Voting in the 2023 Dunbier Awards wrapped up on January 31. Click here to see the voting. Here are the winners.
Best overall: Walter Simonson’s Fantastic Four Artist’s Edition, IDW, with 42% of the vote.
Best design: Walter Simonson’s Fantastic Four Artist’s Edition, Randall Dahlk, IDW, with 36% of the vote.
Best reproduction: Walter Simonson’s Fantastic Four Artist’s Edition, IDW, with 47% of the vote.
Best publisher: IDW, with 84% of the vote.
Favourite material: Walter Simonson’s Fantastic Four Artist’s Edition, IDW, with 48% of the vote.
Congratulations to IDW, Scott Dunbier, and Randall Dahlk. A clean sweep of the awards this year for IDW and Walter Simonson’s Fantastic Four Artist’s Edition.
This year marks the addition of The Dunbier Awards Hall of Fame inductees. These are creators and titles that have shaped the AE format and serve as a benchmark of what is possible. This isn’t about the story or the artist: it’s how the book progressed the AE format.
Dave Stevens’ The Rocketeer Artist’s Edition
There were books printing original art before 2010, but this title started the AE format in North America. IDW didn’t define an Artist’s Edition until their second volume in 2011, but here is that definition:
AN ARTIST’S EDITION PRESENTS COMPLETE STORIES WITH EACH PAGE SCANNED FROM THE ACTUAL ORIGINAL ART.
While appearing to be in black and white, each page was scanned in color to mimic as closely as possible the experience of viewing the actual original art—for instance, corrections and blue pencils. Each page is printed the same size as drawn, and the paper selected is as close as possible to the original art board.
A collection of scans of original art boards, showing the pages with all their production marks, warts and all, printed at the same size as those original art boards. Reproducing original art as closely as possible to the original, so for $100 we could hold thousands of dollars of art in our hands.
This was the first volume to also pair the AE format’s most prolific team of editor and designer, Scott Dunbier and Randall Dahlk, respectively. A team still going strong, winning all of this years’ categories.
Scott Dunbier
The man who brought the AE format to the North American market, spinning a product from past experiences and a desire for something more. With a unique background as a dealer in original art and an editor, Dunbier expected his proposal for the first Artist’s Edition to be rejected, but IDW went for the pitch and the rest is history. Delve into the many interviews Dunbier has done for a thorough examination. This desire expressed in Dave Stevens’ The Rocketeer Artist’s Edition remains as strong today as it was in 2010
It is our hope that Dave Stevens’ The Rocketeer: Artist’s Edition will be the first in a series of books dedicated to showcasing outstanding artists in a format as special as their work deserves.
