Help:Textless Cover Images

= Textless Cover Images = Textless Cover Images, also known as "virgin covers" - though that phrasing makes our skin crawl - serve two major purposes on the DC Database. On comic pages, they serve to demonstrate what the cover art looks like in all its glory, without the logo and barcode etc. Elsewhere, they are some of the best available artwork for characters and teams, and as such get used in galleries and as main images for articles. This is why, apart from a few key differences, we treat them very much like we do interior images. While these images are now commonly used in the industry for solicitations, these were not provided to internet sources until the early 2000s, and as such, it is difficult to find textless images for comics published prior to that time. But be on the lookout!

Currently we have  correctly categorized Textless Covers on the DC Database.

Given how much we prize these images on the wiki, you will probably be wanting to upload one while you're here, and that's where the Image Template comes in. As described here, the template covers our butts legally and provides useful info about the creators of the image and where the image came from. Unfortunately, it's not as simple as just filling the thing out as you might dream it should be filled out. Because of the awesome and terrible power of Category Magic, you have to be aware of what should be filled out when and how in specific cases.

So, let's look at how to fill it out, field by field, for this specific case: Textless Cover images.

The Fields
These are the only fields you ought to use when filling out the template for a Textless Cover image:

As you can see, I've already filled out the License and ImageType fields because those should be the same for every textless cover image.

Naming Conventions and File Type
Before we get into the template itself, it's worth going over how you ought to be naming your images, because that's pretty important, for consistency's sake.

Textless Cover Images are typically named with the same name as the article for the comic it comes from, followed by the suffix "Textless". However, due to our tendency to treat Textless covers as character images, a great many, such as the example on this page, are named using the standard laid out in our naming conventions guidelines. In the example case on this page, the comic is, so your image would, ostensibly, be named Animal Man Vol 2 1 Textless, and ideally, if you do use an alternative naming convention, you will leave a redirect behind for that name.

As for file type, things get complicated for us when any image isn't a JPEG, which uses the *.jpg file extension. PNG files are great for logo images because of their transparent backgrounds, but because JPEG is the most commonly used file type on the internet, it is also the most conveniently manageable for comic covers (and pretty much everything but logos).

In some cases, we have to replace images that have been uploaded for quality, size, or other reasons and if the file type of the original differs from the replacement, things get... enraging.

So! In the end, for the example, the file name should be Animal Man Vol 2 1 Textless.jpg.

License & ImageType
As explained here the License field is how we cover our butts. Thanks to Category Magic, typing "Comic Cover" in the license field automatically adds it to "Fair Use (Comic Covers)".

While an image like the one on this page is not obviously a comic cover, it is one - it is a specific type of comic cover. So, in addition to listing the image license as a Comic Cover (under Fair Use, blah blah blah), we have to specify what type of Comic Cover with the ImageType field.

As this is textless cover art, we use the phrase "Textless Cover" to distinguish it from Cover Art or a Variant Cover.

The default "empty syntax" for the template includes "ImageType2" as a field, and in the case of Textless Covers, because they haven't got logos or barcodes on them, they can also be used as Character, Team, Location, Item images etc. So, ImageType2 can be used to indicate that by using any of the options laid out here.

Note that while using ImageType2, if it is a Textless Cover, ImageType1 must say "Textless", while ImageType2 should never say "Cover Art" or "Variant" - an image can't be both Textless and one of those.

Description
Again, as explained here, the Decription field is used for one thing here, and that is using FairJust to provide the purpose for the image in the context of our wiki, which is demonstrative and educational.

Let's take a look at the text that pops up with FairJust:


 * "Used for purposes of illustration in an educational article about the entity represented by the image. The image is used as a means of visual identification of this article topic. As the subject is protected by trademark or copyright, a free use alternative does not exist."

So, what is the "entity represented by the image" in a Textless cover's case? That depends! What is it an image of? This is where the question of whether to fill out ImageType2 becomes important. If the image presents a character in a very prominent position, it is likely a Character image, and it likely means that the entity represented by that image is the character in question. So, we wrap the FairJust template around the simplest name for a character (which turns out to be either a disambig or a redirect, in most cases), and that will cover all our uses for it.

And, for convenience, F redirects to FairJust. And because the example image here is an image of Animal Man, we can just do this:

Which looks like this:



Remember, though, FairJust will redlink if your article doesn't exist.

One additional note on this. If you add a pipe (one of these "|") to the FairJust template, you can add one additional subject. This is helpful in the case of duos like Batman and Robin. In that case, you would fill it out like this: Which looks like this:

Previous / NextCover
You'll notice that I did not include these fields in the required fields for this type of image. This is because there is no need for it. When Textless Cover is used as the ImageType, these fields will not appear, and if filled out, they will not display.

Issue
In nearly every case, the Source field should not be filled out on a Textless Cover, except in cases where you feel the need to link back to the web source for the image. This leaves the Issue field to link back to the issue the Textless Cover comes from.

To do that, you enter the pagename of the comic that the textless cover comes from. Fortunately, the Issue field is fitted with the Comic Naming Standardization Template - C - which means that if you don't type in the article name exactly it may be able to fix it for you.

So, easy-peazy, the source field in this case would look like this:

| Issue                = Animal Man Vol 2 1

Category Magic Alert! The Issue field automatically adds your image to the associated volume and issue image categories. The Source field does not, and that is why we use the Issue field for Textless Covers. In the example case, the image would go into Category:Animal Man Vol 2 1/Images and Category:Animal Man Vol 2/Images.

Under no circumstance should you fill out both the Source and Issue fields. For a while that was the standard, and now it isn't. If you see it, fix it.

Universe / Subject
For a Textless Cover and almost every other image, we fill out these fields with the universe and subject for the image, as explained here.

Credits
Unlike Cover Art and Variant Cover images, we do not use the "CoverArtist" fields for Textless Cover images. Instead, we list all of those who worked on the cover - that's penciler(s), inker(s), and colourist(s) - under their appropriate job title. As such, the process for filling out a Textless Cover's credits mirror those laid out here.

Sometimes (mostly for colourists) that information was not typically given in the interior credits of comic books, but a lot of cover artists sign their work with a signature. Though it is far from complete, we have been trying to compile Signature Images for staff members, so that their work can be easily recognized and credited when the interiors don't credit them, or get it wrong.

In any case, you can add more fields as needed by adding them on a new line. You will not likely need more than five, and rarely more than three.

For the example image on this page, the cover artist is Travel Foreman, and the colourist is Lovern Kindzierski. So, you would input this:


 * Penciler1      = Travel Foreman
 * Inker1         = Travel Foreman
 * Colourist1     = Lovern Kindzierski

Because Travel Foreman did both the pencils and inks on the image, you need to enter his name under both job titles.

The Category Magic that this field uses automatically adds the image to Category:Travel Foreman/Penciler Images, in this case, but not to Category:Travel Foreman/Cover Artist Images (the actual published cover ends up there).

Notes / Trivia
See this page for an explanation of these fields.

The Completed Template
The completed template for the example on this page (with all unused fields removed, for convenience) would then look like this:

Aside from the potential for additional subjects and credits, these are the only fields that you require when filling out the Image Template on a Textless Cover image.

Related

 * Back to the Image Template Hub
 * Help with Cover Art Images
 * Help with Variant Cover Images
 * Help with Character Images