Quick Award Update for Ignatz and Shuster
In various webcomic categories, cat garza, Year of the Rat, won the Ignatz and Cameron Stewart, Sin Titulo, won the Joe Shuster. Congrats to both cat and Cameron!
Author: Xaviar Xerexes
Bitstrips For The Classroom.
Boing BOing writes about Bitstrips for Schools, an educational comic-making service that was tested in Ontario classrooms this past spring and is now more widely available. Here’s a video of kids using it during that beta phase. The terms for licensing appear to run from 10 to 30 dollars a month depending on the number of students.
Wednesday Stuff About Webcomics
Did I mention SPX is this weekend? Other stories of note:
TECHNOLOGY
Brigid Alverson reviews various iPhone apps for comics.
Gizmodo covers leaked information on Microsoft's new tablet computer.
HOLLYWOOD
Newsarama has a story on the webcomic Wide Awake and that Jarrod Feliciano and Mirjana Novkovic at Do-Over Productions recently optioned the film rights to it. Do-Over Productions on its facebook page describes itself as "Do-Over Productions is a New York based independent production company. We love stories. Especially epic stories – not in their presentation, but in their content – epic in what they make you think and feel."
JUSTIFY MY HYPE
Scott McCloud commands that you read Derek Kirk Kim's new webcomic, Tune. I do too.
AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS
Fallout Boy Pete Wentz now making FallOut Boy comics – an interview with the musician here.
Coverage of Randall Munroe's recent book reading and signing for xkcd: volume 0. Video too.
SPX SPX SPX!!!
Hey it’s the coolest little comics show that could, the Small Press Expo in Bethesda, MD. It’s this Saturday and Sunday and thanks to the very gracious and cool Mrs. X, I am shirking husband and fatherhood to check out the show on Saturday afternoon. There is an insane number of AMAZING comics-making folks at the show and a good set of speakers and panels.
I’m going to check out the "Comic Strips: Online and In Print" panel with Kate Beaton, Erika Moen, R. Stevens, and Julia Wertz and the "Critics’ Roundtable" with Rob Clough, Sean T. Collins, Gary Groth, Chris Mautner, Joe McCulloch, Tucker Stone, Douglas Wolk and Bill Kartalopoulos.
Wakes Me When the Webcomic Is Over
I have a review of the graphic novel Ragbox up on the site. If you've got a comic or comic-related thing on paper you'd like to see reviewed in ComixTalk, here's the information on how to get it to me. And in self-interested plugging, I've restarted xaviarxerexes.com this year; largely also about comics, but also about ME and sometimes about ME as well.
JUSTIFY MY HYPE
After you check out the debut of Bad Machinery from John Allison don't forget to check out the debut of Not Invented Here from Paul Southworth and Bill Barnes.
DEMOGRAPHICS
Sean Kleefeld looks in on results of a survey Brad Guigar took of his Evil Inc readers.
BUSINESS
Newspapers are dying and everyone is writing about it… on the web. Paul Graham explains that newspapers were only ever in the business of selling paper and well, people are less in need of paper these days (it's actually a pretty insightful analysis). A newspaper guy and a blogger argue about the fate of the newspaper biz on a blog from PBS.
The Ragbox
The Ragbox is a comic written by Dave Kender and drawn by three artists: Mark Hamilton, Braden Lamb, and Matthew Reinke (each artist handling one of the three chapters). Kender is the founder of the Boston Roundtable group. This is a short book — the pleasures in reading it are not really for the plot so there will be spoilers ahead. (It's also available as a webcomic here; you can buy the book at the store here.)
Hi & Lois Discovers Webcomics
It looks like the current creators of Hi and Lois are the latest to be afflicted by Wiley Miller disease ("an irrational hatred of webcomics") – check out their current comic which slams webcomics (Oh… it’s on. So on…). I would have cried from reading the cuttting humor deployed by the current creative team of this 45 year old comic strip (which btw are the sons of the original creative team, Brian and Greg Walker and Robert "Chance" Browne), but I was comforted by the touching thoughts of the Comics Curmudgeon.
FLEEN notes that most of the audience for Hi and Lois probably has never heard of "webcomics". Maybe Jay Leno can explain it to them…
Comics And the iPhone Apps Store
Comicspace co-CEO Joey Manley writes a lengthy blog post about the growth of comics on the iPhone platform this year, focusing a lot on the messiness of where comics are on the iPhone apps store (apparently they're all over: music, tv, books, specialized apps, etc). I don't think Comicspace itself has done anything with the iPhone yet — Manley's comments on what he actually thinks of the smaller screen format vs a traditional computer screen may have had something to do with that.
Kickstarter Fundraising Model
Jamie Tanner, the creator of Eisner-niminated The Aviary, is using Kickstarter to run a fund-raising drive — enough money gets pledged, money gets collected and Tanner does his next graphic novel. (h/t Journalista!) He has over $2000 pledged with a goal of $5000.
Not new necessarily but interesting that this type of web-facilitated tool is being used for non-webcomic comic projects. Plus Kickstarter itself looks like a handy way to do this kind of approach.
UPDATE: Don’t know how I missed this but Gordon McAlpin is using Kickstarter to raise funds for a print collection of his webcomic Multiplex. McAlpin is trying to raise $7500 towards finishing the work necessary to complete the book.
Tuesday Is Quiet in Webcomictown… So Far!
Wow — not a lot to report on this morning, but John Allison does have a comic up about thinking up a new comic. Maybe a little bit insider-y but very funny!
Also an interview with Keith Pille, of the webcomic Nowhere Band. Pille is also in the real life band Derailleur. So there ya go!
JUSTIFY MY HYPE
The most recent storyline of Rocket Roadtrip incorporates noted sci-fi author John Scalzi in it. Scalzi was good-natured enough to link to it on his blog recently.
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