SAGG, I moved this post to the Out There Books thread; it seemed appropriate.
SAGG wrote:From RC:
"What’s in the book? Well, as usual, an entire year of Out There strips, plus some extra stuff exclusive to the book. First of all, there’s the cover, scribbled with the usual lack of panache by yours truly, but transformed into a gorgeous flower due to the brilliant coloring of the soon-to-be-famous Danny Green. (You’ll have to stay tuned to find out why he’s soon to be famous. For now it’s a secret. But trust me, it’s happening.)"
Hmmm...is RC speaking only about those 81 color Sunday strips being in his book, or does he mean we might be gettin' some colorin' in the online comic itself...?

Unfortunately, I was only referring to the
cover having color; the cost of printing the Sunday strips in color would have been prohibitive—it would have made the book cost way too much and I want the book to be affordable to all. They’re “Sunday” strips because of their
format, not because they have color (since they don’t). And to further clarify, it’s not 81
strips, just 81
panels; it’s only
ten Sunday strips (20 pages—each strip takes up two pages.) Sorry for the misunderstanding. 81 strips—jeez, I don’t have
that kind of time. Wish I did.
As far as the online strips ever being in color—once again, I wish I had that kind of time. The comic strip for me is a balancing act; I
could spend more time on the artwork. I could color it, I could make it more detailed, I could spend time on the backgrounds rather than ignoring them or filling them with my quickie scribblings—but something would have to give. And that something would be the frequency of updates.
When I started the strip, I made a decision—new strips six days a week. That meant compromising in other areas. I don’t know if I’ve made the right decision; maybe color would have been better, maybe more detailed artwork would have been better, maybe both. But it’s the decision I made. At this point, my feeling is that the readers appreciate a new strip every day and would rather have that than a prettier strip every other day or once or twice a week. I could be wrong.
Anyway, I would
love to increase
Out There to seven days a week with color on Sundays—and I’m an optimistic sort, I think that will happen someday. But not right now. I just don’t have the time.