Posted in: Comics, Recent Updates | Tagged: Comics, mark waid, marvel, NYCC

Marvel House Of Ideas Panel: Digital, Dexter, And The Destruction of the Space-Time Continuum

Dapper Dan Hart attends the Marvel NYCC House of Ideas panel for Bleeding Cool;

Marvel's push on digital media is really encouraging. It feels like they're trying to bring it all together so that no matter what your medium or access, you're going to be able to read the stories you want and reach the content associated with it. It was a very encouraging session and definitely a signal for  other publishers to raise their game when it comes to the digital medium.

The panel repeatedly reiterated that they want to avoid competition between Print and digital, really hoping to have synergy between them

Marvel app on iOS and Android, still free to download. New issues available same day & dateas in stores, but they're not looking to take away business from brick and mortar stores

The recent free download codes initiative was aimed at helping stores, each store gets 50c per code redeemed. 200,000USD given back so far. No-one else is doing that. There will be 6 more months of this. Unclear if this meant stores would stop getting the 50C or if the free codes would stop (Interesting, what happens after those free codes do stop? Will there be a swing towards digital or away?)

Arune encouraged everyone to use the free codes, if only to help their retailer.

Civil War & Dark Tower are two of the biggest sellers on the app.

Buying via Marvel Digital comics site allows multiple purchases in one transaction,  rather than buying per book in the app.

There was a not so subtle dig at other publishers for bumping their prices for books with download codes included.

New in Digital comics this year: Infinite comics created specifically for tablets. (AvX had the first 3 examples of these comics) Not splash pages, but one panel to the screen with all the action in it. (Sounds like splash pages to me, but hey-ho)

Mark Waid stated he's a big supporter of the format. Rather than reformat print media to suit tablet, they're creating with tablet as the intended medium. The ability to add visual effects like focusing on specific parts of panels, as characters perform actions or look at something, really helps enhance the experience. One feature that Waid said as a writer, top left of the page is the only moment to surprise a reader visually. With Infinite, he can have a surprise whenever he wants. They also said that there's going to be no animation or cheesey voiceovers, more of a visual effect created by the turning of the page.

4 readers on stage got to read some infinite stuff, they all gave glowing reviews. "Amazing, intuitive, the art looks amazing" Then again they were looking at new iPads with the Retina Display; the art SHOULD look amazing.

Nick Lowe commented that it's a shame Nightcrawler died, as his powers would work very well in the Infinite format, bamfing in and out, and blamed Kurt's unfortunate death on Axel Alonso.

This weekend only there is a free Infinite comic available on the app; Ultimate Spider-Man #1 (cartoon tie-in)

Also, signing up to the Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited service, at the show, garners you a limited edition, Handsome Doom figure, complete with Infinity Gauntlet. "Curse you Richards, Doom looks like Jon Hamm!"

Kristin said the archive on MCDU was very popular and that complaints it doesn't work on iOS will be addressed in Dec, with an app coming in the new year. She's been working with participants in the Marvel Advisors program since San Diego Comic Con to gather feedback and input from fans and users of the service.

Arune plugged the AR app again, and we saw a forthcoming AR clip from Indestructible Hulk 1, with former wrestler Diamond Dallas Page being a wee bit intense and enthusiastic about his love for the Hulk. Wow, that guy is ALWAYS in character.

Marvel.com isn't just for solicits, they're really pushing to have news, exclusives and previews there first. Keep checking it, there will be movie and TV news appearing a lot more often. Check it out, it's lightyears better than it used to be.

Mark Waid confirmed that trying to use an iPad to activate the AR on another iPad would effectively destroy the space-time continuum. Yikes.

Finishing up the panel was an episode of What The ?!  where the Marvel Heroes and Capcom fighters had a BBQ. Spider-Ham was the hogroast, Grilled Man-Thing was the veggie option. Funny stuff.

During the Q&A Steve Wacker confirmed that the Dexter comic is still coming, now scheduled Feb next year.

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