Scott McCloud

The percentage of comics consumers who actually want to become comics creators is probably higher than in most other mediums, and while the barriers to comics publication are lower than ever, with multiple sites offering hosting for free, there are still plenty of barriers to creation to overcome, f…

Scott McCloud was born on this day in 1960, as Scott McLeod. (Like all great self-made iconoclasts, he changed his name.) Cartoonist, scholar, orator, inventor, and champion, Scott McCloud is one of the most important creators of his era, and perhaps the Ben Franklin of comics.

Two weeks ago, First Second Books released The Sculptor, Scott McCloud's long-awaited, five-years-in-the-making, latest graphic novel. It's a complex and nuanced work that functions as both an emotionally rich personal statement, and a masterclass in graphic storytelling (not surprising, g…

Since Scott McCloud first shot onto the cultural radar in the mid-80s, with his "reconstructionist" superhero series Zot!, he's been known as one of the modern masters of the comics form – his seminal 1993 volume Understanding Comics set a benchmark for intelligent analysis of …

Jack Kirby is very probably the single most influential figure in the history of American comics. He produced countless stories in a career that spanned seven decades, inventing and re-inventing genres and styles every step of the way. He inspired generations of artists and writers; created and co-c…

Each weekday, ComicsAlliance brings you a carefully selected variety of links from around the web about comics and comics-related media, including movies, video games, toys, and whatever else might be worth noting. Quite frankly, these are items you may just need to know about to have a productive d…

For many Scott McCloud is a name that's synonymous with comics -- Understanding Comics, Reinventing Comics and Making Comics -- but it's been awhile since the Zot creator has released sequential art that wasn't rooted in education. That changes on February 3 next year with the relase of The Sculptor…

Lettering's something of a ninja craft. It's taken for granted not because it's inessential, but because -- like makeup -- it's often supposed to go unnoticed as a visual element. If executed improperly, however, lettering can draw undue attention to itself and distract where it …

ComicsAlliance closes the day with an after-hours link dump. Sex: Nerve, a site that both in this instance and in general you should probably not visit from work, recently stopped by Emerald City Comic Con and had a chat with some of the pros, retailers, and fans -- including Danielle Corsetto of &…

This past weekend I dug into THQ's (and 5th Cell's - The developers of WB's "Scribblenauts") latest entry into the "Drawn To Life" franchise - "Drawn To Life: The Next Chapter."
Given that players are tasked with creating much of the game's content from scratch within ce…