Digital Comics Database
Project Narrative
For my project, I propose the creation of a crowd sourced digital comic book database
that uses Comic Book Markup Language (CBML). This will be an online resource that allows
users to search the database for comic books, learn about and create markup for each comic
book, as well as be a forum to discuss and expand on CBML.
The scholarly merits of comic books and graphic novels are beginning to be recognized
and there are some resources available to contribute to the scholarly community. There are
even online comic book databases, however there is minimal or no markup for these items. The
databases that do provide metadata don’t provide the metadata to do the scholarly or critical
analysis that my proposal would offer. There are also very limited resources on CBML.
The first goal of this project is to have comics be accessible and usable as a scholarly resource,
allowing users to be able to gather data and hopefully add to the discussion of the scholarly and
literary merits of comic books and graphic novels. The second goal is to create a resource that would allow users to learn about CBML and to create a community that would allow them to expand and build on CBML.
The ultimate project will ideally include three levels of interaction. First, users will be able do advanced searches of comic and graphic novels already available in the database. This will hopefully allow for meaningful and scholarly research on comic books and graphic novels.
The second level of interaction would include an interface that would allow users will be able to upload images of a comic book or graphic novel and be able to easily add descriptive data. This
would not require the user to know Comic Book Markup Language. The third level of
interaction would be for users hoping to learn about, discuss and use CBML. This would include instruction on CBML, a forum for users to interact, a place for users to upload their data as well as access the full data records.
Technical Requirements
The purpose of this project is to create and make available CBML encoded comic books
and graphic novels. This will allow them to be digitally published as well allows for the ability to analyze and study them. This means that initially several comic books will need to be encoded with CBML and both the encoded file and the images for the comic book will need to be made available online. A relational database will need to be created to store the data. There will also need to be a frontend interface using HTML/CSS and PHP to connect to the database so the items can be displayed and edited. This interface include search feature, as well as a system for users to upload the files they have created. A help section will also need to be created that include resources about CBML.
Environmental Scan
Comic books and graphic novels have begun to become viewed as serious scholarly
subjects. They apply to a broad range of interdisciplinary studies, including American literature,
popular culture studies, art, mass media, history and sociology. This means that there are many
resources related to comics. There are scholarly journals, comics studies at universities, multiple digital databases, and a few resources directly related to the digital markup of comics.
Comics Journals
ImageTexT: Interdisciplinary Comics Studies is a peer-reviewed, open access journal
dedicated to the study of comics. It is published by the English Department at the University of
Florida. Image and Narrative is a peer-reviewed open access e-journal out of Belgium that focus
to the study of visual narrative. This includes comics. International Journal of Comic Art is the
premier comics studies journal that has been publishing articles since 1999. Their aim is to
publish scholarly and readable research on any aspect of comic art. This includes animation,
comic books, newspaper and magazine strips, caricature, political cartoons, humorous art and
cartoon magazines. The journal does not maintain an online edition; however the table of
contents is available online. The Comics Journal is an American magazine that takes comics
seriously. The magazine has the view that comics are fine art and should be evaluated with a
higher critical standard. It is known for its long interviews with creators, regular columns, and
critical reviews. The Web site includes excerpts from recent issues and hosts an active message
board.
Comics Databases
There are several online comic databases in existence. Some provide covers only of the comic books, while others provide the complete comic book in a PDF, image or compressed file version. Most of these do provide some level of metadata with the comics, with varying levels of completeness. These are primarily used as a cataloging and search tool. There are even some with markup of the text. However, these are used more for the digital presentation and accessibility of the comic books; this would primarily be seen in retailers of digital comic books. The Grand Comics Database (GCD), available at is an example of a large online database. The entire comic book is not included, but cover images are available. They are also extensively indexed with information on publications, credits, dates and more. This also an example of a crowd sourced database. Volunteers upload covers and index them. The Comic Book Database is another well-known database. Like the GCD this also a crowd sourced database with the goal of cataloging comics and graphic novels. This database also doesn’t provide access to the complete comic book. Examples of databases that provide access to public domain comics are
The Digital Comics Museum (DCM) and the collections at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
The DCM is a collection of public domain comics from the Golden Age of Comics. The metadata in this collection is limited. The University of Nebraska-Lincoln has two collections that are part of their libraries image and multimedia collections. These are The Government Comics
Collection, and The Educational Comics Collection. Both of these collections include public domain comics that were created by corporations, non-profit organizations and government agencies. Both of these databases provide access to a digital version of the comic books as well as descriptive metadata. Comixology is an example of a digital comic retailer. Many of the larger labels, including DC Comics and Marvel Comics, sell their digital comics through
Comixology. Comixology provides metadata stored with each issue, allowing for a basic search function as well as connecting individual comics to larger story arcs.
Markup Language
There are limited resources on marking up comic books in particular. Comic Book
Markup Language (CBML) was developed by John Walsh at Indian University. CBML is an XML vocabulary based on the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI). CBML attempts to address the issue of trying to encode images, text and those elements unique to comic books like panels and word balloons. Walsh provides resources on CBML on his website Comic Book Markup Language as well as a more detailed article, “Comic Book Markup Language: An Introduction and Rationale”
(Walsh, 2012). There also the article by Suzanne Covey “Beyond the Balloon: Sound Effects and
Background Text in Lynn Johnston’s For Better or Worse” (Covey, 2006), which discusses CBML as well as provides several examples.
Prototype
Below is an example a page from a comic book as well as a sample of the CBML markup.
Figure 1. From Captain America Goes to War Against Drugs. [David 1990]
Figure 2. CBML fragment illustrating an encoded page from Captain America Goes to War Against Drug.
See Figure 1 above.
I’ve also included several simple examples of what a potential frontend interface would look like. The first example (see Fig. 3) illustrates what a potential search interface would look like.
Users would be able to enter a keyword and limit it to certain fields. These fields would include title, author, publisher, issue number, writer, artists etc.
Figure 3. Example of Searching interface
The next few examples illustrate what the inerface would look like for users uploading a comic
book and adding CBML tags to individual pages. Users will be able to choose a PDF file of a
comic book and upload it (see Fig. 4). They then can populate as much metadata as possible.
Once the comic book has been added to the database. Each page can have the CBML created
for it (see Fig. 5-7). This would be an interface that would allow the usre to select see the page
they are working on and select specific elements and attributes that they wish to add. As each element is finished it will be added to the page as CBML so the user can see the document they are building as they go along.
After changes to the comic have been saved to the database, any user can go in and add or edit the metadata. Ideally these changes will be tracked.
Figure 4. Example of how users can upload comics and add metadata.
Figure 5. Example of users can add CBML tags online.
Figure 6. Example of the panel tag being added to the page.
Figure 7. Example of a completed panel tag
Meta-Critical Reflection
Comic books and graphic novels have begun to become viewed as serious scholarly subjects.
They apply to a broad range of interdisciplinary studies, including American literature, popular culture studies, art, mass media, history and sociology. This means that comic books are beginning to become a serious field of academic research. The goal of my project is to support that and help further the scholarly study and analysis of comic books. A large database, like I am proposing, would allow for the types of searching and data analysis that is already being done with digital collections of literary texts. It would allow users to search the text of the comics, search for particular characters, search for specific keywords, search for comics within a certain story arc, and search for comics by particular artists or writers.
Bibliography
Covey, Suzanne. "Beyond the Balloon: Sound Effects and Background Text in Lynn Johnston's
For Better or For Worse." . ImageTexT: Interdisciplinary Comics Studies. 2.2 (2006). Dept
of English, University of Florida. Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
http://www.english.ufl.edu/imagetext/archives/v2_2/covey/
ComicbookDB. (2013, November 01). The comic book database. Retrieved November 21, 2014,
from http://comicbookdb.com/
Comics by comiXology. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
https://www.comixology.com/
David, P. (1990). Captain America goes to war against drugs : Government Comics. Retrieved
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http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/comics/id/55/rec/5
Educational Comics. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
http://contentdm.unl.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/edcomics
Government Comics. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
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Grand Comics Database. (2013, November 01). Grand comics database. Retrieved November
21, 2014, from http://www.comics.org
Image & Narrative. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
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http://www.english.ufl.edu/imagetext/
International Journal of Comic Art (IJOCA) - 2010. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
http://ijoca.com/
The Comics Journal. (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2014, from http://www.tcj.com/
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Walsh, J. (2012, May 17). Comic Book Markup Language. Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
http://dcl.slis.indiana.edu/cbml/
Walsh, J. A. (2012). Comic Book Markup Language: An Introduction and Rationale, 6(1).
Retrieved November 21, 2014, from
http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/6/1/000117/000117.html