Last Sunday, an auction of Tintin and Herge memorabilia smashed national and international records. The highlights of the auction were a handful of original pages drawn by the man himself. All the pages are reproduced below, taken from the auction catalog. If you are interested in Tintin memrobilia then I advise you to have a look through the catalog but these drawings are the real gems.

My favourite are the pages from Flight 714, particularly the sketch pages. In the image of Tintin with his hands behind his back we can see how fine an artist Herge was. Also, the strange figure in the bottom left hand corner. It is an odd mix of styles, half realistic, half modern art. The pages from The Castafiore Emerald are great examples of how Herge refined the story as he drew. Look how the sequence and point of view of the images changes between the original and the inked work.

Many thanks to MetaBunker for finding these.

In the 1920’s and 30’s, before RADAR was developed, there were various attempts at developing an acoustic system that literally listen to the sound of approaching planes. An example of this can be seen in King Ottakar’s Scepture.

In the UK, massive concrete acoustic mirrors were built that focused the sound into a microphone, allowing planes to be detected earlier. Now these crumbling structures are to be saved as national landmarks.

Its amazing that technology Herge used as cutting edge science in his early books is now needing preservation orders and listing as a national landmark.

More Info: Britain’s vast cement “listening ears” designated a national landmark