Author: Xaviar Xerexes

Hey one bit of SPX-related news I forgot to relay is that Dave Roman's all age webcomic Astronaut Academy will be a graphic novel from First Second — scheduled for publication next summer.  Very exciting — Roman is a great cartoonist and I think this book is a great project for him.

Posting is going to be light to non-existant over the Columbus Day holiday here in the United States but I'll be back with more reviews next Tuesday. In the meantime here's some stories worth reading from around the Intertubes:

BUSINESS: Jason Brubaker of the webcomic ReMind writes up how he's been making money from his webcomic this year.

REVIEWS: CBR has a review of Dylan Meconis' Bite Me graphic novel (collected from the webcomic); Comics Alliance has a review of the webcomic Buttersafe; and Boing Boing praises Dan Goldman's Red Light Properties webcomic.

INTERVIEW: Daily Cross Hatch posts the first of a 3 part interview with Drew Weing on his new graphic novel Set to Sea.

From the Mailbag:  Sean O'Neill writes about a project he's working on — a graphic novel for young readers called Rocket Robinson and the Pharaoh’s Fortune. O'Neill describes it as "a classic adventure story about a 12-year-old boy traveling in Egypt who discovers a plot to steal a secret ancient treasure."  I hope to get a chance to read more of it – a quick look at is is promising.

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A few new reviews from me this week — thumbs up to Koko Be Good and Bone: Tall Tales.

I saw that Wired compared xkcd's new map of online communities versus the original one it did in 2007.  It is kind of amazing how quickly some sites fortunes have risen and fallen since just 2007.

INTERVIEWS

• Comics Alliance has an interview with the Cyanide & Happiness crew on the release of their second book collection "Ice Cream & Sadness" which features a foreword from Randall Monroe of xkcd.
• PW has an interview with Dan Goldman, currently working on his webcomic Red Light Properties.
• Mike Rhode talks to Lauren Affe, comic colorist.
• Graphic Novel Reporter talks to Matt Madden about this year's Best American Comics anthology.

HYPE: Robot6 covers Steve Horton's forthcoming Spinning To Infinity webcomic — a unique story serialized in one-page increments with each page telling a standalone story with a new artist on every story. Horton has over 30 artists on-board, with openings for a couple more. Interested artists can contact him at smashoutgames@gmail.com.

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So after mistakenly wondering what had happened to Ben Bittner's websites on Friday I found several recent mentions of him, including an appearance at the 2010 Stumptown Comics Fest (there's a picture of Ben there too).  Ben's webcomics include Space Pirate Apocalypse and Cooking with Anne.

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2009: (above) Charles Snow, creator of Sordid City Blues contributed the ComixTalk cover art for the month of October.

2008: We covered the end of the long-running webcomic Cigarro and Cerveja Tony Esteves. The archived comic is still available here.

2007: Jerzy Drozd announced the launch of Sugary Serials – an all ages webcomic anthology site. I interviewed Jerzy at SPX this year — you can see the video here.  Also Tim Demeter wrapped up his webcomic Reckless Life; Cox & Forkum called it quits on their political webcomic; and Jennie Breeden hit the milestone #2000 with her webcomic The Devil's Panties.

2006: In 2006 we had a ComixTalk cover from Ben Bittner, the creator of the webcomics Space Pirate Apocalypse and Cooking With Anne.  Unfortunately his website appears to be gone — anyone reported a more recent online sighting of his work?

2005: Founding editor-in-chief Lea Hernandez handed over to Lisa Jonte the editorship of the webcomic anthology site Girlamatic.

2004: T Campbell organized the first meeting of the Washington Webtoonists group.  

2003: Chris Onstad's Achewood hit the two year milestone; and 21st Century Fox joined the webcomic collective The Nice.

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Scott McCloud reminds you it's 24 HOUR COMICS DAY tomorrow. Good luck to all the crazy comicnauts launching tomorrow.

Forbidden Planet reminds you that there's less than a week to the deadline for this year’s Jonathan Cape/Observer/Comica Graphic Short Story Prize.  The winner gets £1000 and their four page short published in the Observer Review, while the runner up wins £250 and their work appearing on the Guardian and Vintage websites.

And FLEEN's mention of Alexander Danner's write-up of the recent MICE convention in Boston, MA reminds me I wanted to post a link to it.  So here it is!

Last but not least — this video should remind you of comics creator Jason Shiga's genius:

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Jason Bane wrote in to tell us that he's the editor for Carpe Chaos, a webcomic site that launched on June 1st of this year:

Carpe Chaos is an independent science-fiction space opera about five alien races who learn to travel between stars, and it focuses on the ways their cultures collide and how they work to solve their problems. There's no one "hero story" that follows a single character throughout his or her transformative journey, but instead a series of short stories that all take place in the same galaxy (and the stories span thousands of years). There are six stories so far, and while the first five are only one chapter long, the latest comic, Rising Up will run for four chapters. 

The site publishes a new chapter each month.  I gave it a quick look, reading the story "Strength in Numbers" and it's promising.  Certainly the art is nice and I like the idea of short stories set in a shared universe without necessarily having to follow one long narrative.  It uses Flash for presentation and you get a "pages turning" effect with the "feel" of a comic book — which is a plus or minus depending on whether you like that kind of thing.  

UPDATE – in the comments someone posted a link to an non-flash html version of the comics.

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Inkbot is an anthology site for webcomics that sent me a few press releases this month.  I like its mission statement – one new title a month and only creator-owned comics.  Inkbot says it does not retain any rights to the comic (other than presumably a license to display online).  Founder Christian Rubiano sent me a blurb on two webcomics: Odessa — historical fiction centered around the question "What if the Nazi's won WWII, and what if Americans helped them do it?" and self-described as an examination on race relations, propaganda, and geo-politics; and American Ambition — a comedy which features the last remnants of a once-great superhero team.

For the most part, and not to pick on Rubiano, standard press releases are kind of boring to a news site. Try to find something interesting about your comic project and RIGHT NOW that makes it especially interesting and compelling for someone to write about it instead of anything else that day.

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