Mobile comic

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A Mobile comic is a digital comic or cartoon strip that can be purchased, downloaded, read and sometimes edited or shared with friends via mobile phones.

Contents

[edit] Overview

Increasingly the line between digital comics, animation and games is blurring and the same applies to their mobile counterparts as mobile comics become multimedia with sounds and interactivity.

Mobile comic content has until recently been miniatuarized or adapted versions of established branded comic content. With the rise of file sharing and piracy it has been increasingly hard for publishers to control money leakage from digital/mobile comics and as such publishers (especially traditional Japanese Manga houses) have shied away from licensing digital or mobile comics.

This however, has led to the rise of user-generated (independent artists) using platforms to publish and sell their work at low cost, and (for the first time in years) do so profitably.

The challenges for mobile comics creation include:

  • Small screen size, which means as little text as possible can be included. The point size of lettering is also an issue: for example, ROK Comics suggests 18 point lettering is advisable on frames.
  • Different handsets with different screensizes and technical specifications means the same java viewer will not work on all phones.
  • Story telling must end within 25 frames, or less. The number of frames depends on delivery method

Several mobile content providers have now developed their own mobile comics platforms, some using java-based applications which have to be downloaded to the mobile first before comics can be viewed. Others are using Multi Media Messaging and WAP subscription to deliver strips.

[edit] Titles

Initially the titles released were existing comics licensed for the new medium but new titles are emerging purely on the mobile phone.

Thunder Road [1] [2] is the first original title for the medium and the artist Steven Sanders (who previously worked on The Five Fists of Science - itself licensed to mobiles through GoComics) has said "I think digital/mobile is the way to go, because I want comics to go back to being a cheap, disposable entertainment again, instead of 4 dollar things that are printed on expensive paper and that cater to collectors.". [3]

In 2008, British artist Keith Page began serialising Charlotte Corday of the Surete on ROK Comics. According to comments by Keith posted on the downthetubes news blog (a British comics news site) he decided ROK Comics was a good way to present Charlotte Corday in a newspaper strip-style way, at a time when many print newspapers worldwide seem to have abandoned daily, ongoing adventure strips.

Written by screenwriter Stephen Walsh, Charlotte Corday of the Surete: London Calling is set in London in the early 1950's will also be a full length graphic novel.

New Zealand cartoonist David Fletcher also publishes Crumb exclusively on ROK Comics. The strip is being translated into Chinese for publication in China.

[edit] References

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ GoComics Books - Mobile Comic Books
  2. ^ TALKING TO THE THUNDER ROAD CREATORS, July 19, 2007, Newsarama
  3. ^ Thunder Road: Comics On Your Phone Should Be Good, Silver Bullet Comic Books

[edit] External links

Some of the key mobile comics publisher include

  • GoComics Publish comics for mobile under license.
  • ROK Comics Publishes licensed and creator-owned comics for mobile and has a Comic Creator tool for users to upload their own art or work with provided backgrounds, characters and props.
  • Comic Creator Mobile application that allows users to create, customize and send comics