Graphic Novel Help Needed
SGCBearcub
Posts: 243
So I've finally finished the script for my graphic novel and I was hoping for some suggestions on web design.
I really like the way Journeys of Shelby Bly is laid out with the way the pages flip. Any suggestions on how to achieve this? I'm open to all suggestions regarding the web page and web hosts.
While I'm willing to do some coding if necessary, I really don't know much about CSS and html. My skills are 20 years out of date so the more I can get out of the box the better.
Thanks in advance:)
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This is my site and my webcomics. I find that one page at the time works fine for me.
i hope you like it!!!!.
http://www.comiccinema.com/webcomicsfolder/bacaenfolder/index.html
http://www.comiccinema.com/webcomicsfolder/angelfolder/index.html
:)
AJ
Did you write your own site, or do you plan to use an existing package? If you end up with WordPress or one of the other well-known and often-modded platforms, you might be able to get on their forums and commission someone to do it for you (or just ask if there's already a piece of code out there). I ended up going with CubeCart for my own store site (as it's just a store), but there's a ton of code-swapping that goes on even for that.
Have a look at ISSUU.com
They provide a page flip function on your pdf uploads that works on just about every platform, and is easy to embed in a webpage - no plugins necessary... You can even create links in your magazines... Very easy to manage.
They even offer a print service for vanity publishing. Not as cheap as bulk printing obviously, but very convenient to have it all in one place!
Here's my silly comic book tutorial as example:
http://issuu.com/wetcircuit/docs/c6fur
Thank-you for the link. The full pages really work for your stories. I particularly enjoyed the Legend of the Baca.
I haven't decided yet as I wasn't sure whether the graphic format I might choose would constrain the website options. I like the idea of having my own site as opposed to something like Smack Jeeves and Drunk Duck. I'm a little confused about Wordpress. I've been trying to find examples of sites that use WebComic and Comic easel but either I'm looking in the wrong place or most of the links are broken.
I neverr thought about code swapping--thanks for the suggestion :)
Flexpaper is sort of like ISSUU in that it publishes PDF documents, but you purchase the software and install on your website rather than hosting it at their site like you do with ISSUU. The benefit is that you have more control over what you can do with your book. There is a publishing interface as well as a wordpress plugin for Flexpaper. There are both flash and html viewers so you can view your book on pretty much anything, including ios. Biggest downside that I see is that you need the paid version to get the flip book "Zine" feature. (The free version is sort of like looking at a standard pdf document.)
They have both commercial single site and multiple site paid versions (unbranded). At $149 for the single site version, it quite a bit less than it would cost for one year of the commercial ISSUU version. Flexpaper commercial license is a lifetime license that includes access to the source, and there is an api so it can be customized.
I like the flip-paging with ISSUU. Thank-you. Also, if I haven't said it before, I love your tutorial.
If you're going with Wordpress, you might also consider Comicpress. There are a lot of sites out there that use it, and the developer seems to help out a good deal.
If you go through the main Webcomic site, most of the links in that scroll seem to work.
for Comic Easel, here are a few links in the Showcase section of the sidebar, well down the page that seem to work, although they're a bit difficult to find, and it's only the five most recently added. The Showcase section as a whole doesn't seem to be working as intended.
Wordpress has a great theme called ComicPress, which comes with plugins that enable quick and easy customisable webcomic templates. Give it a look for sure. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that there are pageflipping addons for this theme - its community is very active.
Edit: There's also another plugin for Wordpress called PageFlip or something, but it's been a while since I last saw this around the place.
This looks really interesting, especially the zine option. Thank-you.
I'm getting that impression. I may have to learn how to code afterall, lol. I think I'm leaning toward the wordpress options more and more. At least to start until I have something marketable.
Truthfully, I expect the pilot episode of my graphic series to be a 75-100 page learning exercise. Actually, given that my artwork is likely to be more poor craft than skill for years, I may end up selling stuff other than the graphic series and give it away for free just to get the story out there.
Thanks for the links, they were very helpful. I'd missed those completely when searching on wordpress.
Good stuff here!
-MJ
I think I found it. Flipping Book Thanks!
I think I found it. Flipping Book Thanks!
Flipping Book needs flash. I was disappointed to realize it doesn't work on iOS, so I went with ISSUU... Thanks for the other links on this thread!
Oh, I also use ComicLife2 from Plasq.com It's multiplatform now, and the layout tools are really easy to use (it's what I made my tutorials in). You don't *have* to use the cutesy styles. Comes with a lot of templates and exports the pages as images, pdf, epub, and others...
http://comiclife.com
I use Wordpress with Archimedes for my comic/podcast site www.octobercomics.com it does the trick although sometimes the updates cause havok with the pages.
Did you have any problems with the images importing all fuzzy and with jagged edges? I think it may be a compression issue so I may have to crop and resize in Gimp before importing but I was curious if you had the same problem.
I've been debating saving my pennies and getting Manga Studio. I know there's so much about it I wont use given I can't draw worth a toot, but the page templates sound tempting.
I really think I'm probably going to go with Wordpress, at least to begin with.
I really think I'm probably going to go with Wordpress, at least to begin with.
Be sure you do all of the reading before you start uploading stuff. My host (JaguarPC) is not WP-friendly and it took me weeks of frustration to find that out before they finally said we're not helping you with this unless you buy our wordpress-specific package.
It's easy to google your host name + wordpress and see what others are saying. If the ones who are having no trouble are also discussing how they wrote most of their own site without an editor and are using a Linux-based server, that also tells you something.