Mark Waid Takes His Second Step In Digital!

[CyberLord]

Mark Waid has released the first chapter of one of his digital comics.
You can read it here: http://www.thrillbent.com/.
He is doing some really interesting things with digital. It has me thinking about my own comic. I don't think it's too late for me to incorporate some of these effects into my own work. I'm just not certain yet that I want to.
I highly recommend reading his blog as well.

[50%grey]

Pretty much the same thing everyone else is doing.

Motion comics, are kind of like 3d movies for me. Very gimmicky

They keep coming out ,and people just don't like them.


I think the main thing is people want to treat them like a film, and they really aren't.

Film has the added benefit of sound, which is a HUGE element of that format.

Even the old silent movies had background music.

[CyberLord]

Pretty much the same thing everyone else is doing.

Motion comics, are kind of like 3d movies for me. Very gimmicky

They keep coming out ,and people just don't like them.


I think the main thing is people want to treat them like a film, and they really aren't.

Film has the added benefit of sound, which is a HUGE element of that format.

Even the old silent movies had background music.

I feel the same way.
It is cool, but I am not sure it is still comics. This is why I am not sure I would want to incorporate it into my comic. Is this just a gimmick, or does it have legs?

[50%grey]

Not sure, we won't know till the majority goes digital, and the bigger companies switch to something like this.

I know they've done this a bunch in the past, and it hasn't caught on.

[CyberLord]

Not sure, we won't know till the majority goes digital, and the bigger companies switch to something like this.

I know they've done this a bunch in the past, and it hasn't caught on.

I think the bigger companies have been so star-struck by Hollyweird they may have lost sight of the ball. It may just take someone like Mark Waid, or another lesser known innovator, to make this work.
While this is gimmicky right now, someone with some real imagination might find ways to make this something other than a lesser version of motion.
Anyway, it's interesting to watch.

[Chris2.0]

I for one kinda like what Waid is doing...

Could be that Waid is doing to comics now that Eisner and Kirby did in their day to the medium?

In any case, even if he is wrong with the "enhanced" format of the comic (think post 3D-conversion!), I don't think he's wrong with targeting the digital medium exclusively - that is the way of the future after all...

Just wait until cheap colour e-ink foldable screens and 99c (or $10 subscription plans!) comics meets in the near future!

[Johnny Blaque]

I for one kinda like what Waid is doing...

Could be that Waid is doing to comics now that Eisner and Kirby did in their day to the medium?

In any case, even if he is wrong with the "enhanced" format of the comic (think post 3D-conversion!), I don't think he's wrong with targeting the digital medium exclusively - that is the way of the future after all...

Just wait until cheap colour e-ink foldable screens and 99c (or $10 subscription plans!) comics meets in the near future!

He can't be the Eisner of Kirby if a million people have done this years and years before him. Somewhere Scott McCloud is laughing his ass off about how right he was about this stuff. But no one will still pay a penny for his comics...

The comics themselves are alright. Insufferable is better done than Luther. Keep the cutesy gimmick stuff to a minimum and focus on well drawn and written comics. That's the real draw to this for me. If he gets some REALLY GOOD artists, that already puts him ahead of the others. Hire Jason Pearson to do a weekly thing. Get John Paul Leon for something. Or Paul Azaceta or some of the other good BOOM! artists like Matteo Scalera or Rafael Albuquerque. Peter Krause is a step in the right direction.

[CyberLord]

I agree with both of you but to get Chris 2.0's $0.99 price at Johnny Blaque's fine art is going to be tough with a medium that takes far longer to create than it does to experience.
As my programmer friends would remind me, you can have it cheap, fast, or bug-free (high-quality). Pick any two!
Readers of comics today are looking for an experience far above what Jack Kirby, Jim Steranko, or Neal Adams would have provided back in the 1960's and 1970's. Color work alone has dominated todays comics art to the point where lousy pencillers produce work that is viewable.
In my opinion comics will have to move from the short story to the finished novel. I'm not talking about the "graphic novel" which is still just a single story arc in a never-ending soap opera. I'm talking about "Dune" before the sequels and prequels. I'm talking about "Childhood's End", "The Left Hand of Darkness", and books like those that told ONE story without regard to the money-making potential of sequels.
There will always be room for the short story. In today's fast paced world, people will probably appreciate short fiction. But we must move beyond the guys in spandex punching each other in the face and start telling real stories that are relevant to the lives of people living in the 21st century.
And then make sure the illustrations match the story.
It will take longer to produce such works, but I believe it will be worth it in the long run.

[Huerta]

He messed up on that first panel with the camera screen effect. He should've had a few more panels of that but each one a little different so it gives the illusion of real movement with the screen effect, plus it would've looked cooler playing with it. The way he did it was to sudden and jarring.

And 50 and JB are right, this has been done for the past 10 years already.

[astrocity20]

Readers of comics today are looking for an experience far above what Jack Kirby, Jim Steranko, or Neal Adams would have provided back in the 1960's and 1970's. Color work alone has dominated todays comics art to the point where lousy pencillers produce work that is viewable.

Aren't people still reading small black and white manga titles? All I'm really looking for are affordable, well written comics that usually do not star people in spandex.