill s the league of extraordinary gentlemen ; heroes & monsters and a blazing world notes edit a b c starkings richard . the secret origin of comicraft part 1 . accessed february 10 2008 a b c d e f starkings richard . the secret origin of comicraft part 2 . accessed february 10 2008 1994 will eisner comic industry award nominees and winners . accessed february 10 2008 a b comicbookfonts more information . accessed february 10 2008 aboutus.org active images . accessed february 10 2008 active images.com . accessed february 10 2008 references edit ihnatko andy . web can be font of all fonts chicago sun times may 24 2007 . benjamin ong pang kean . the starkings way talking letters & fonts with richard starkings april 15 2005 . thomas michael . the invisible art in plain sight a look at the art of lettering june 9 2000 . external links edit official website comicbookfonts companies portal retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title comicraft & oldid 743512013 categories comic book letterersgraphic design studiostypesettingcompanies based in los angelescompanies established in 19921992 establishments in californiahidden categories articles with topics of unclear notability from october 2009all articles with topics of unclear notabilityarticles lacking reliable references from october 2009all articles lacking reliable references navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 10 october 2016 at 00 27 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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