BD and manga on the iPhone, phones and Mac/PC!

So this time, I was rather surprised to read an article in a local Genevan paper on a new site - www.ave-comics.com - which is launching now and will be providing a selection of comics and manga for reading on the phone or computer via a special viewing software they developed. The software will be downloadable for I-Phones, I-touch, Blackberry, Sony Ericsson and Nokia phones as well as PC and Mac. The originality of this digital reader is the zoom system and the reading feature that goes from panel to panel as well as the whole page by page reading (see example here: http://www.ave-comics.com/fr/avepreview/

Different comics (BD) and manga titles will be available in french, spanish and english languages and should cost less than their paper counterparts, according to the site (however, individual volumes of the first comic in the manga category - "Eat it fresh" (I say this, since it is another european/manga hybrid, created by a french team Paka) cost 1.59Euros for 19pages (roughly 2,23USD - which doesn't seem like such a great deal for the manga format to me); on the other hand, the different color BD available range from 46 to 92 pages for 4,99Euros (circa 7USD) - which is certainly much better than the paper version for around 18USD).

The categories available are Manga, Comics, Adventure, Humor and Kids, with interestingly a selection of old US comics in english in the Comics category (in french-speaking world, the term "comics" usually designates american comics, much as "manga" designates japanese comics and "BD" refers to european style/format). The current selection is pretty small, but since the site just launched we can assume that they will be expanding it gradually.

Also, Ave!Comics apparently intends to work with any publisher who would be interested and offers the adaptation of titles for their format and installation of the titles with their reader on their own website or the website of the publisher.

As I understand it, Ave!Comics is still in a very early stage of its launch and more time is needed to see how successfully they will develop and how interesting their offer will be for the readers, content and price-wise. But this is definitely an interesting enterprise to follow.

-tacto

french-speaking comic/manga scene (EDIT! :D)

Since I regularly find myself in the french-speaking part of Switzerland next to the French border, I decided to try and post regular follow-ups on the happenings in the french-speaking comics (bande dessinee)/manga world.

For those who might be unfamiliar with the french-speaking comics/manga scene, I think it's worth mentioning that french-speaking comics (aka "bande dessinee") had (and still have) a big presence and role in Europe, beginning with the world-famous TinTin. Several prestigious art-schools dedicated to sequential art exist in France, Belgium and Switzerland and have produced numerous best-selling artists.

Traditionally, a standard BD volume is published full-color, hard-cover, and has around 48pages for an average price of 20USD. In the past decade, however, french-speaking BD market has seen an enormous boom of manga titles, which was largely enabled by several french TV shows for teens that aired for several years in the late 80ties - early/mid 90ties and ran numerous cult anime series (such as Dragon Ball, Rose of Versailles, Knights of Zoodiac, Lupin the 3rd, Orange Road, Golgo 13, Galaxy Express 999, Captain Harlock, Sherlock Holmes, and a good hundred of others) with an excellent voice-dubbing, which led to the creation of a whole "Generation Manga" of hard-core anime fans who naturally enabled and devoured the paper manga boom that followed in the libraries.

Currently, every big BD publisher also has a manga-publishing line. Moreover, gradually more and more french-speaking and european artists inspired by the manga style started to create their own titles and be published in BD color format but with a heavily manga-influenced style.

One of the artists (Aurore) has just seen her first title "Pixie" (scenario by Mathieu Mariolle) licensed by Tokyopop and published in a smaller format, soft-cover, full-color in the US: http://auroreblackcat.deviantart.com/art/Pixie-USA-released-112832461.

This movement is definitely similar to the OEL movement in the US, although probably more of a blend between BD and manga than its american counterpart. So this is it for an ultra-fast introductory post! Let me know if you have specific areas/questions you would like to see covered (or if you have interesting stuff to add) :D

EDIT: Amy Kim Kibuishi, the creator of the lovely "Sorcerers and Secretaries" published by Tokyopop asked me the pertinent question of whether I had more european/manga hybrid titles to recommend.

And this definitely sparked my interest... because I don't really know much about them! So I am setting out on a crusade to discover the hybrids over Europe and bring them to light! :D

In that sense, I feel that I cannot close this post without mentioning the excellent work of Yishan Li, a chinese artist based in UK with already an impressive number of titles under her belt. I shall definitely come back to her work later on, but would just like to mention that you might well already know her, since she has taken over the "Adventures of CG!" in Cosmogirl from 2007 to 2008, the page strip started by Svetlana Chmakova: http://www.cosmogirl.com/funandgames/manga/

Cheers!

-tacto

coffee junkee (2)

I somehow caught myself on the fact that most of my main characters are men. I wonder why is that? So now I make a conscious effort to pay more attention to my female heroes.

Have you a preference in identifying yourself in your stories? A dashing knight? A tomboy? A Teddy Bear?? :D

coffee junkee (?)

Ha! Finally a sketch on the blog! :D This is a character for one of the current 2 candidates for the short story Dee and I are going to do for an anthology. "Coffee Junkee" is the temporary title I'll go by for now (usually Dee makes fun of my ability to come up with lousy titles/names, so don't get attached to it! XD)

Actually, we have a good drawer of sketches from the project we have been working on for the past year, but after deliberation we decided to post only new fresh stuff, so here we go. Cheers! ^^

Manga shopping in Geneva

Today I paid a visit to one of the two major manga comic shops here. I wish I could locate a purely manga store like this somewhere in San Francisco – they have a larger manga collection than any other book store or chain by far and I am always amazed at the number of titles I have never heard of before and also amused by the different cover designs of the french versions as compared to what we see in the US (wait.. this looks familiar.. what?? Vampire Knight??! But this cover…. XD).

Plus, I really like the way they organized their space – aside from the thousands of titles arranged by alphabetical order on the shelves they have a good hundred of new issues and titles on display on two huge tables in the middle of the room which is really smart since one can just scope the whole table and pick up the title by cover art and/or name depending on one’s tastes - great sales technique if you ask me (proof here with an anime girl reading one of the volumes in the middle!)

I also did a small search for OEL titles and sure enough, there were the 3 vol of “The Dreaming” french version by Queenie Chan right here on the shelf! You go, Queenie! :D

Curiously enough though, I was unable to find any other OEL titles…mystery… am probably going to ask the owner about this the next time I go back. Next target – the big bookstore chains’ manga section! *stealth ninja <.<*