Brad Guigar
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Is this a comic you’re preparing especially for their site or is it one from your archive? (Or is it the current comic, only transplanted?)
If it’s the former, I have to think that you’d have to start fairly high. Do a site search for “Setting a price”…there’some good information there.
This topic comes up quite a bit. Here are a number of posts from the archive that might be helpful.
I’ve had the same experience.
I talked it over with Frumph this morning. He found out that the Jetpack people are aware of the bug, and they’re working on it.
My decision — for my own strip — has been to post manually and wait for Jetpack to solve the problem. I have two reasons:
(1) I can post manually for a short time with no adverse effects.
(2) I’d rather handle this through Jetpack than to add yet another plug-in to my already-overloaded site.
However, if it goes on for more than a month, I’ll be using the IFTTT option I outlined in the post from earlier this week.
This post from the archive sums up my thoughts.
In short, you need to make sure that you set the retail price high enough so that AFTER you account for the distributor discount (60% off cover price), there’s still enough left over to cover all of your costs āā which include printing AND shipping. And don’t forget, that includes the shipping from the printer to your door AND shipping to the distributor or customer.
That’s why thinking about this stuff in terms of unit cost is so helpful.
Once you break down your costs to a per-unit basis, you can use that as a place to start off from when it comes to setting a price.
Iām a little hesitant to raise the price so much for my readers because Iām worried it will impact direct sales. But the distributor says that artists undervalue their work too much, which I sorta agree with.
But remember: YOU control the price your readers pay when they buy from you directly.
So if you wind up setting the retail price higher, simply offer them at a lower discounted price on your site.
This has the added benefit of making you look like a good guy who is passing savings along to his readers — AND encourages sales through your Web site (where you make the most per-unit profit).
Win-win.
If I recall correctly, it’s 65% off the cover price.
…Not to be confused with 65% OF the cover price.
In other words, figure out what 65% of your retail price is and subtract that from the retail price. That’s what the distributor will pay.
I’m strongly in favor of pairing a minimum bid with default house ads to maximize the value of your advertising space. I wrote much more on the subject in this post from the archive.
I’m going to bet that (as I’ve said) the answer is in the transfer to Photoshop.
Here’s what I mean. In a vector-illustration application (like Adobe Illustrator), the image is saved as a series of mathematical equations. This is great for lots of reasons:
ā¢ It makes the image infinitely scalable.
ā¢ The image can be opened up in that same app (or other apps) and easily re-worked.
However, all of that data has to remain intact for the file to work correctly.
However, Photoshop (and other raster-based applications) reduce the image to a series of pixels.
The resolution of your image is (loosely defined) the number of pixels that will fit into a square inch. That’s what the measurement DPI (or PPI) stands for … Dots (or pixels) Per Inch. The higher the resolution, the greater the detail in your image.
300 DPI isn’t really that large in terms of resolution.
I scan my line art for illustrations at 600, 900 .. heck, sometimes 1200 DPI.
The bottom line is this: that raster-based image app (Photoshop) is reducing the image to its bare essentials.
If you limit the number of colors that you use, that’s going to reduce the file size even further.
And using the command Save For Web strips out even more unnecessary data, resulting in a file size that’s even smaller still!
I agree with AndyL. If that’s the case, file size should be a strictly secondary concern.
However, if it became more important, I have to believe that you’d achieve a smaller file size by importing into Photoshop and then using “Save For Web” (as Larson pointed out).
I don’t know that I’d go the tagline route with your comic.
I’d choose a gag that you guys feel is (a) particularly strong and (b) nicely representative of your comic overall. The fewer words the better. Bonus if it’s strictly visual with no words at all. Throw that title logo in, and let the strength of your art/writing stand on its own.
In other words, don’t tell them that it’s a funny fantasy comic… show them!
Your work is charming on its own. It will shine through in the ad, making it effective.
Feel free to workshop a few choices here!
I agree ā and I’ll bet that those people referenced in the OP got those low file sizes by doing exactly that.
That code would be the makings of an excellent guest post for the site, if you’re ever interested in sharing! š
