Self Publish a Comic Book
For generations, comic books have captured the imaginations of young and old alike as they follow the adventures of superheroes, funny guys, or damsels in distress. If you've written or planned out a comic book of your own and want to know how to self-publish a comic book, there are a few main steps you'll need to take to see your creation in print.
Contents
Steps
Decide Your Publication Route
- Determine your goals. Do you want to build a readership so fans will follow you for more projects, or do you primarily want physical copies of your comic book?
- If you want feedback while you write your comic, you should probably publish your comic online.
- If you want to give copies as gifts to friends and family or your focus is on getting your work into bookstores, you probably want to start with a print publication.
- In general, it's less expensive to start online with a web comic. Then you can sell print copies once you've built a following.
- Decide on your comic page size. Even if you plan to publish a web comic, you may want to research printers for physical copies as well to make your comic a size you like for both the screen and for the page.
- Figure out how you will market and sell your book and how you will find your audience. Don't self-publish until you know this.
Publish Online
- Decide what kind of site you want to use. Do you want to use a blog format for your uploads, or would you rather use individual pages on the site? (Blogs tend to make it easier for readers to keep up with your updates.)
- Find a web host. Many free hosts exist which might be a more viable option for those just getting started.
- Buy a domain name and set up your website.
- Decide on an update schedule, one that's comfortable for you. Twice or more a week can help you with an audience, but it's more important to have a schedule you can keep up with.
- Go live after your website and your comic is ready and as perfect as you can make it. You can start with only one page prepared, but it's better to have a few extra ready, so you can still update even if something interrupts your production schedule.
Publish in Print
- Look at your budget, then look at the options around you. There are PoD (Print on Demand) and offset printers. PoD printers allow you to start selling your print version with minimal up-front costs, but offset printers can earn you a greater return per book sold and have more printing options. Note that some PoD printers specialize in printing comic books, while others print books in general as well as comics.
- Decide if you want to set up your own publishing company or be more obviously self-published. Some people prefer setting up their own official publishing company; others don't mind the self-publishing stigma and take advantages of printing companies that are willing to be considered their book's publisher.
- Get an ISBN for your books. You're supposed to have one for each format (including each file format) you use to publish your comic book. Some printers offer inexpensive or free ISBNs, but make sure to read the fine print.
- Have a barcode created for your book. This will open more vendors for you. You can find places to get the barcode images for free, or you can pay a small fee for an easy-to-use file.
- Follow your printer's instructions for page preparation and upload. Your printer should have individual instructions for how to get physical copies of your comic book.
Tips
- Note that it's easier to produce a good image if you draw in the higher resolution, then convert to the smaller.
- Calibrate your monitor when working on color comics. Otherwise, the colors on your screen won't match the final physical picture. Calibration needs to be repeated frequently.
- Standard settings for web images is RGB color format and 72x72 pixels per inch.
- Standard settings for print images is CMYK color format and 300x300 pixels per inch.
- For the majority of printers, the cost per issue goes down as the number of copies requested increases. This may be advantageous, even if you can't sell them all. This could include promotional copies and other forms of free advertisement.
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