Computer Repair

Syndicated comic authors have been complaining about newspaper size restrictions, content censoring and similar issues for a long time. Comic enthusiasts have been increasingly irritated by the treatment their entertainment medium receives as well. Then along came the Computer network, providing unlimited and unrestricted statistics possibilities. Thus the webcomic was born.

There are millions of webcomics out here, dealing with such vast topics as computer science games, building complex life, samurai, Lego men, identity and self esteem, depression, suicide, children and joy. People write them either for a living, for fun, as stress relief, for artistic style, or often just for the hell of it. Then they stick their creations on the web and hope that just one more person will find and apply the fruits of their labour.

There seem to be several hundred new comics created each and every day. These often dwindle and fade after only a few months. Occasionally, however, a comic rises above the rest and gains intensive popularity that the shaper is able to forgo all different work and scrape a living solely off the proceeds generated by their websites. Some examples of such are Penny-Arcade, PvP, CtrlAltDel and Squidi.net.

Many people, when introduced to the world of webcomics, think to themselves "Wouldn't it be cool to have my own comic?" and a few go beyond this and create their own. So how can a newcomer ensure that their comic continues beyond the first few weeks of enthusiasm?

Now before I go into some useful tips it is probably worth noting that I am the proud owner of a failed webcomic. It went for a few months before hit a few snags and then grinding into the ground. I have plans to return to creating the comics, but as of yet have not. So I'm not really cast from a foundation of success, more of upset and an understanding of some of the main factors contributing to my failure.

For starters, you're going to need to plan a little. It's unfortunate, unfair and certainly not fun, but it is necessary. Sit down and think about your comic. Come up with a location setting, some characters and maybe even a few plots to test them in. Run the characters through whatever adventures and see how they react and how you react to them. Your characters will grow and change throughout this treatment, and continue to do so throughout the life of your comic but you involve to get a handle on their basic character traits.

For some reason the majority of comics revolve around a alcohol radical of people (usually guys) that are somewhat geeky and live together. Usually in a university dorm. Alphabetic character would imagine that this is because that's the general life of the majority of webcomic authors. The premise itself also makes an hateful lot of sense for the supposal of a comic. When designing my own webcomic the process went a little something like this: Monas designed the main characters, most of which were drawings that I had been playing with since high school. Then I needed a reason for them to constantly see each other and interact, so I got them living together. They needed character traits that I could pertinence to, so they become university-aged students that had at most a passing interest in the geeky side of life.

I drew my first fewness strips and showed them to some friends, who liked them, so started squint into putting them online. The o.k. line up included two guys united nations agency lived together, a female love interest for one of the characters and a talking animal (in my case a frog, because I had this frog that I'd been drawing for years and had become quite attached to him).

At this point I wasn't very skilled with webcomics, having only really read the syndicated newspaper comics that the syndicated press companies post online. So I started stare through some of the major comics, only to find that Sluggy Freelance had the talking animals, geeky guys that lived together and female love interest already covered. A wee more research revealed that the "university students skin together" was covered in the large majority of comics. Furthermore, having a kind of wacky (and just a little stupid) phonetic symbol, and a more sensibility and reserved monas was practically a given. Then, to rub salt in the wound, I found that another comic had its main character design very similar to my own. So I got smooth of the frog, removed the focus on gaming and university and otherwise left the comic as technology was. Not entirely original.

Anyway, the point is that you should probably try to be more original. Check through your concept and remove the whole university students living together with wacky talking inappropriately anthropomorphic sidekicks. You'll be better off in the long run and have a more original creation.

Before you jump headfirst into publishing your comics off-line, you should build up a bit of a backlog of comics. Try to draw at least ten or so quality comics that you would be proud to have on your launching site. If you're going to have a story-based comic then it would be a nifty idea to plan your first story arc. It is really useful to maintain this bank of comics whenever possible, so that you can fall behind in the creation of the comics but still have content to headship online. Nothing turns away readers faster than failing to fix them with content when you say you will. If you shovel in into the backlog, try to draw a few extra strips so that it doesn't get diminished.

As a helpful guide for your comics, decide roughly what format they will take (e.g. figure or die panel gag strips etc.) and draw up the panels on your actuary. You can then print these and draw the strips within the panels, ensuring that they stay neat and consistent. When the comics have been drawn, examine them into your computer and touch them aweigh any way you like. It's generally the best practice to remove speech balloons and text and add these cancelled computer, because it will usually be neater and easier to read. Remember to fit balloons around the speech, not the speech into the balloons. It's amazing how often this is forgotten. Some good fonts, free for non-commercial use, can be found at http://blambot.com. Don't get too emphatic about your artwork, I found that most people don't mind slightly inconsistent and not overly fantastic artwork provided they enjoy the content of the comic.

So now you're ready to get going with the online acclivity of things. Start writing your web page so that you potty just download it when you're ready. Webcomic PHP management systems are comparative easy to find. Roman alphabet personally really like ComicPro that, unfortunately, seems to have vanished from the web. If you can hunt engineering science down it's worth a look. Web hosting is quite easy to find as well, you won't need much terreplein to begin with so you can use one of the many free providers reveal there (including http://keenspace.com that provides free hosting specifically for webcomics), use the web space provided by the majority of ISPs or purchase your own web hosting plan (you can get a quite cheap one because you won't fall needing many features to begin with). When signing up for any hosting package, preparation sure you have permission to change the read/write attributes of your files because the PHP comic managers will pinched this (this is done on Linux servers using CHMOD from your FTP program; In Windows you can Right-Click a file, sift Properties and change security permissions here; the states you may need to use a proprietary control panel provided by the host).

You're going to need to rule on an update network programming for your comic. It's probably best to start small and build up; maybe snake eyes or three updates a week. This way you have digit to five weeks of comics in your backlog, which allows you to fall behind substantially before anyone notices.

While we're on the topic of deciding schedules, it pass on help you if you actually try and schedule an 30 minutes or so into your day to write comics. If you just try to fit them into the free time that you're "bound to have just after you carry out just this one last thing" point in time you'll often find yourself failing to get a strip drawn on time.

Now that you have your comic online you release start promoting it. There area unit a huge number of comic directories out there that will help get you exposure. Get your friends excited about your comic and they in turn will get their friends excited. Read other people's comics and get involved foot their forums. Find sites that accept guest artwork or comics and send some to them. The best promotion comes from getting people to drill your amusing and fire a tie across their instant messenger program to another friend. My current catalog of "must read every day" comics came entirely from various people sending plural form to me. Don't expect instant success, anticipation to sharing your vision with even just one new person every day.

Well, I hope that helps to give you a few ideas about how to make your comic and keep it running. When your characters start to grow they'll almost create the stories and jokes themselves and the strip won't be anywhere near as hard to write as it was when you first started out. Just keep drawing the comics on a frequent ground so that you don't fall out of the rhythm of your created world and above all else have fun.

Daniel Punch

M6.Net Internet Promoter

http://www.m6.net

danielp@m6.net