Today through the end of the month, An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! is on sale for $8.88, and you can get another 10% off that by using the coupon code GREATBOOK when you order!

Labels: books

The Webcomic List Awards 2009 are now open for nominations! But you can't nominate Station V3 (or Z7, Ebb's Children, or Silence in the Darkness On Q16), because I'm one of the judges. If you're interested in nominating some of your (other) favorite comics, you've got until December 13th!

You CAN vote for Station V3 at TopWebcomics - and if you do, you'll see the "Meanwhile, in the Alternate Universe..." strip I wound up not using last Saturday!

And if you're not interested in any of this voting stuff (or even if you are!), you can get 10% off a copy of An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! this month by using the coupon code GREATBOOK when you order.

Labels: books, voting bonus, webcomic list awards

I bought the new Hitchhiker's Guide book on Monday... For whatever reason I haven't finished it yet (ordinarily I would have read the whole thing that night), but I suppose maybe it's a good sign that when I picked it back up I noticed I had stopped at page 42? I don't think it's going to be my favorite Hitchhiker's Guide book (which is actually So Long And Thanks For All The Fish), but it's not bad so far.

In other news, there's a new voting bonus up today! It's a sprite strip in which Neap tries to get Linton to rescue Violet and the Plant.

And there's also a new PodWarp 1999 episode up now! (Or at least one you haven't heard before!) Mark Mekkes and I discuss holidays in science fiction (last December).

Labels: books, podcast, voting bonus

Today's strip is a double-sized daily update, to celebrate it being the 2000th strip in the archives - I hope you enjoyed it (and the other 1999)! (Some of those 1999 strips - as well as a few that aren't online at all - can be found in An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! which is on sale through this weekend for $8.99 plus shipping!)

And if you're looking for more Station V3-related strips to read after that, all three spinoffs also updated today! (Yes, even Ebb's Children!)

Labels: books, lots of exclamation points, milestone

Lulu recently revised their printing prices, and adjusted the cost of An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! up to make sure I still got the same amount for each book - which was nice of them, but I've revised it back down again. In fact, through the end of next week, I've revised it even further down, and you can get a copy for $8.99 plus shipping - $1 off the original price!

(Good to the last page! I'm marking down prices, low low low! Station V3 is good for you! My prices are innn-saaaane! Etc.)

Get yours today!

Labels: books

Last night I attended another Sequential Artists' Pub podcast. This week's main topic was books - preparing things for print, where/how to have them printed, where/how to sell them, etc.

In case you're wondering, I save the full-size 300dpi scans of my strips before I resize them and save them for the web, and I used those files when I put the first book (Get Yours Today!) together. I took the print-on-demand route for publishing, with lulu.com, so it's printed (and sold) through them. I'll most likely put out the second book (which I'm currently working on) that way too.

And in unrelated news, today's voting bonuses are the rough drafts for yesterday's strip, today's strip, and tomorrow's, and a bad translation of today's strip. Enjoy!

Labels: books, podcast, voting bonus

For anyone who wanted a copy of An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3 but didn't want it on paper, you're in luck! The book is now available from Lulu as a PDF download - it's over 100 pages, including several month's worth of strips (mostly from 2004), and some new material (mostly involving the Space Pod) exclusive to the book!

And for anyone who wanted the book in its printed form, you're also in luck! That's still available too.

Labels: books

I haven't had too much to say here this month! (But there might be something soon enough.) I did renew the stationv3.com domain name for another year, and this time the comic paid for the domain name itself (and is now working on the hosting) through sales of the book - so thank you to everyone who bought a copy so far, and I hope you enjoy it!

In other news, there are two new voting bonuses today - A sprite strip in which the past/present/future Ebb/Neap situation is (sort of) resolved, and the third season of Rumormonger Idol begins. Thanks for voting!

Labels: books, site status, voting bonus

As some of you probably know, LiveJournal has little "SnapShot" windows that pop up to give a preview of the page a link leads to. In addition to the preview, it lists some related searches. At the moment, for a link to the Station V3 book for sale at Lulu.com, it lists "Pomegranate" as one of the related searches. I'm not quite sure how it came up with that! But if you're looking for a book to read, I'd recommend the V3 book instead of the pomegranate. On the other hand, the pomegranate would probably taste better. So if you're hungry, eat the pomegranate. (While reading the book, for best results!)

It also listed "Dark Shadows" and "Blue Whale" as related searches. Related to each other, yes, but I'm not sure how they connect to Station V3! (Or the pomegranate.)

Labels: books, other things

Last January I made some comic-related New Year's Resolutions. I think for the most part I managed to keep them:

• Update Station V3 every day - yep, did that.
  
• Update Z7 at least 50 times - I wound up putting up 98 new strips and getting it back on a regular schedule.
  
• Update Ebb's Children at least 10 times - Update 13 times.
  
• Make a few changes to the site - Yep, made a few. Maybe not as many as I planned, but a few!
  
• Finish putting together the first Station V3 book - Did that! (And you can buy it here.)
  
• Keep things interesting - I certainly hope I did that!
  

...And I also did a few things I hadn't planned to do! For example, starting Silence in the Darkness on Q16, the third Station V3 spinoff. It actually had the most visitors of the four comics last month, thanks to visitors from StumbleUpon, and various German web sites, such as this one. (Though Station V3 still had the Pac-Man share of the site bandwidth pie chart, and is back in the lead this month.)

Plans for 2008 include hoping the comics will earn enough through Project Wonderful ads and book sales to pay for their hosting, doing more guest strips for other comics, and generally doing pretty much the same thing I did in 2007! (Except for putting together the first book - I'll have to work on a second one instead.)

...So keep checking this year and see how I do, and I'll have a followup post on the subject this time next year. :)

Labels: books, comics, new year's resolutions, site status

As you can see in the photo above, Ebb is enjoying reading a copy of An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! He's even got two extra copies just in case something happens to the first one. He thinks it would be nice if everyone had a copy!

(He's right, you know!)

I'm pretty happy with the way the book turned out, considering all the file had to go through to finally get uploaded! I had the original files for most of the strips I used (a few of them I re-scanned), but a lot of them needed to be tweaked a little to line up properly on the pages, and I started putting the book together over a year ago, on a different computer. The files survived the death of that computer, and I continued on this one, getting a prototype version of the book printed earlier this year. I liked the way it turned out, but I had a few things to change and/or add... A couple months later (and some hardware upgrades, and a switch from Windows XP to Linux), and it's finally done. Hopefully when I start putting together the next one, it won't be as complicated!

If any of you were thinking of ordering it and wanted it in time for Christmas, it'd probably be best to order it soon - according to Lulu's holiday deadlines, the closer it gets to Christmas Eve, the more expensive the shipping options are to get it on time. I know some of you have ordered it already - let me know what you think of it when you get it!

Labels: books

The first collection of Station V3 strips is now available! An Experimental Space Pod Visits Station V3! is over 100 pages, with a few of the earliest strips, the strips from April to mid-October 2004, and some new material exclusive to the book. Could make a great gift for someone, or you might want to get it for yourself... and then there's the deluxe "both" option!

Get yours today!

Labels: books

Today's first bonus is a sprite strip in which two rumormongers discuss novel writing, and the second bonus is a sketch in which Morty tries writing a how-to book.

As for my own progress, I've got a couple hundred words written and a vague idea of where the story might go. Which is probably about as far as I got last time I tried the NaNoWriMo bit, but this time I got there by the middle of the month instead of the end, so maybe I'm getting somewhere... And as for the other book (the first collection of Station V3 strips), I'm putting the final bits together and checking to make sure all the pages look right.

Labels: books, voting bonus

You may have noticed it's been a little quiet here lately, apart from new strips still going up every day. Due to some computer problems last month, I've switched operating systems (to Linux), and put in a new hard drive. Fortunately, this hasn't affected the update schedule here (or at the other strips in the "V3 universe") - the first thing I did was get the scanner and printer working, and the GIMP works as well as any of the programs I was using before. Also fortunately, I didn't lose any data along the way, but it did delay work on the Station V3 book, which is a little frustrating, since it was very close to being done. At this point I can start getting back in to finish work on it - It looks like I may have a few formatting issues to work out with the different program (OpenOffice) I'm using now, but hopefully it'll be ready soon.

In other book news, The Kid's Book Project is almost done, with all the pages in.

In other other news, November is National Novel Writing Month - I've signed up at nanowrimo.org, since what's one more thing not to have time for? :)

And finally, I've put up two new voting bonus sketches today - in the first one, a book is being written, and the second one is a preview of what might happen once V3's crew gets their new replacement station. Thanks for voting!

Labels: books, computers, site status, voting bonus

The Kid's Book Project is close to being done - 50 webcomic artists (including me) making a story where they only see the page before theirs (working from the front) or the page after (working from the back), and some lucky artist gets to tie the two parts together. It's down to the last 10 artists, and should be coming out in December. It's £6 plus shipping (US price with shipping currently works out to $17.50 or so), and the proceeds go to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

In completely unrelated news, today's bonuses: A bad translation of today's strip, and a sprite strip in which two rumormongers discuss the Rumormonger Idol reunion.

And speaking of rumormongers - for any webcomic artists reading this, Get a Rumor!

Labels: books, voting bonus

The first Station V3 book will be available this month. (Not last month, as I'm sure some of you have noticed...) I'm making a few more changes to it, and adding a few more pages of new material. So when it does come out, it'll be that much more enjoyable!

To get the month started on the voting lists, there are two news bonuses up today: At TopWebcomics, the Rumormonger Idol reunion special continues, and at buzzComix, a rumormonger discusses the simulation tournament with one of the monsters. As an added incentive (bribe?), if V3 makes it to the Top 40 on either list this month, I'll add another desktop image to download to this page. Vote early, vote often!

Labels: books, voting bonus

August was a pretty busy month here - a lot of people reading through the archives lately. New readers? Looking for answers for the trivia quiz? Going back and re-reading some of your favorite strips? Whoever you are and whatever the reason, thanks for reading! And point your friends here if you think they'll like it! (If not, maybe some new friends...?)

So, about the Station V3 book, and that trivia quiz... Since this is September 1st, I can tell you someone has posted the right answers to the quiz, and will be getting a copy of the 'prototype space pod' version of the book. And since September 1st isn't over yet, you can go see those right answers, post them yourself, and win a copy of the photocopied-and-stapled Station V3 mini-comic I put together for this year's Free Comic Book Day, featuring a slightly revised Third Planet story. Do it now! Or if you'd rather wait for the book, it'll be going on sale later this month. (Of course, you can always get both... That's allowed!)

On the technical side of things, the host I'm on seems to be having a couple problems today - which fortunately aren't affecting things here at this point, but if the site is suddenly gone, that may be the reason. (Of course, if it *is* gone, you most likely aren't reading this.) The LiveJournal feed should be unaffected even if it does disappear, though, so you can always check that. I'll try to get everything back up and running as soon as possible if it does go zap.

And finally, a big Thank You to everyone who voted for Station V3 last month and kept the comic in the Top 100 on TopWebcomics and buzzComix - it does seem to help bring in at least a few new visitors, according to the site logs! I've got two new bonuses up today to get this month started: A sprite strip in which Linton is not especially pleased with how he did in the first round of the Security Simulation Tournament, and a bad translation of today's strip. Thanks for voting, and if you have a bonus request, let me know!

Labels: books, contest, site feed, site status, voting bonus

So, about that "secret project" I mentioned a week or so ago... The first copies arrived the other day!



I started putting some files together for a Station V3 book last year - fortunately, the files survived a couple computer problems, and I got around to finishing the initial version of it ("A Prototype Space Pod Visits Station V3!") this month!

It's 100 pages - mostly a collection of strips from 2004, with a few earlier strips and also some new material. Before it goes on sale, there are a few things I'm going to add/change/delete - but you can win a copy of this version by being the first one to get all the answers right in the trivia quiz on the forum!

Labels: books, contest, Station V3 projects

(Apparently Ebb didn't get the message about Harry Potter...)

Today at Black Diamond Antiques at the Schuylkill Mall in Frackville, PA, I was looking through some books at one of the booths - a lot of science fiction (I was hoping maybe I'd find "The Space Barbarians" by Tom Godwin, but no such luck), and a lot of TV show tie-in books. And of course a lot of overlap between the two - mostly Star Trek, of course, but there were also a few (original) Battlestar Galactica books, and surprisingly, a lot of Space: 1999 books!

I wound up buying "The Space Guardians" (seen above with Ebb). One reason I picked that one was the fact that one of the episodes novelized in it is "Force of Life," which is one of my favorites from the first season. And it was also the cheapest one they had. :)

Labels: books, photograph, Space: 1999