Talk:Prestige format

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[edit] Clarfiying

"These collections are typically referred to as 'trade paperbacks' or 'graphic novels.'" Are they? I thought they were described as prestige format or some other euphemism. I think there would be problems if someone called them graphic novels. The whole thing needs sources but this stood out as odd and in need of clarifying. (Emperor 22:00, 8 May 2007 (UTC))

I think I agree. Unless I'm mistaken, this article describes something roughly the same size (or slightly bigger) as a usual comic book "pamphlet" in dimension, that basically just happens to have a card stock cover, different binding and maybe better paper quality. And is perhaps a few extra dozen pages long. While it's true that I've seen some similarly-constructed books described as "graphic novels" (such as the collected version of the Fray 8-part miniseries), I don't think the term is nearly so interchangeable with that term or "trade paperback" as the article implies. For one, all the "trade paperbacks" in the industry that I've seen are much smaller than the "prestige format" books I've seen, in terms of dimension; they're also a little longer, printed on much cheaper (non-glossy) paper, and usually seem to be collections of chapters of serial comics works (example: Runaways).

Additionally, the term "graphic novel" implies something somewhat longer in terms of page-length, and you can also produce a hardcover "graphic novel" (which has in fact actually happened a few times, though it's rather rare in practice; the Trigun manga's English translation was at one point being released in special hardcover omnibus editions, for instance, and as I recall, the Fruits Basket series' English-language release is also seeing similar treatment right now), while "prestige format" apparently denotes something with a specifically card stock (paperback) cover.

In other words, while there are some "graphic novels" and "trade paperbacks" are constructed similarly, the truth is that as described in the article so far, the terms simply aren't completely synonymous with "prestige format", which sounds like it refers to not just the physical format, but also the storytelling length (relatively brief, but longer than a single "pamphlet"), and is a more specific term in general. 4.238.16.168 (talk) 06:22, 26 November 2007 (UTC)