Tree house

I was recently pleasantly surprised to see that Australian newsagents would be getting the latest Tree house of Horror Simpsons comic from Bongo. You have to realise that living in Ballarat I have no access to comic stores, so a publication like this, full of alternative press artists, is a real treat!

I also love this crumb print

Australian comics wiki HAYASE!

I just found out about this Australian comics wiki. I think it would be great if comic readers/makers in Australia started heavily editing this wiki and giving it such things as, comprehensive listings of Australian comic artists, where to get supplies, and what libraries have good comic collections.
You can find the wiki here,
http://hayase.net.au/wiki/

I have had bad experiences with wikipedia when it comes to independent comic entries as most of the editors would delete that kind of information on site for what ever reason. Hayase could be a great alternative wiki for Australian comic artists. If you think you have something to add, then head on over and sign up for an account.

I have also made an offer for a free package of digital comics for those who want to join in on a test I am conducting. You need to have an iPhone or iPod touch to join in.

Some links

BoingBoing reviews a new Sony eReader that promises buyers will indeed own their books as opposed to just leasing them as per Amazons Kindle model.

Lucy Knisley comic on the subject

Apple tablet in the works?

It seems like the main argument against eReaders is that people like books. I like books too, but there is no reason that you cannot have both. There is going to be huge possibilities with comics if Apple does indeed have this tablet in the works.

All done

You can expect to see a return of comics here on the blog now that I have finished all of my study responsibilities.
All I can say is that I am glad to have my life back, now I just need to find a job!

Back!

Good news is that I had my last exam yesterday and now I have finished all my requirements for my graduate diploma.
I am a little rusty on the drawing front, it may take a few weeks of consistent practice for it to feel normal again. This really emphasizes the importance of drawing every day to me.
You can expect to see some new comics next week.

Kindle or iPhone

I am still interested in formatting comics for portable digital devices. Two of the main avenues that I can see are the iPhone and the Kindle. For some reason I am more attracted to the Kindle, despite the controversy surrounding them and DRM issues. Perhaps it is because it has a larger screen than the iPod and uses the ePaper technology that is actually similar to paper than a computer screen.

This has had new found relevance now that Amazon has released an international version of the Kindle which you can get sent to Australia and download content to in Australia, and now hoave the larger Kindle DX.

I found this article that discusses difficulty getting comic material to look good on the Kindle, but something tells me they are talking about detailed large scale colour comics, and I wonder how smaller scale and simpler black and white art of the independent and self published work would go. Surely work saved as a hi-res bitmap PDF would look crisp.

Say what you like about digital versus print, it does not change that new possibilities to distribute your work are there and increasing daily. Put another way, you can still collect vinyl and own an iPod. There are lots of comics I would love to read but not necessarily own in hardcopy.

The other thing that I find exciting about eReaders is the ability to charge for content (It sounds crass but financial compensation helps keep the comics coming out)
Try charging for content on the web and you will see your readers turn in the other direction. I think this is due to that looking at content on the web is like looking through a spyglass. You pay to look through this spyglass by buying a computer and paying for an internet connection but you are not necessarily retaining content, and even if you did there no real way to easily sort and reread it. Where as when you have an iPod or Kindle the content actually gets download to your device, you retain it and can reread it at your own convenience.

There is one guy that sells an eBook (actually two) on how to format for the kindle. Although I am sure you could figure out the details without buying his book, as he appears to be someone that has done his research and condensed it into an eBook.

If I can come up with a straightforward solution on how to format for Kindle (or other eBook readers for that matter) I will post it here in the coming weeks. In the meantime what are your thoughts? Perhaps it is too early to really invest in todays eReaders, you read about some people who are waiting for eInk to be made in colour or with touch screen capabilties.

So here are some technical specs of the Kindle
Screen size: 6" (15 cm) diagonal E Ink® electronic paper display, 600 x 800 pixel resolution
Screen resolution: 167 ppi,
Greyscale range: 16-level gray scale.
File types: Kindle (AZW), TXT, Audible (Audible Enhanced (AA, AAX)), MP3, unprotected MOBI, PRC natively; PDF, HTML, DOC, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP through conversion.

Synesthesia

I watched a video on synesthesia the other day (care of bOINGbOING) I have seen another documentary on it years ago which was longer and more informative. The synesthesia described in this video though seemed to be a lot simpler than the previous documentary I watched. This recent video said that you have synesthesia when you associate letters or numbers with colours, which I just thought was normal. I have particularity strong associations with the days of the week which I thought I would share here,

Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
Sunday

These are approximations of the colours I associate with certain days. I could probably fine tune it if I was to use the colour picker in Photoshop.

A must watch

Yellow Cake from Nick Cross on Vimeo.