I’m going to start calling them pages now.
on April 5, 2010 at 6:00 amHere are pages 42 and 43. (Spread 20)
I decided to start calling the spreads "pages" now because I don't like that Google's number 3 keyword for my site is "spread". In case you are wondering why the page numbers don't quite match up to the spread number, it's because I'm using the page number of the printed book just so I don't get confused. Worry not, you are still seeing all the pages here.
How to get 10,000 unique viewers in 3 days.
So if anyone wants to know how to get 10,000 unique viewers in 3 days, then write an article about how much you love or hate Comic Sans MS and submit it to a few sites. A warning though. With great arguments comes heated comments. Not so much on my blog but on the websites linked to my article.
Most of the negative comments came from my statement that people will hate you for using Comic Sans in your comic. Now I know the truth, may people will hate you for talking about Comic Sans no matter what the context. So to please all the haters, I have changed my statement from "many people will hate you" to "many letterers will want to dropkick you." I hope you will take me seriously from now on. I never joke. Comic artists don't exaggerate anything. EVER.
I was going to compose a top ten list of hate comments from other sites linking to my post but it would be to hard to weed through. Plus, some are so vulgar it would make a drunk navy trucker quiver. So I decided to share one of the funniest comments I read among the rantings. And here it is:
"Comic Sans is based on Watchmen. Why do you hate Alan Moore?"
This quote truely sums up the power of the internet. I laughed, I cried. I scratched my head because, Wow!
First of all, Watchmen was written by Alan Moore, not lettered by him. Dave Gibbons lettered Watchmen and in an interview with him he says Comic Sans is "an appalling-looking font" and "Comic Sans is so ugly" and "The major sin about it that really bugs me is that it only includes the uppercase I, the one with bars on the top and bottom, which as you know, you only use in comics for the first-person pronoun." Read the interview here.
With all the opinionated controversy behind me, it's time for my next subject. Why Mac's are better then PC's. ha!
I finally got my Page Rank back!
I'm sure there are a number of you who love this technical stuff like PageRank and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) but I am mostly clueless about making my site stand out on search engines. From what I know, search engines like Google, rank websites depending on things like who and how many links they have going to them. The more incoming links a site has the higher the page rank. The higher the page rank, the better chance that site has of being displayed in a search with similar keywords.
Before I switched from Blogger to WordPress, my site had a 3 out of 10. Shortly after I switched, it dropped to 0 and I couldn't figure out how to get Google to know I had switched. Apparently I didn't submit a sitemap to google. My IT guy helped me and a week later my site was recognized by google again. I now have a 3 out of 10 page rank. The funny thing is, I still had the same amount of traffic after dropping to a "0" as I did with a "3" from before. So now I'm trying to figure out why. It seems like many of you understand this better then I do so maybe you can shed some light on it. I also read that there is a difference between a PageRank and a page rank. So confusing. Anyway, I have a 3 now and I feel better about myself but I'm not sure what it's really doing for me.
damn Jason! that's the stuff! Love this page spread. :P
Thanks Jason!
hehehe… dropkick.
Great "pages" my friend!!
Comic Sans – Now more controversial than Mac vs. PC
There is even a website: http://bancomicsans.com/
I like that the first chapter has reality based technological visuals and this chapter is pure fantasy visuals, it makes for a nice juxtaposition of what you are capable of as an artist.
As far as comic sans is concerned; I get that a certain group hates it and that it is an easy fix but the bottom line is that the haters are a very vocal minority, there I said it, “regular” people have no objection to the font, it disappears into the background like a good font should. I wonder what the origins of the comic sans hatred is? Was it Gibbons or was it just a troll who decided that we should all be sick of comic sans. Having said that, I am tirelessly working on purging the font from everything because… why not?
As far as your next controversial topic goes…
MACS ARE PCS!!!!
HAHAHA! I love it!
Great page Jason. It has a cinematic effect to it that really pulls me in. As far as the comic sans things goes, it's much like the Arial font in graphic design and lens flare effect in Photoshop. Once everybody and their mom starts using it, it becomes hated. The Auto-tune effect in music as well as been overused and now it's being hated. my 2 cents.
Yeah that is true. I just told a friend of mine to make his own lens flaire instead of using the one that comes with Photoshop. Great point.
I was of half a mind to write my own bit on Comic Sans just to test your theory, but I erred on the side of caution. Flame wars are bad for business. Honestly, I don't understand how it is that fonts can make people feel so personal – there are good and bad fonts, lots of them. They're just computers, Junior!
By the way, something I've been meaning to add, and was not sure how toy phrase it until now: have you ever considered spelling your main character's name onamotapoetically? That is, as "Vittles," instead of "Victuals?" It came to me with all this discussion of typefacing and fonts and the visual impact of words. The actual word being pronounced so differently from its spelling always runs me up on a mental bump, I've found. And it being the actual name of a character, it might be smoother reading to make it spell as it sounds. Might make it stand out, too. Just a thought.
As ever, glad to see the movement here! Forward-forward-forward, that's always the crucial thing!
–M
Well, you just brought up something that I've been battling since I started making this story as an animation almost 10 years ago. In fact the original animation was going to be called "Tender Vittles 4.2" for some strange reason. It was more of a joke without much thought put into the story. More just to learn how to animate really. As it evolved I and I got more serious about making it for film festivals I decided to just call it "Vittles". I even owned the domain name tendervittles.com, believe it or not. But I canceled it because it was just confusing to people.
In the end when I decided to make it into a GN, I changed the name to Victuals just to cover my bases a bit more. I'm not familiar with legal junk and naming a cat after a cat food was a big question mark for me. I suppose I'd rather have his name be "Vittles" then "Victuals" but I don't know if it would come back to haunt me. I mean, I'd hate to be sewed by the cat food company. I don't even know if it matters.
Honestly, I don't think it does. It's such a generalized word I doubt they could come after you. Or that they would even try. And I think it'd make your character read better. But that's one man's opinion.
–M
I'm glad you voiced this. I have a good year before I have to commit to anything so you can be sure I will look into this more especially since you brought it up out of the blue like this. Thanks again.
That’s one of the surefire methods to attracting attention to your site – controversy. Especially with a topic that creates such fierce opinions amongst designers and digital artists. If you would have talked about Helvetica, I guarantee it would have been 1000x worse. That debate over that font has started wars in small countries.
Hey man – live and learn. You’ve become a better comic book designer with that painful lesson. Its all about growth. :)
Helvetica? Oh man, I am so clueless about fonts. I can see how people use controversy to get traffic after seeing what just happened.
Loving this page, sincerely. You know, maybe you should consider doing a wide format book so that this is actually a page instead of a spread. I would hate to see the crease of a book run through your beautiful artwork.