The Comics Reporter reports the news that the Eisner awards are accepting submissions for a possible “Best Digital Comic” category.
The category would encompass a subset of webcomics but potentially include comics “distributed via other digital media”.
Any professionally produced long-form comics work posted online or distributed via other digital media is eligible. The majority of the work must have been published in 2004. Audio elements and animation can be part of the work but must be minimal. Web comics must have a unique domain name or be part of a larger comics community to be considered. The work must be online-exclusive for a significant period prior to being collected in print form.
That’s pretty swell, but the “long-form” requirement would seem to limit the possibilities considerably. It sounds like they’re basically looking for “graphic novel”-type webcomics, such as “Nowhere Girl” and “Same Difference”. And that’s fine, I guess, since that seems to be what the Eisners are all about. Still, a lot of webcomics deserving of recognition (Scary-Go-Round!) tend to fall in that awkward spot in the spectrum between “graphic novel” and “newspaper daily.”
Can anyone think of any webcomic that would be eligible to be submitted? The “majority of work must have been published in 2004” part limits the number of possibles rather drastically. I suppose specific storylines could be submitted perhaps.
Whew.. I dont know. I would guess long form online comics, could be anything thats updated for a long time. Not necessarily some big epic. So, a daily comic could totally be up for that.
They DO want to narrow it down. I mean, if you want to pick apart what was said.. It also says “professionally produced long-form comics work” === So “professionally” would narrow down the field in webcomics pretty slim. Dontya think?
I think they were just saying any comic online with a good amount of work, of a professional calibre would be considered. — But MAN, I can only imagine how many e-mails they’ll be getting.
This is great news for the webcomics scene, in general. It’ll certainly raise its profile.
I guess panel comics (like mine) don’t qualify, do they? 🙁
It’s a pity they’ve cut the timing so fine: “Deadline: March 25, 2005 (but sooner is much preferred)”.
This is a huge step in the right direction for Webcomics and very exciting in general. I would hope that the guidelines for submissions would evolve as time goes on. It seems to me they are trying to use print comics regulations on webcomics and that just doesn’t fit the medium. Still, that is a minor nitpick for now and the news is very gratifying to hear.
Take care,
Jamie