Brad Guigar
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Honestly, those lines look awfully blurry to me. I’m not getting “ink bleed”… I’m getting “out of focus.”
I’m having a hard time getting my head around this:
From what I gathered in their forums, it is the dimensions that is the ‘equivalent’ of 300dpi. Anything larger would be < 300dpi while anything smaller would be > 300dpi.
When you say “larger,” which quantity are you talking about — the physical size of the image or the resolution?
Here’s my test image. I realize that A4 is slightly longer than the US letter paper (8.5×11) that I printed it out on so what I see with my eyes is a hair narrower overall than the actual files would be.
Only if your printer is re-sizing the image, though, right? If you print the file at 100% and allow it to clip some of the image off the 8.5×11 paper, won’t you see the true image?
Are there any general guidelines for panel borders? Just looking at Watterson & Herge, they seem roughly the same as the line art.
As I’ve stated here before, I’m a proponent of making the panel border slightly heavier than the majority of the lines used to build the image — particularly heavier than the lines used to create the backgrounds. My reason for this is simple: When you have background lines at extend across the panel border (vertically or horizontally), these background lines can be confused with panel borders unless there’s a significant difference between the two. Here’s a more in-depth discussion of that concept, with illustrations.
Lastly – what are your opinions on the lines themselves, which are supposed to replicate a slight ink bleed? I’m not a fan of super clean vector art, at least for my own work…
if the comic fails because they accidentally charged too much, it will affect them way less than myself.
It’s. Two. Dollars.
Now, let’s get another thing ironed out…
“Nerve-racking.” — literally putting your nerves on the Medieval torture device, the rack.
Sorry… that’s a pet peeve up there with “champing at the bit.”
🙂
OK, let’s slow down here. Reading your post, it seems as if you’re conflating copyright and ISBN.
Your copyright is secure the moment you’re done with the book. You own it. You have copyright over it.
You may choose to register that copyright with the Federal Government, but you don’t have to.
There’s a metric ton of information about copyright and trademark on this site, if you’ve like to do a little further reading.
The real issue with eBooks isn’t copyright — it’s ISBN.
More research for you on that topic. 🙂
Now, do you need a new ISBN for your digital book?
When I ask myself that question in regards to my own business, I’ve determined that I do not. And here’s my reasoning.
The ISBN is a number that catalogs and classifies your book. If your book is going to be sold in retail stores — or if it’s going to be shelved by libraries, then it is in your best interest to have an ISBN for that book.
The only reason I could think of to have an ISBN for my eBooks would be if they’re being digitally distributed by an online retailer. But Kindle Direct Publishing doesn’t require a dedicated ISBN for an eBook. Neither does Apple’s iBookstore.
And I can’t honestly think of a situation in which having an ISBN for a digital book would be an advantage for my own personal business.
Especially in cases — such as yours — in which I’m selling these things myself or offering them to Kickstarter/Patreon backers.
Also, would an e-book count as a “second printing?” So many small details to cover…
Not that I’m aware of, it wouldn’t. It’s a digital version of the first printing.
Bottom line: When I’m faced with the situation you’re describing, I’m pretty comfortable with generating a less-than-high-res PDF (or MOBI file) of the book… making sure that the copyright notice is in there somewhere… and let it rip.
Haven’t we already addressed this issue?
Listen, set the price at whatever it needs to be so that you make a good profit through that distributor. They have more experience in this than you do. If they say it needs to be $15, then I’d listen to them. They don’t have a motivation for lying about this.
As for what you price those books on your site, that’s ENTIRELY up to you. Set the price on your site at $15 and thn see what happens to sales.
My bet? There’s not a big enough difference between the two prices to make a significant difference in sales. You are not going to lose fans because the price of your book went from thirteen bucks to fifteen.
BUT… if you see sales falter, run a sale and mark them down to 13 bucks.
Do you really think that all of those retailers are running around checking the prices that indie publishers are setting on their Web sites? Hell no! They’ve got much bigger issues to deal with.
And — bottom line — if your book is selling at their store, they’re going to order more to sell.
Because that’s the business they’re in.
I’m going to say it again: You can always bring a price down — it’s much harder to go the other way.
Listen to the people with experience who are trying to guide you. Set that book at 15 smackers and then pay attention.
Your worst case scenario is that you get to look like a big shot three or four times a year when you run a big sale and reward your readers with special low prices.
I feel like I should point that none of what you’re doing addresses the comments that I made. Your biggest problem lies in the initial color choices that you’re making in your flats. They’re all at the same brightness and intensity. Tone some-a that stuff down! 🙂
Maybe a tool like Color Schemer could help you make better initial choices.
Well, it’s a double-edged sword.
The more you create shareable content for Facebook, the more people will interact with you. On Facebook. Away from your site — where you generate income and promote merchandise, Kickstarters, Patron and con appearances.
And in return for all of that work, Facebook delivers a higher percentage of those other messages being delivered — but never 100%.
On the other hand, it’s the story of the 400-pound gorilla. Facebook generates a mertic ton of traffic, and you could always tap into a viral effect and have your message carried exponentially far.
I don’t know what the right answer is across the board. For me, I try to abide by the “everything in moderation” credo.
I’m not sure how long this system has been in place (I haven’t been paying very close attention until recently),
I don’t want to make you feel bad. I’m only posting this in case you’re interested in getting more information on the topic.I originally posted on this topic in May 2012 — Understanding the Edgerank system. And I’ve touched upon the topic a few times since then.
You may also be interested in reading about how paying to promote your Facebook posts could actually harm your outreach.
I’m seriously considering abandoning my Facebook page in favor of an email list or something else that ensures that 100% of my readers get any content I offer.
I agree with the members who have pointed out that this is “throwing out the baby with the bathwater.”
Arming yourself with knowledge is the best way to work the system. In short: Do everything you can to encourage your followers to become active in regards to your posts. That includes: Reads, Comments, Likes, Shares and Posts.
For example, posts with images then to get interacted with more often.
Overtly encourage people to “Like” or “Share” your post. In other words, get a call to action in there. I know it’s ham-handed to read a post that ends with “Please Like or Share this Facebook Post,” but that kind of call to Action is traditionally pretty effective.
The post that people interact with aren’t the ones where you promote merchandise or repost today’s comic. They’re the ones in which you’re social. Your thoughts on the Godzilla movie… how you fared in the “Which Hair Bear Are you?” poll… etc. Getting people to interact with that stuff will improve the chances that they’ll see the other stuff.
Simply put, the higher the resolution, the sharper the image.
You could make your color images 600 dpi — and they’d look sharp as heck — but it would result in huge file sizes. And that would make printing your book difficult. That’s because a 600 dpi file (prepped for print) separates the color into four inks (channels, in Photoshop) — Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black (CMYK).
For lineart, conversely, there’s only one ink (channel) — black. So the file size is going to be small enough that you can afford to go higher on the resolution before getting into trouble.
Now, before we go too much further, I’m going to define some terms because this can (and does) get confusing.
Low res: Low resolution (usually 72 dpi). Anything on a screen can be processed in lo-res. However, it’s useful to note that as screens improve (ie Apple’s “Retina Display”), that number is going to rise as baseline users gradually assimilate the tech.
Hi res: High resolution (300 dpi or higher). Anything to be printed must be processed in hi-res.Lineart: The final image is comprised only of solid black on solid white. There are no grays. But gray areas can be simulated by using fine black lines (crosshatching) or dots (halftone). Lineart resolution can start at 600 dpi and go higher. I’ve created 1200 dpi lineart for publication. The trick here is that you can change the mode in Photoshop to bitmap and your file size will drop dramatically.
Grayscale: The image is comprised of black, white and all of the shades of gray in between. Grayscale resolution starts at 300 dpi and can go (moderately) higher.
Color: The image can be comprised of a full spectrum of hues. Resolution starts at 300 dpi and should only increase if absolutely necessary — and then very, very moderately unless your printer instructs otherwise.
There are two kinds of color images: RGB and CMYK. RGB is for screen displays. CMYK is for print. Sending an RGB file to a printer is usually asking for trouble (although there are some POD printers that will accept RGB files. But beware, there are some RGB colors that are impossible to print in a CMYK setting without special inks.
So what?
So this… you may have an image that is black-and-white lineart with colors behind it. That final image would be a color image, not lineart. In other words, you can’t set the lines at one resolution and the colors at another resolution.
It’s all one image, therefore you have to use one resolution.
But don’t worry. If your color file features lineart as part of the image, those lines are going to print just fine at 300 dpi.
Now, you can set this up in two files — one for the lineart and one for the colors that appear behind the lineart. In that situation, you could definitely have two resolutions. But every time you go to print those files, you’re going to have to line up the two files perfectly in a third document (such as an InDesign page). I know some people who claim to work this way. I don’t recommend it.
Although we’ve covered resolution issues here quite often, this post from the archive covers your specific question.
That’s a smart move.
You can always come down, but it’s very difficult to raise your price after you’ve started.
