ONE takes place two years after the events of ZERO.  The Advanced Soldier Program is no more — its presence and purpose erased from the history books.  One more black program that didn’t turn out the way it’s backers hoped.  As for the ten prototypes, they roam free, the result of a tumultuous legal battle that ended on the side of individual liberty.  But while they may be free, they are still watched…

We are committed to bringing you an exceptional story that is freely

available on the web.  But to do that, we need your help!

Please help us by telling your friends about us, voting for us, and

taking a look at our Approved Products and Recommended Reading.

Thanks again, and please remember to click below and VOTE for us!

]]> http://www.soldiersthecomic.com/support-your-soldiers/feed/ 4 http://www.soldiersthecomic.com/extraordinary-article-on-stress-in-wired/ http://www.soldiersthecomic.com/extraordinary-article-on-stress-in-wired/#comments Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:58:22 +0000 Rob http://www.soldiersthecomic.com/?p=1422 Wired Magazine ran a very interesting article on stress and it’s effects on health. Very interesting reading, with tons of cited research into the field. You’ll be amazed by some of the results and the way the medical community if moving forward — I know I was.

While PTSD was mentioned, this wasn’t an article that focused on that topic. However, you can certainly see how the research they’re pursuing would help with a wide range of veteran issues. You can read the full article HERE.

We’re at the point where a few teaser pages are in order.  That means space for Issue One is on the site!  Yay!

You can follow the development of Issue One HERE.

Frank is crunching away and the full color production pages are starting to flow in and they look great.  I know it’s been a long wait, but I promise it is worth it.

More news as it develops…

Rob

Everyone, please welcome Francis Ysip to the SOLDIERS team!  We’ll be getting a bio page for Francis up shortly, but for now, here is a sample of the awesome work that lead us to pick him…

And there’s a lot more where this came from!  He’s busy doing character sketches right now, and they will be posted up under the Character Bios very soon.  And wait until you see the new cast shot that will go up on the Home Page!

So what does all of this mean?  It means SOLDIERS is Back!  Look for new teasers, transitional pieces, and additional info over the next few weeks — with an all new story arc starting in July!

Learn all about Francis at his SOLDIERS profile HERE.

Zero has been read by over 10,000 unique visitors, it’s being followed by 2,600 people on RSS, our bounce rate is about 37%, our dwell time is high, and we’re over 70,000 page views. Considering SOLDIERS updates are inside a flash gallery and we average 20 pages a gallery, that equates to about 770,000 actual page views (SOLDIERS episodes have been read over 35,000 times). Not too shabby… We climbed from rank 3,500 or so to the low 200’s on TopWebComics – quite a feat, considering how difficult that voting structure is – and we’re in the top 100 over on ComicRank.com. All in all, we are very happy with the results.

SOLDIERS Zero was a test platform, and we learned a lot of very valuable lessons. We came up with a new way to handle the presentation that gives the same effect but allows for a lot more page views as well as hyperlinks. We found a superior archive system that is already in place on the site. We are changing the navigation from episode to episode. And we made a lot of structural changes in the site’s code that make operating it a heck of a lot easier than when we first started. A huge shout out goes to our webmistress, Laura, for all of her hard work and innovation.

In addition to site mechanics, we also learned a great deal about the digital market. Part of our test was to decide how to use the web to sell digital comics. We made SOLDIERS so it would be organic to a wide range of digital devices. We’re already on iTunes, we’re soon to be on Kindle, and other platforms are in the works – I’ll keep you appraised as they become available. Our intent was to see if we could put our comic up as a webcomic and transform that into sales. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out the way we wanted. A number of instances arose where, once they discovered it could be read on the web for free, would be app purchasers diverted to the free option. We were in competition with ourselves.

We structured the SOLDIERS site to give our readers as smooth and elegant a reading experience as we could. I realize it isn’t like most webcomics – we planned it that way. As readers got used to the format, the response really climbed. The experience was so good that most felt no need to read it any other way. Which is awesome – except that the free version doesn’t generate any revenue.

We have the option of making the web version not as easy to read, or make the episodes much shorter, but have decided against that. If we do something, it has to be good – we won’t intentionally give our readers a poor experience. So, we’re going the pay route. I realize some of you may not like this decision, and for that I apologize. But SOLDIERS is very expensive to produce and in order to continue making it, we need to be able to make money at it.

We will start regular production of SOLDIERS right away, and new issues will be out early 2010. We will offer a substantial preview of each issue and will then prompt for purchase. We will have SOLDIERS available through iTunes, Kindle, and a pdf download site still TBD. We are working hard on other platforms. Our publisher, Underwater Samurai, is very intent on providing digital content through every channel that is appropriate. No matter how you view digital, we want you to be able to read SOLDIERS.

In the meantime, we will be beefing up the site with a lot more extra content. Character bios, pod casts, development material, and other stuff – including a lot more “Interview with a Vet”. We loved doing that and you loved reading it. Also, the Store is getting a major overhaul – better presentation and more products. And, we’re finally getting around to putting the Advice articles up!

We’ll have new stuff going up every week until the next issue is ready, so swing by every now and then and check on us.

Click Here to read this week’s episode!

Don’t forget — you can get the entire Zero Issue (all 9 parts!) for your iphone for only 99 cents!  And, coming soon, Kindle!

It seems that a good number of readers think SOLDIERS is like any other webcomic and posts only a page a day, when really it’s closer to 18.  Crazy, I know!  I think the fact that we have the episode embedded in a Flash Gallery really throws them.  So, we’ve made some changes.  For our long time readers, I hope these changes don’t bother you, for our new readers I hope they make it easier.

First change is the Episode Navigation Arrows at the bottom.  Now there are First, Previous, Next, and Current.  Also, notice that the “Episode” part is included.  I think this may have been throwing some people off, as so many other comics use these arrows to go from image to image.  We put out a new EPISODE each week, not just another page.  Hopefully, by making the labels less vague our readers will better understand how the comic is organized.

Second change is to intro each Episode with a short blurb explaining that the comic is in a Flash Gallery.  We also raised the image a bit so when you move your mouse over the image you will clearly see the navigation controls. I encourage you to try the full screen option on the far right of the navigation controls — especially if you are using a netbook.

Also, special bonus, there is an easier method to reading each episode — your keyboard’s arrow keys.  After you advance to the first page using the navigation controls and your mouse, you can advance to all of the other images just by using the right or left arrows of your keyboard (this is how I read them).  It’s easier, faster, and a lot more natural.  Try it, I’ll be you’ll like it.  Just remember, you have to advance the first image with your mouse first (just how the code it written, we’re working on it).

If anyone has any more questions, concerns, or ideas go ahead and tell us about it with a comment.  We read , and usually respond, to every comment left on the site.

Rob

Read this week’s episode here.

And if you have an ipod — go here to buy the entire issue of SOLDIERS! Only 99 cents!

Rob