Let’s join Raichu here with some terrible iPhone photos! (Because my decent camera isn’t charged, and I’m too excited!) You can click on any of the thumbnails to see a larger image.

The interior is printed nice and crisp, and looks especially great in this slightly larger size. (Not that you can really tell from these pictures, but Raichu will assure you it is.)

Side by side with the old Lulu print on the right. You can see how much larger the Ka-Blam print is. The Ka-Blam book feels sturdier, and seems like a slightly higher quality overall.

The content inside is the same as the Lulu version: all of Chapter One, plus two extra comics, Q&A, character information, and other stuff.

Eldora even makes an appearance on the front interior to highlight Messenger’s website! The color on the inside and outside covers is brilliant. I can’t wait until I have a color project to print! It will look gorgeous.

Having a finished book in hand is such a great feeling. Now, to get back to work on #2! You can snag a copy of this shiny new #1 from IndyPlanet!

(Psst, you should also check out my friend Arborwin’s comic Grayling! She also just finished a book which I look forward to snagging when it’s available!)

The inside content is exactly the same as the Lulu version I did last year; only the cover art and the ads in the back have changed, so if you’ve already got a copy of the first edition you can safely skip this one! It’s $7 + shipping, 100 pages, black and white. It contains all of the re-drawn pages of Chapter One, plus two bonus minicomics along with other extras.

Issue 2 is coming later this summer! Stay tuned!

I just submitted the re-release of the first issue of Messenger to Kablam for printing. It looks as though it’ll round out to about $7 + shipping, which is pretty sweet compared to Lulu’s 12. I’ll probably take the Lulu copy down soon (but leave up the e-book or something if I can) since it’s kind of pointless and redundant to have two versions floating around. Issue 2 will likely shape up to be around the same price, and since books aren’t terribly heavy I’ll bet shipping will be combined. I am debating/working out the logistics of doing a pre-order thing – bundling the 2 books signed/sketched in, with a sticker and/or a bookmark or some other thing. I’ll have a better idea when I get the second book finished and off to the printer, but I’d guess the price would be about $20 shipped? Does that sound horribly prohibitive? Would anyone even care? I don’t even know. D:

All that said, if you snagged a copy of the Lulu version sometime in the past year, don’t bother picking up the new Kablam print; they’re identical with the exception of a couple of ads at the end and a different cover. (Save your moneys and pick up issue 2 later this summer! :V )

In other notes, there are a couple of new link exchanges up on the links page, which I’ve neglected to mention: Wayrift and Ginpu! Thanks for linking, guys! :)

Vote incentives are late but will be up in a day or so – like I said, things have been crazy around here lately. Ugh.

In news this week, I’m trying to promote the forums at the request of several fans. As I mentioned in my previous post, the forums have never quite built back up to what they used to be before the comic site was hacked a few years ago, so I’m working on that. I’ve added a new section that’s only available to registered members where I plan on adding sketches, page previews, and other “behind the scenes” extras. As we speak, I’m preparing sketches for chapter seven to upload this week, as well as one-panel-previews for upcoming pages. Come join in! :)

There’s a new vote incentive up this week, the second in a series of new coloring styles I’ve been trying out for work on Chapter Seven. I’m also willing to take ideas or requests for future vote incentive drawings, so if you have any characters or ideas in mind, leave a comment or post on the forum!

After looking through the script I’ve got going, and some of the pages I’ve got together, it looks like I’m running short on materials for working on Chapter Seven – specifically, Chio-colored markers. I’ve been using the same set of markers for the past six years, and they’re finally burning out on me. I work as a freelance designer, and business has been slow this past month, plus I’m getting ready to move to a new house which has an assortment of related costs. To try and alleviate the cost of picking up the new colors I need, I’ve added a special donation wallpaper to the sidebar. If you donate any amount, you can download a copy in your choice of two large sizes. Picking up a copy of the book would also help out (there’s a coupon code once again this month, use GREATBOOK when checking out from lulu.com to get 10% off your order. I also have an extra copy on hand that I’m willing to let go for $12 + shipping which I’ll sign and draw in just for you!) and I’m also planning on putting some of my original drawings up for sale, since all they do is sit around and take up space in my drawer, anyway.

I’ve been thinking about doing a little side story thing in addition to the regular comic, just for fun. I’ve drawn so far ahead that I literally feel like I have nothing to do other than a little write up for the new pages as they go up. Being prepared is almost boring!

That’s all for now!

Vote if you get a chance!

I would like to take a second to thank Philip of Frumph.net and Webcomicplanet.com for both pointing out (and subsequently helping me fix) several glaring errors I’ve been making using ComicPress. I never even realized I was doing it wrong in the first place since it looked like it was working! But now everything runs so much slicker. It is fantastic. Thank you!

I thought it might be worthwhile to mention that I have one extra copy of the new chapter one book floating around that I would like to get rid of, if anyone is interested in having their very own copy. I can sell it to you for $12 (+$3 shipping anywhere in the US/Canada) and I will even sign it and sketch the character of your choice in it before I mail it off. It’s a bit cheaper than buying it from lulu, so if you’re interested, drop me an email at bug [at] messenger-comic.com!

In other news this week, I have a couple of links to put up:

Messenger at TVTropes: This is a really neat site that’s just fun to dig through, so I shamelessly stole the idea from Chu and added Messenger to it. Anyone is welcome to change and add to it.

I’ve been doing a lot of outlining and scripting for upcoming storylines in the comic, and so I’ve been spending a lot of time using Tiddlywiki, which is basically a little wiki notebook thing you can run on your local machine. It’s great for keeping track of all kinds of things going on at once, and it’s free, which is awesome. I used to use this to take notes in in college, since it was easy to cross-reference ideas from entry to entry. It is super handy for comic-writing, anyway.

I’ve added a couple of link exchanges to my links page, hooray! It also occurred to me that I made a tumblr account for art/comic related stuff quite some time ago and never bothered using it. There is also a plurk page now, too, which kind of seems like a twitter ripoff, so I’m not sure how long that will last. I did a whole research thing on social networking in college, but I never much had a reason to play around with it. The comic is now my excuse. I just find it interesting. :D

That’s all I’ve got for now!

First off, I’d like to say welcome to the new readers! I know there are a few, since I’ve heard from some of you and traffic in general has been up. I’ve been advertising like crazy lately thanks to Project Wonderful and cheap cheap ads. ♥

In other bits, I’ve been making various tweaks to the site. I’ve updated the RSS feed to actually include images. All along I thought that WordPress was so great because it does all this stuff automatically, but apparently it doesn’t include images. I installed a new plugin, and now it appears to be working correctly, but if you’re an RSS-er and it doesn’t, let me know! It should be all set for now.

I’ve been doing a lot of writing for upcoming chapters of the comic lately, which has been a lot of fun. I have a notebook where I keep track of everything that’s going on so I don’t get confused (yay continuity) and sometimes you have to work backwards, and go back to things that have already happened. In between all this, I decided to draw up a map of locations where events in the comic have taken place so far. There’s a lot of running away and moving around, so it seemed like it would help put things in more order. You can find that page here. As the comic goes on, I plan to add to it and keep it up to date with the story.

For the rest of October, Lulu is running a discount code good for 10% off the [messenger] book. You just have to type in “FALLBOOK” at the checkout screen. Not too bad.

I’ve been debating doing another live video stream/chat session, would anyone be interested? Here are the days and times I’m thinking about:

And, as usual, please vote if you get the chance! Thanks!

Here’s the coupon code information copied directly from lulu:

Disclaimer: Enter coupon code ‘PINTA’ at checkout and save 14.92% off any purchase – maximum discount $25 per account. Enter coupon code ‘SANTAMARIA’ and save 25% off on any order of $350 or more – maximum discount of $500 per account. Discount cannot be used to pay for, nor shall be applied to, applicable taxes or shipping and handling charges. Promotional codes cannot be applied to any previous order. Maximum discountof $500 per account. No exchanges or substitutions allowed. Only one valid coupon code may be used per account. Offer expires on 10/12/09 at 11:59 PM GMT. Lulu.com reserves the right to change or revoke this offer at any time. Void where prohibited.