1.
Top Shelf Productions
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Top Shelf Productions is an American publishing company founded in 1997, originally owned and operated by Chris Staros and Brett Warnock and a small staff. Now an imprint of IDW Publishing, Top Shelf is based in Marietta, Georgia. Top Shelf publishes comics and graphic novels by such as Alan Moore, Craig Thompson, James Kochalka, Andy Runton, Jeffrey Brown, Nate Powell, Alex Robinson, Jeff Lemire. The company was founded by Chris Staros and Brett Warnock after discussions between the pair at the 1997 Small Press Expo, the partnership evolved from combining Warnocks design skills and marketing abilities with Staros talents for editing and book-keeping. The duo started publishing under the name Primal Groove Press, the first title to be published by the new imprint was Pete Sickman-Garners Hey, Mister, After School Special, a collection of Garners previously self-published comic books along with two new tales. Staros and Warnock have aimed to give their imprint a style that is quite hip, but also quite endearing, in April 2002 the collapse of the bookstore distributor LPC caused severe financial problems for the company. A $20,000 check the distributor had issued bounced, investigation by Top Shelf revealed an LPC filing for Chapter 11, a move which left Top Shelf in a perilous state, The company had issued checks based on the LPC check clearing. The company called upon the goodwill it had established in the comics market. They asked former customers to find it in your hearts to each spend around fifty bucks and this would literally pull us through. The communication swiftly spread across the internet, with both Neil Gaiman and Warren Ellis disseminating the appeal through their online presences. The move created such an atmosphere that rival publisher and fellow LPC client Dark Horse felt moved to issue a statement to the effect that they were in a profitable position, Top Shelf were unprepared for the response, with a volunteer drafted to help pack the orders. A second communication was issued a day later, declaring Top Shelf Saved by Comics Community Record 12 Hours, Top Shelf have slowly expanded their line and typically aim to launch works at conventions in order to generate a buzz. The 2004 Comic Con International saw the company launch 8 books and this has at times caused unrest with retailers, particularly when Blankets was launched at the 2003 Comic Con International. The company also followed this route with Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbies Lost Girls, the work had long been on the schedules of Top Shelf, initially intended as a three volume affair scheduled for a 2002 release. The eventual publication proved controversial, with Moore himself describing the work as pornography, before publication fears were raised that the book would prove hard to sell given its nature, and that there may be legal implications. However, the work received good reviews and the print run sold out in one day. The work has yet to be distributed in the United Kingdom, Top Shelf agreed not to distribute the work in the UK until after that copyright expired at the end of 2007. They do, however, refute that the breaches the copyrights held
2.
Limited series (comics)
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In the field of comic books, a limited series is a comics series with a predetermined number of issues. A limited series differs from a series in that the number of issues is finite and determined before production. The term is used interchangeably with miniseries and maxiseries, usually depending on the length. In Dark Horse Comics definition of a series, This term primarily applies to a connected series of individual comic books. A limited series refers to a book series with a clear beginning, middle. Dark Horse Comics and DC Comics refer to limited series of two to eleven issues as miniseries and series of issues or more as maxiseries. The limited series has a story to tell. It follows the standard plot set-up of beginning, middle, usually, all plot points are covered by the end of the series. There have been limited series done in a format. Limited series are often done by a creative team, but in cases where there are changes. The number of issues is determined by some combination of the writers plotting. In 1979, in the process of recovering from the DC Implosion, publisher DC Comics experimented with a new format in the World of Krypton miniseries, as DC termed such short-run works. The new format allowed the company to tell stories that may not have fit into a series and to showcase characters into a short story without the risk. With the success of the format, DC followed by experimenting with longer stories. Debuting in 1982, Camelot 3000 was the first limited series to run to twelve issues, DC coined the term maxiseries as a promotional description for this. It did not take long for other publishers to begin using the limited-series format, Marvel Comics used it to feature popular characters from team titles and put them in solo adventures. Wolverines earliest solo adventures were told in limited series, crossovers were introduced in limited series form before the concept of multi-title crossovers was conceived. Contest of Champions brought forth the idea of an event affecting the Marvel Universe
3.
Graphic novel
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A graphic novel is a book made up of comics content. Although the word normally refers to long fictional works, the term graphic novel is applied broadly and includes fiction, non-fiction. It is distinguished from the comic book, which is used for comics periodicals. Fan historian Richard Kyle coined the term graphic novel in an essay in the November 1964 issue of the comics fanzine Capa-Alpha, the Book Industry Study Group began using graphic novel as a category in book stores in 2001. In the publishing trade, the term extends to material that would not be considered a novel if produced in another medium. Collections of comic books that do not form a story, anthologies or collections of loosely related pieces. The term is sometimes used to distinguish between works created as standalone stories, in contrast to collections or compilations of a story arc from a comic book series published in book form. As the exact definition of the novel is debated, the origins of the form are open to interpretation. The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck is the oldest recognized American example of comics used to this end, the first American edition was published in 1842 by Wilson & Company in New York City using the original printing plates from the 1841 edition. Another early predecessor is Journey to the Gold Diggins by Jeremiah Saddlebags by brothers J. A. D. and D. F. Read, inspired by The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck. In 1894 Caran dAche broached the idea of a novel in a letter to the newspaper Le Figaro. In the United States there is a tradition of reissuing previously published comic strips in book form. In 1897 the Hearst Syndicate published such a collection of The Yellow Kid by Richard Outcault, the 1920s saw a revival of the medieval woodcut tradition, with Belgian Frans Masereel cited as the undisputed king of this revival. American Lynd Ward also worked in this tradition, publishing Gods Man, in 1929, the 1940s saw the launching of Classics Illustrated, a comic-book series that primarily adapted notable, public domain novels into standalone comic books for young readers. In 1947 Fawcett Comics published Comics Novel #1, Anarcho, Dictator of Death, by the late 1960s, American comic book creators were becoming more adventurous with the form. Gil Kane and Archie Goodwin self-published a 40-page, magazine-format comics novel, savage in 1968—the same year Marvel Comics published two issues of The Spectacular Spider-Man in a similar format. Meanwhile, in continental Europe, the tradition of collecting serials of popular strips such as The Adventures of Tintin or Asterix led to long-form narratives published initially as serials. By 1969, the author John Updike, who had entertained ideas of becoming a cartoonist in his youth, addressed the Bristol Literary Society, on the death of the novel
4.
Science-fiction comics
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Publication of science fiction comics became increasingly common during the early 1930s in newspapers published in the United States. They have since spread to countries around the world, with the two largest publishers of this comic genre today being the United States and Japan. The first science-fiction comic was the gag cartoon Mr. Skygack, from Mars by A. D. Condo, the first non-humorous science fiction comic strip, Buck Rogers, appeared in 1929, and was based on a story published that year in Amazing Stories. It was quickly followed by others in the genre, notably Flash Gordon, Brick Bradford, and this influence spread to comic books, in which science fiction themes became increasingly more popular, one notable title was Planet Comics. With the introduction of Superman, the genre was born. In the 1950s, EC Comics had great success and popularity in publishing science fiction comics of increasing complexity, however, a wave of anti-comic feeling stirred-up among parents and educators by Dr. Fredric Werthams book Seduction of the Innocent threatened to drive them out of business. Japanese manga also featured science fiction elements, in the 1950s, Osamu Tezukas Astro Boy was one of the first major mangas that centered around science fiction. In the following decades, many other creators and works would follow, including Leiji Matsumoto, Katsuhiro Otomo, in the UK, the publication of Eagle gave a platform for the launch of Dan Dare in 1950. Starting in the mid-sixties, The Trigan Empire, drawn by Don Lawrence was featured in Look, in the 1970s, publications, such as 2000 AD, featured a selection of regular stories putting a science fiction spin on popular themes, like sports or war. Its success spawned a number of spin-offs in imitators like Tornado, Starlord, when the Nazi occupation forces banned the import of Flash Gordon into France, Le Rayon U was created as replacement in the magazine Bravo which had been running the former. Other French science fiction comics which debuted in 1943 include Otomox, featuring a robot, serialized in Pic et Nic. The first French comics magazine featuring a science fiction hero was in 1947 with the relatively short-lived Radar. A far longer lasting French comics magazine would be the small-format Meteor, published from 1953 through 1964, subsequent notable French science fiction include publications like Métal Hurlant and authors like Enki Bilal and Moebius. With the invention of the Internet, a number of science fiction comics have been published primarily online. Among the earliest science fiction webcomics was Polymer City Chronicles, which first appeared in 1994, other notable comics include Schlock Mercenary, and Starslip Crisis. The first graphic novels were popular comics collected as books, many graphic novels contain elements of science fiction including robots, mecha, virtual reality and time travel. First usage The first recorded usage of the term, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is in 1978 by Will Eisner, A contract with God, a graphic novel, though graphic novels existed for years prior. The first science fiction-based graphic novel is considered to be Astro Boy, by Osamu Tezuka
5.
Robert Venditti
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Robert Venditti was born in Memorial Hospital and raised in Hollywood, and Pembroke Pines, Florida. Though he says he wanted to be a prose writer, he rarely read comics as a child. He later moved to Gainesville to attend the University of Florida where he received a B. A. in Political Science, after college he worked as a clerk at a law firm in southern Florida with aspirations to practice law, but found that work not to his liking. In about 2000, while working at Borders, a coworker recommended comics books as reading material to him, in 2002 Venditti attended a convention and met Chris Staros from Top Shelf Productions, and was added to Staros email list. That April, Staros subsequently sent out an email announcing that Top Shelfs distributor was going bankrupt. Venditti contacted Staros to offer help, and ending up doing warehouse work for him, the first issue of the five-issue miniseries was published in July 2005, and the fifth in March 2006. The prequel Surrogates, Flesh & Bone, was released in September 2009, in May 2012 Venditti began writing the X-O Manowar series for Valiant Entertainment. Venditti began his first work for DC Comics when he took over from Paul Cornell on Demon Knights beginning with issue #16, on March 26,2016, it was announced Venditti would begin writing Hal Jordan & The Green Lantern Corps. As of 2008, Venditti lives in Atlanta, Georgia
6.
International Standard Book Number
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The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, the method of assigning an ISBN is nation-based and varies from country to country, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country. The initial ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering created in 1966, the 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108. Occasionally, a book may appear without a printed ISBN if it is printed privately or the author does not follow the usual ISBN procedure, however, this can be rectified later. Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number, identifies periodical publications such as magazines, the ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the US by Emery Koltay. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108, the United Kingdom continued to use the 9-digit SBN code until 1974. The ISO on-line facility only refers back to 1978, an SBN may be converted to an ISBN by prefixing the digit 0. For example, the edition of Mr. J. G. Reeder Returns, published by Hodder in 1965, has SBN340013818 -340 indicating the publisher,01381 their serial number. This can be converted to ISBN 0-340-01381-8, the check digit does not need to be re-calculated, since 1 January 2007, ISBNs have contained 13 digits, a format that is compatible with Bookland European Article Number EAN-13s. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an ebook, a paperback, and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, a 13-digit ISBN can be separated into its parts, and when this is done it is customary to separate the parts with hyphens or spaces. Separating the parts of a 10-digit ISBN is also done with either hyphens or spaces, figuring out how to correctly separate a given ISBN number is complicated, because most of the parts do not use a fixed number of digits. ISBN issuance is country-specific, in that ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency that is responsible for country or territory regardless of the publication language. Some ISBN registration agencies are based in national libraries or within ministries of culture, in other cases, the ISBN registration service is provided by organisations such as bibliographic data providers that are not government funded. In Canada, ISBNs are issued at no cost with the purpose of encouraging Canadian culture. In the United Kingdom, United States, and some countries, where the service is provided by non-government-funded organisations. Australia, ISBNs are issued by the library services agency Thorpe-Bowker
7.
Comic book
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A comic book or comicbook, also called comic magazine or simply comic, is a publication that consists of comic art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by brief descriptive prose and written narrative, although comics has some origins in 18th century Japan and 1830s Europe, comic books were first popularized in the United States during the 1930s. Comic books are reliant on their organization and appearance, authors largely focus on the frame of the page, size, orientation, and panel positions. These characteristic aspects of books are necessary in conveying the content. The key elements of comic books include panels, balloons, text, balloons are usually convex spatial containers of information that are related to a character using a tail element. The tail has an origin, path, tip, and pointed direction, there are many technological formulas used to create comic books, including directions, axes, data, and metrics. Following these key formatting procedures is the writing, drawing, Comics as a print medium have existed in America since the printing of The Adventures of Mr. Obadiah Oldbuck in 1842 in hardcover, making it the first known American prototype comic book. The introduction of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shusters Superman in 1938 turned comic books into a major industry, the Golden Age originated the archetype of the superhero. Historians generally divide the timeline of the American comic book into eras, the Golden Age of Comic Books began with the introduction of Superman in 1938, spurring a period of high sales. The Silver Age of comic books is considered to date from the first successful revival of the then-dormant superhero form. The demarcation between the Silver Age and the era, the Bronze Age of Comic Books, is less well-defined. The Modern Age of Comic Books runs from the mid-1980s to the present day, in response to attention from the government and from the media, the U. S. comic book industry set up the Comics Magazine Association of America. The CMAA instilled the Comics Code Authority in 1954 and drafted the self-censorship Comics Code that year and it was not until the 1970s that comic books could be published without passing through the inspection of the CMAA. In the early 1970s, a surge of creativity emerged in what known as underground comix. Published and distributed independently of the comics industry, most of such comics reflected the youth counterculture. Underground comics were almost never sold at newsstands, but rather in such youth-oriented outlets as head shops and record stores, frank Stacks The Adventures of Jesus, published under the name Foolbert Sturgeon, has been credited as the first underground comic. The rise of comic book specialty stores in the late 1970s created/paralleled a dedicated market for independent or alternative comics in the U. S, some independent comics continued in the tradition of underground comics. A few represented experimental attempts to bring closer to the status of fine art
