Comments on: Zuda for August 2008

By: Strip News 8-15-08 | ArtPatient.com

Strip News 8-15-08 | ArtPatient.com — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:17:35 +0000

[...] late to the party on this one, but Comics Worth Reading has a look at the Zuda comics in August 2008’s competition. A quick overview, but [...]

By: Johanna

Johanna — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:58:52 +0000

Yes, and that is a welcome thing to see! I’m glad to see that choice is being rewarded.

By: Jeff Winstead

Jeff Winstead — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:53:41 +0000

Thanks for the positive comments; however I would like to point out that Vic Boone is, in fact, a complete story done in eight screens. Seven, actually, considering the last screen is our nod to old B-movie lobby cards.

By: Shawn Aldridge

Shawn Aldridge — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:31:48 +0000

Thanks for the words on Vic Boone.

Jeff Winstead has been my best friend for 15 years, we’ve always worked together. The colorist, Rachel Winstead, is his lovely wife.

By: Bill Williams

Bill Williams — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 18:04:24 +0000

I think most people enter the contest assuming that they will win and are staffing up for that eventuality. And the cross-disciplines required in the making of comics are very difficult to execute much less master. I have been at this for a while, so I do three and hire freelancers to do the rest. Some weeks, the work load is harder to carry than others.

What gets me about the Zuda-strips in how they are paced. Many strips are all setup and no pay off, but they are kind of a mess anywhere but the computer screen. How do you stack two six panel Zuda pages and not get a claustrophobic twelve panel mess in print? Of course, that may just be an aesthetic choice on my part. Check the difference between web & print.

SideChicks webcomic- http://www.graphicsmash.com/comics/sidechicks.php

SideChicks for print- http://www.wowio.com/users/product.asp?BookId=4664

On a related note, SideChicks has cracked the 1 million page view mark on Graphic Smash this week. Since the launch in August 2006, we have missed two weeks.

Sorry for the bit of shameless self-promotion,

Bill

By: Johanna

Johanna — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 11:34:40 +0000

Yeah, I kind of ran out of things to say about the middle-tier strips. And that was the one with the intriguing backstory that I didn’t see visible in the strip itself, which was too violent for me in its premise.

By: matt

matt — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 02:44:11 +0000

you skipped gulch. ;)

By: Johanna

Johanna — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 01:27:11 +0000

Oh, good analysis. Thanks for sharing that!

By: Justin Jordan

Justin Jordan — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 01:23:22 +0000

“Has anyone talked about how many of the leading and winning strips are not single-creator works? That’s unusual for webcomics. Is it a side effect of the company running the competition, or that several of the entrants see this as a way to get more attention for other projects?”

Money, I think. There’s the license fee for getting in to comp and then the potential for a page rate.

Which means that writers who can’t draw (yo!) have a little more enticement to get artists involved.

Plus, it’s just a pitch’s worth of stuff, rather than trying to get an artist on for the long haul of a webcomic.

I know I’d love, love, love to do a webcomic (and indeed, it’d probably be an ideal formate for Jenny Strange: http://librarygorilla.livejournal.com/81355.html)
but I can’t get an artist to go along with me and I can’t yet afford to pay one.

By: Justin Jordan

Justin Jordan — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 01:11:49 +0000

Thanks for the well wishes, Johanna!

If Junk doesn’t win, I really want Shock Effect to take it – Beautiful art and writing and a premise I dig.

This is a really competitive month – I liked all of the stuff, and there three I really want to see more of.

By: jim dedieu

jim dedieu — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 20:40:18 +0000

Thanks a lot for the vote of confidence.

“An absolutely gorgeous reverie about a drug-using samurai”
At least someone seems to get Furiku Buredu…
That’s really heart-warming.