Alfred J. Kwak Filmstripboek Deel 1

Alfred J. Kwak Filmstripboek "De Eieren", "Het Verjaardagsfeestje", "Het Kroonjuweel"
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Written by	Herman van Veen
Artwork by	Harald Siepermann Hans Bacher
Typesetting and layout	Ton de Jong jr.
Publisher	PrimaMedia bv (Ton de Jong)
Language	Dutch
Release date	25th of November, 2006
Number of pages	50
Binding method	Hardcover
ISBN	978 90 77217 12 2

The first part of the filmstrip book series contains faithful filmstrips of the first three episode of the animated series, "De Eieren" (lit. 'The Eggs'), "Het Verjaardagsfeestje" (lit. 'The Birthday Party') and "Het Kroonjuweel" (lit. 'The Crown Jewels'). This book uses screengrabs from a Standard Definition quality source, likely the Disky DVD release from the same year.

Story

Summary

This book faithfully retells the story of Episode 1, Episode 2 and Episode 3 of the animated series. Please check the relevant pages for a more elaborate summary.

De Eieren

When Henk de Mol and Johan Sebastiaan Kwak meet at the start of spring, Henk introduces Johan to Anna van de Polder. While Johan was originally skeptical of marrying, it is not long before the two fall in love and get married. Anna and Johan make 7 eggs and Johan is tasked to watch them as they are threatened by the cynical Schor de Kraai and Miriam Merel, and the egg-thief Rap de Kiekendief. Luckily Johan makes sure the egg that was stolen returns. As he does it hatches. Henk, Anna and Johan name the child Alfred Jodocus Kwak after Henk's grandfather. The other six eggs hatch as well, giving Alfred 3 brothers and 3 sisters.

Just as the family is reunited after Alfred had wandered off and Henk had returned him, the ground is torn apart by construction workers. Based on plans by Olaf Nijlpaard, funded by Alfons Rokodil, the Beton Maatschappij, led by Bart 'Beton' Bever is transforming their once peaceful pasture into a theme park called Groot Speelgoedland. Henk tries to convince Johan to move his family from Breed Rietland to Groot Waterland to a mine house that was once owned by Henk's grandfather. Alfred sneaks out in the middle of the night to visit the theme park, but gets scared by an Animatronic Gorilla.

Het Verjaardagsfeestje

Henk and the Kwak family emigrate to Groot Waterland. Just before crossing a busy road during a rainstorm, Alfred gets distracted and Henk chases him. Johan, Anna, and Alfred's brothers and sisters are killed by car carrying Olaf Nijlpaard and Alfons Rokodil in a hit-and-run traffic accident. Henk adopts Alfred and both move into the house of Henk's grandfather. Alfred has a tough time processing the passing of his family, but Henk promises him to be both his father and his mother.

A year later Alfred celebrates his first birthday and his friends come over for a party. Pikkie de Ekster gets obsessed with the sparkling key around the neck of one of the sparrow triplets and tries to take it from them. He breaks the rope, but gives the key back. Henk concludes that it must be because Pikkie is a magpie.

The bus arrives to bring Henk and the kids to the King's Palace for a guided tour by Jonkheer Poen van Kalekoen. During the ruby of the crown exhibit Pikkie stays being enthralled by the jewel. He steals it and the whole palace is locked down. Pikkie accidentally drops the ruby from high up on Alfred's head, just as the guards find him and assume Alfred was the thief. He gets locked up in the palace's cellar.

Jonkheer Poen van Kalekoen explaining about the history of Groot Waterland's monarchy.

Het Kroonjuweel

The King returns to his castle only to find that drawbridge has been drawn. Jonkheer Poen informs him that Alfred has tried to steal the ruby of the crown and now faces the possibility that he will face the death penalty. Henk begs the King to release Alfred, but he doesn't comply. Henk gets the kids and they all stay in an hotel. Ollie de Ooievaar concludes that Pikkie must've stolen the ruby as she's a magpie.

Henk visits Alfred, intending to give him some food, by going through the bars of a window high in Alfred's cell. They are interupted by Krabnagel de Kater who wants to devour Henk. Henk drops inside the cell. He tells Alfred that it's probably Pikkie who stole the ruby, but Alfred doesn't want Pikkie to take the fall, even though he might not get the death penalty. Two mice allow Henk to escape.

During the trial, the judge Wisal de Uil takes out the ruby, which leads to Pikkie trying to steal it again. The conclusion is that it was Pikkie who stole the ruby. The King gives Pikkie the royal yellow card and Alfred is pronounced innocent. Henk and the kids return home in the bus that they came in.

Continuity

This book retells the story of Episode 1, Episode 2 and Episode 3 of the animated series. Please check the relevant pages for more info.

• Both Stip and the motorcyclist do not speak in the original episode, but they get dialogue in this book.
• Anna van de Polder's line "Oh, daar gaat hij weer!" (lit. Oh, there he goes again) is given to one of Alfred's sisters, making this the first time in any Dutch media the kids speak a full line of dialogue.

A good example of the frame blending issue. This picture shows two frames blended into eachother.

Errata

• While the next book improves on the quality of the screengrabs used, this book uses nearest-neighbor interpolation image scaling making it possible to see the individual pixels each picture is comprised of. In some cases frame blending can even be seen, resulting in a doubling effect in the image. Another quality comparison can be made with colors. While part 1 uses bright colors and high contrast, part 2's color pallet is more muted.
• All screengrabs appear to have been printed in the RGB color model, rather than being converted to CMYK, the standard model for print media. This can be observed in the bright magenta beams of the ruby in the crown, which lose saturation in the center. This effect suggests a color shift resulting from an RGB-to-CMYK conversion error, as the magenta extends outside the CMYK color space.
• Some text clouds appear to be in the wrong order, creating confusing dialogues.
• The text box introducing the following scene on page 9 appears at the top of a panel one frame earlier than intended.
• The original line "Geografisch gezien zijn er veel plassen en sloten die we moeten droogleggen..." (lit. Geographically, there are many ponds and ditches that we need to drain...) seems to have been mistakenly adapted to "Geld technisch gezien zijn er veel plassen en sloten die we moeten droogleggen..." (lit. Financially speaking, there are many ponds an ditches we need to drain...).
• The hatching of Alfred's brothers and sisters is cut entirely and they appear on the next page.

Some panels are highly zoomed in, revealing individual pixels.

• In the bus on the way to the King's Palace Henk's lines to explain what the the king is doing on Wednesdays is mistakenly given to Alfred instead.
• During the guided tour Jonkheer Koen van Kalepoen refers to the Castle of Ottodonk, when the original was Otterdom.
• It is hard to understand from the panels that Pikkie de Ekster pushed the ruby over the edge onto Alfred, who was walking down below.
• At the end of the book a list of all the different books that will be released in this series is shown. Episode 16 is mislabeled as "De straat van Jeep" (lit. The street of Jeep), when the original Dutch title for the episode is "Rangpang".
• In one textcloud on page 33 Alfred seems to be responding to something mid-sentence that was cut for this book.
• Henk using the holes the Palace mice made to escape is cut entirely, making it unclear how Henk escaped the cell Alfred was held in.

Cast

Character gallery

The characters in order of appearance.

• 
  Mevrouw Bij
• 
  Mevrouw Bij's Son
• 
  Willem Bij
• 
  Henk de Mol
• 
  Johan Sebastiaan Kwak
• 
  Anna van de Polder
• 
  Jan van de Polder (mentioned)
• 
  Stip
• 
  Stap
• 
  Henri Dropshot (not named)
• 
  Johnny Hollyday (not named)
• 
  Rap de Kiekendief
• 
  Olaf Nijlpaard
• 
  Alfons Rokodil
• 
  Bart 'Beton' Bever
• 
  Schor de Kraai
• 
  Miriam Merel (not named)
• 
  Alfred Jodocus Kwak
• 
  Alfred's brothers and sisters
• 
  Alfred de Mol
• 
  Animatronic gorilla
• 
  Pikkie de Ekster
• 
  Ollie de Ooievaar
• 
  Drieling Mus
• 
  Hannes Snater
• 
  Wannes Snater
• 
  Pel de Pelikaan (not named)
• 
  Koning Radbout de Derde
• 
  Jonkheer Das
• 
  Hunters 1 en 2
• 
  Hunter 3
• 
  Jonkheer Poen van Kalekoen
• 
  Otto de Derde (mentioned)
• 
  Joris de Woeste (mentioned)
• 
  Do Lano (not named)
• 
  Soldier 1
• 
  Soldier 2
• 
  Soldier 3
• 
  Richard de Derde (mentioned)
• 
  Soldier 4
• 
  Soldier 5
• 
  Soldier 6
• 
  Soldier 7
• 
  Jailer
• 
  Krabnagel de Kater
• 
  Mouse 1
• 
  Mouse 2
• 
  Re Lano (not named)
• 
  Wisal de Uil
• 
  Prince Franz Ferdinand (not named)

Main staff list

© 2006 Herman van Veen Studios BV, Soest
© 1989 Harlekijn/Van Veen Siepermann, Bacher & JFA productions BV
Exclusive license given by Herman van Veen Studios BV, Soest, Stephan Dunweg

Illustrations: Hans Bacher, Harald Siepermann
Text: Herman van Veen
Typesetting and layout: Ton de Jong jr.
Distribution: Joosten & De Haas
Printing company: Drukkerij Proost
Special thanks': Hans Huijsing, Maan Jansen, Manon Kotvis and Letja Verstijnen

ISBN: 978 90 77217 12 2
CIP
NUR 361

Production notes

The book opens with a foreword from Herman van Veen, co-signed tongue-in-cheek by Alfred Jodocus Kwak.

Original Dutch Voor u ligt het eerste filmstripboek uit een serie van 17 Alfred Jodocus Kwak boeken. Hiermee is een lang gekoesterde wens in vervulling gegaan, om van de 52 filmafleveringen van Alfred en zijn vrienden boeken uit te geven. Het bleek geen eenvoudige klus om van bewegende beelden, drukbare plaatjes te knippen. De charme waarin de films zijn gemaakt, met zijn mooie kleurrijke omgeving, is in de boeken gelukkig nog helemaal aanwezig. Om een voorbeeld te geven van de technische hoogstandjes; een aflevering van een tv-serie duurt circa 25 minuten en bevat ongeveer 36000 filmframes. Hieruit moeten per aflevering 100 plaatjes geknipt worden. Vervolgens moet een tekst-scenario worden gemaakt en de teksten met tekstballon bij de plaatjes worden geplaatst. Het geheel komt overeen met het verhaal van de tv-serie. Veel lees- en kijkplezier, Herman van Veen én Alfred Jodocus Kwak.

Translation Before you lies the first filmstrip book in a series of 17 Alfred Jodocus Kwak books. With this, a long-held wish has come true to publish books based on the 52 film episodes of Alfred and his friends. It turned out to be no simple task to cut printable images from moving pictures. Fortunately, the charm with which the films were made, along with their beautiful, colorful setting, are still entirely present in the books. To give an example of the technical feats involved: an episode of a TV series lasts about 25 minutes and contains approximately 36,000 film frames. From these, 100 images must be selected for each episode. Then a script must be created, and the texts need to be placed in speech bubbles alongside the images. The result matches the story of the TV series. Enjoy reading and viewing, Herman van Veen and Alfred Jodocus Kwak

The cover seems to be a traced over screengrab from Alfred K. Kwak Episode 2 featuring Jonkheer Koen van Kalepoen giving his guided tour at the ruby of the crown. The screengrabs were from a Standard Definition quality source, likely the Disky DVD release from the same year.

From photos made by Harald Siepermann at PrimaMedia we can see that originally the cover for this book looked different, featuring King Radbout de Derde and Jonkheer Das at the castle gates from the start Alfred J. Kwak Episode 3. Likely this was changed to feature a more prominent character and scene.

• 
  Ton de Jong (??) showing Stephan Dunweg printed pages and a mock-up of the cover.
• 
  Both mock-ups of the previous picture warp perspective transformed to show them head on.
• 
  The screengrab from Alfred J. Kwak Episode 3 the mock-up cover was based on. They seem to have needed to recreate the paws of the King's hunters.

This screengrab was traced for the actual front cover.

Changes from the original

Changes from the episodes

The following lists all the changes between the Episode 1, Episode 2 and Episode 3 of the animated series and this book. The book remains largely faithful to the original episodes, though it includes additional dialogue in scenes where none was present. In some instances, dialogue is condensed to improve flow. Additionally, the sequence of certain frames has been rearranged.

De Eieren

• The day after Johan met Anna, the scene in which Johan rushes back to the river to brush his teeth and wash his hair is omitted.
• Both Stip and the motorcyclist do not speak in the original episode, but they get dialogue in this book.
• The scene with Johan pacing impatiently and Henk driving his wheelbarrow accidentally over Johan's foot has been cut.
• Johan chasing the egg stolen by Rap de Kiekendief is cut short. Rap runs away and bumps into Henk almost immediately, causing him to throw the egg in the air only for Johan to catch it. Because of this the appearance of Snel de Snoek is cut entirely. Henk's and Rap's conversation about flying is also cut.
• The hatching of Alfred's brothers and sisters is cut entirely.
• Alfred finding out the sound of his own voice and that the gorilla in the theme park is actually an animatronic is cut as Alfred gets scared and runs back to the clog after encountering the gorilla only once.

RGB-to-CMYK conversion error can be seen in the beams of light from the ruby.

Het Verjaardagsfeestje

• Several scenes from the guided tour are cut shorter.
• The panic scene just after the ruby of the crown has been stolen is cut much shorter.

Het Kroonjuweel

• The conversation with the Palace mice is cut shorter.
• The confrontation with Krabnagel de Kat is cut much shorter.
• The conversation between Henk and Alfred in the cell is cut shorter.
• The scene between King Radbout de Derde and his son, Prince Franz Ferdinand de Eerste, has been cut.
• The introduction of Wisal de Uil and the start of the trail is cut.
• The trial itself is also cut shorter.