Comments on: Comics have evolved again – tell us it’s not true

By: Joe

Joe — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 08:32:53 +0000

Hmmm, I wonder if that would lend some weight to my speculation that this form of comics might appeal to people who perhaps didn’t go into comics stores to buy print material regularly?

By: Richard

Richard — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 22:18:45 +0000

More on the comics on your mobile story –
From Dirk at Journalista:

Trendspotting (http://www.trendsspotting.com/blog/?p=140) gathers recent data on the Japanese comics fans’ increasing use of cellphones to read manga. Perhaps the most interesting nugget is how the readership breaks down by gender: Some two-thirds of digital manga readers are women.

By: The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log » ROK mobile comics gets more notice

Wed, 20 Jun 2007 10:28:10 +0000

[...] Well, whatever your opinion on comics and cartoons on mobile phones (and Kenny’s post the other day seems to have generated a fair bit of discussion on the blogosphere) it certainly looks like more interest is being paid to the idea, with PrimeNewswire running a story on ROK Comics. There isn’t much there that John Freeman hasn’t already said about the venture, but what I thought was significant was that a Nasdaq company was reporting on it – obviously the business world of New Media is paying attention to see where this will go, as well as comics readers having a look. I must admit I rarely use my phone for more than short calls and text messages, but an awful lot of people do enjoy using extra services from video clips and photographs to music on their phones in the way I would use my laptop, so really, why not comics? I’m unsure about reading a full comic on a mobile, but short strips would seem pretty well suited to the medium – even Judge Dredd worked quite well in three or four panels in a newspaper strip after all; they even managed to summarise the epic, multi-part Apocalypse War in one single strip to keep newspaper strip readers abreast of developments in 2000AD, so why not a few panels for the phone? [...]

By: Joe

Joe — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 08:39:54 +0000

It was indeed Kenny in his 80s mode; at that time the closest I got to those brick-sized ‘romafones’ was jokes about them in Peattie and Taylor’s Alex cartoon strip (then in the Independent) where it was an important status symbol for the City crowd. And obviously, as you say, a way of keeping in touch with one’s striped shirt maker and offshore banker :-)

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 16:54:58 +0000

In correction to the last comment – it was Kenny with the mobile phone and the off shore bank accounts, striped shirts and braces in the share dealership. Maybe I should occasionally look at the byline to see who wrote the article. Duh.

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 16:50:50 +0000

I’m another who has a problem with this, although I’ll freely admit it’s more my problem than the viewing media.
It’s a question of scale really. It’s difficult enough to get used to looking at web-comics, with the strange formats and layouts to fit the comic on the screen, but at least that’s a fairly large space to display the page.

The idea of a comic page on a mobile phone screen just doesn’t work for me. Like you said, if it has to be displayed panel by panel then it’s failing before it begins.
Obviously there’s room for improvement and there could be great possibilities in sending daily single panel strips or newspaper strips out that way, but whole comics? We’re nowhere near ready yet.
Of course, by whole comics I mean the sort of comics I imagine we’re really talking about; 20 plus pages with 4+ panels per page (that would take 80 mobile phone screens – surely the technology isn’t there for that yet. And even if it were, would you want to spend the time slowly flicking through panel by panel? I know I wouldn’t.

Of course, I’m more than willing to be a corporate guinea pig for trials. Maybe Steve Jobs would like to send me a new i-phone to really explore the potential?

And the most interesting thing about it – Joe’s admission that he had a mobile phone back in the 80s. Joe Gordon – comics blogger by night, stock market trader by day?

By: Joe

Joe — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 09:14:00 +0000

David, I suspect you’re right – after all the best webcomics have adapted the traditional format to one more suitable for reading on a screen (as you obviously know with the excellent Broken Voice site) and I sometimes wonder how many people who read those actually buy print comics or graphic novels. I’m sure there are a lot, but I also strongly suspect there are quite a few who don’t pick up traditional print media that often but do read a number of online strips and cartoon panels. And as you say there is a long tradition of adapting major comics characters into short 3 or 4 panel strips for daily newspapers – even Dredd was adapted in this form and ran for years; I seem to recall they even managed to do a recap of the epic Apocalypse War in 4 panels at one point!

By: Journalista - the news weblog of The Comics Journal » Blog Archive » June 19, 2007: The most inexperienced of whores

Tue, 19 Jun 2007 08:37:55 +0000

[...] The Forbidden Planet Blog ponders comics on cellphones. [...]

By: DAJB

DAJB — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 18:54:21 +0000

“I can’t really see the application to other longer comics forms.”

Well, I’m biased on this one since I’m currently engaged in adapting three of my longer form comics for the ROK service. That aside, I suspect we’re looking at a different market for these comics than we traditionally associate with print comics.

Remember the three-panel-a-day Batman strips that used to appear in daily or weekly newspapers? Or even the current “Striker” strips in The Sun? They both tell (or told) longer-form stories that would typically span many strips and have (or had) an audience distinct from the usual comic buyers. So, longer form comics can be done this way.

By way of example, check out the “Free Pro” comics section at http://www.rokcomics.com and you can see the trailers I prepared for “Shades”, “Hunted” and “The Spires”. (Yes, okay, so that’s a bit of a plug but at least the trailers are free!)