A comic strip is a sequence of cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st century, these have been published in newspapers and magazines, with daily horizontal strips printed in black-and-white in newspapers, while Sunday papers offered longer sequences in special color comics sections. With the advent of the internet, online comic strips began to appear as webcomics.
A cartoon is a type of visual art that is typically drawn, frequently animated, in an unrealistic or semi-realistic style. The specific meaning has evolved, but the modern usage usually refers to either: an image or series of images intended for satire, caricature, or humor; or a motion picture that relies on a sequence of illustrations for its animation. Someone who creates cartoons in the first sense is called a cartoonist, and in the second sense they are usually called an animator.
Webcomics are comics published on the internet, such as on a website or a mobile app. While many webcomics are published exclusively online, others are also published in magazines, newspapers, or comic books. Webcomics can be compared to self-published print comics in that anyone with an Internet connection can publish their own webcomic. Readership levels vary widely; many are read only by the creator's immediate friends and family, while some of the most widely read have audiences of well over one million readers. Webcomics range from traditional comic strips and graphic novels to avant garde comics, and cover many genres, styles, and subjects. They sometimes take on the role of a comic blog. The term web cartoonist is sometimes used to refer to someone who creates webcomics.
Publication of comic strips and comic books focusing on science fiction became increasingly common during the early 1930s in newspapers published in the United States. They have since spread to many countries around the world.
PvP, also known as Player vs Player, was a longrunning video game webcomic, written and drawn by Scott Kurtz. It was launched on May 4, 1998. The webcomic follows the events at a fictional video game magazine company, featuring many running gags and references with a focus on nerd culture. Dylan Meconis was added as a co-writer in 2013.
Sinfest is a long-running daily American comic strip by Tatsuya Ishida. It originally appeared in the Daily Bruin student newspaper between 1991 and 1994. Ishida relaunched the comic strip in 2000 by self-publishing it online as a webcomic. Sinfest has also been collected into five printed books; Dark Horse Comics published two of them, in 2009 and 2011.
Doctor Fun is a single-panel, gag webcomic by David Farley. It began in September 1993, making it one of the earliest webcomics, and ran until June 2006. Doctor Fun was part of United Media's website from 1995, but had parted ways by 2003. The comic was one of the longest-running webcomics before it concluded, having run for nearly thirteen years with over 2,600 strips. The webcomic has been compared to The Far Side.
VG Cats is a webcomic written and drawn by Canadian cartoonist Scott Ramsoomair. Published on its own website, it follows the adventures of a pair of anthropomorphic cats, who both have an interest in video games, and often play the roles of characters in popular games that are parodied in the strip.
David M Willis is an American web cartoonist currently living in Columbus, Ohio. He is best known for his interconnected series of webcomics Roomies!, It's Walky!, Shortpacked!, and Dumbing of Age. Willis is also known online for his chatrooms and forums including "ItsWalky". KUTV in Salt Lake City calls him a satirist who is "a little bit edgy."
Brewster Rockit: Space Guy! is a satirical retro-futuristic comic strip created by Tim Rickard. It chronicles the misadventures of the dim-witted Brewster Rockit, captain of the space station R.U. Sirius, and his crew. Many of the comic's characters and elements are derived from the Star Trek franchise, American science fiction films of the 1950s, and science fiction comics of the 1940s and 1950s. It debuted on July 5, 2004, and is nationally syndicated by Tribune Content Agency.
Photo comics are a form of sequential storytelling using photographs rather than illustrations for the images, along with the usual comics conventions of narrative text and word balloons containing dialogue. They are sometimes referred to in English as fumetti, photonovels, photoromances, and similar terms. The photographs may be of real people in staged scenes, or posed dolls and other toys on sets.
T.H.E. Fox is a furry webcomic by Joe Ekaitis which ran from 1986 to 1998. It is among the earliest online comics, predating Where the Buffalo Roam by over five years. T.H.E. Fox was published on CompuServe, Q-Link and GEnie, and later on the Web as Thaddeus. Despite running weekly for several years, the comic never achieved Ekaitis' goal of print syndication. Updates became less frequent, and eventually stopped altogether.
Sluggy Freelance is a long-running webcomic written and drawn by Pete Abrams. Starting in 1997, it is one of the oldest successful webcomics, and as of 2012 had hundreds of thousands of readers. Abrams was one of the first comic artists successful enough to make a living from a webcomic.
Ctrl+Alt+Del (CAD) is a gaming-related webcomic and animated series written by Tim Buckley. The name of the comic refers to the Windows command Control-Alt-Delete. Premiering on October 23, 2002, the comic's focus has gradually shifted away from single strip gags towards longer story arcs and greater continuity through the use of video game references. Ctrl+Alt+Del currently is updated every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Sandra and Woo is a comedy webcomic written by a German author, Oliver "Novil" Knörzer, and drawn by an Indonesian artist, Puri "Powree" Andini. It is published in English and German. The first strip was put online on 19 October 2008 and the black-and-white comic strip was updated twice a week after. The last regular strip before the current hiatus was posted on 26 November 2022. A new strip, reusing existing art, was posted on 12 August 2023.
The history of webcomics follows the advances of technology, art, and business of comics on the Internet. The first comics were shared through the Internet in the mid-1980s. Some early webcomics were derivatives from print comics, but when the World Wide Web became widely popular in the mid-1990s, more people started creating comics exclusively for this medium. By the year 2000, various webcomic creators were financially successful and webcomics became more artistically recognized.
Notable events of the late 1990s in webcomics.
"Loss", sometimes referred to as "loss.jpg", is a strip published on June 2, 2008, by Tim Buckley for his gaming-related webcomic Ctrl+Alt+Del. It is part of a storyline in which the main character Ethan and his fiancée Lilah are expecting their first child. Presented as a four-panel comic with no dialogue, the strip shows Ethan entering a hospital where he sees Lilah weeping in a hospital bed after suffering a miscarriage. Buckley cited events in his life as inspiration for the comic.
