As a Kindle fan, I thought I'd post my thoughts on reading comics on the Kindle
I'll say it upfront - the iPad is perfect for comic reading. It's got it all - screen size, perfect panning, bright colours. The Kindle cannot compete for comic reading, and I won't pretend it does. However, I'm must say, it's not that bad.
HOW GET YOUR COMICS ON THE KINDLE
(1) First find your comic. Comics are either stored as *.cbr or *.cbz format (where * represents the comic's name). The former is a compressed folder in RAR format. The latter is a ZIP folder. Basically, it's just a collection of sequentially named jpg files which can be read by a comic reader. Check the lifehacker article for more info.
(2) You can either rename the respective file as a *.RAR or *.ZIP or simply open the files using WinRAR or WinZIP. I'm not a Mac man but I think RAR files can be handled by the native OS just as Zip files can be handled natively by Windows XP onwards. Anyway, choose an extracting tool appropriate for the compressed format you have, and extract the sequentially named comic jpg files into their own, uniquely named folder.
(3) Connect your Kindle to your PC and open up the Kindle's root folder. If you can't see a folder called 'pictures' create one and copy your new comic folder (full of the comic images) into this that. Just to clarify: you should have K:\pictures\new_comic_folder\comic0.jpg
(4) Eject and unplug your Kindle. Press ALT and Z together on the keyboard (this shortcut refreshes your library). Your comic should appear.
I suggest you create an appropriate 'COLLECTION' on the Kindle and store it in there.
VIEWING THE COMIC
The illustrations below are taken from a Marvel comic I have legally purchased. I don't think these screen shots infringe on any copyright laws and I'm sure there's not enough of the comic here to give any of the plot away. If I become aware of any copyright infringements I will immediately withdraw the images with apologies to the artists. I just wanted to illustrate the blog with a comic I actually read.
The viewing experience was, for me, surprisingly good. Of course you need to switch to landscape mode. But most of the text is legible and the colour comic translated well to gray scale.
View Size
I'm using my faithful Kindle 2 which doesn't have a zoom option for image viewing. Well not really. You can press the 'AA' hard button and switch the flag 'ACTUAL SIZE'. The result is the screen capture below.
For me, I found this clumsy on the Kindle. It's too easy to get lost while panning around the page with the slow eink refresh. Besides, comics these days rarely follow a pattern with regard to frame layout. You're lucky to get a complete frame in a window - even in landscape mode. And the Kindle does not pan in fine increments - it jumps to the next viewing window. Meaning you often have to flick back and forth on a frame just to read a bubble.
So your best option is to select 'NO' to the ACTUAL SIZE option, select 'FIT WIDTH' to the SCALE option, and select the landscape mode that brings the toggle joystick to the bottom of the Kindle (for me it was the second option in SCREEN ROTATION).
So your best option is to select 'NO' to the ACTUAL SIZE option, select 'FIT WIDTH' to the SCALE option, and select the landscape mode that brings the toggle joystick to the bottom of the Kindle (for me it was the second option in SCREEN ROTATION).
Menu Options
Now you've got the the Kindle in landscape and fit-to-width mode. Hit the MENU hard button and select: ENABLE FULL SCREEN MODE, and ENABLE PAN TO NEXT PAGE. The first option is obvious, the second allows you to use the toggle joystick to advance to the next page. This way you can disregard the NEXT/PREV page hard buttons entirely. The screen shot above shows you your menu options. Don't disable dithering - you won't like the result.
Navigation is now quite slick.... well... considering the refresh rate of the Kindle. Panning down the entire page requires 3 clicks of the joystick. Half a page is almost entirely visible on the Kindle screen... almost. The second click will show you almost all of the bottom half. The third click only exposes the very bottom of the page you're reading. The forth will take you to the top half of the next page.
A major limitation is you can't skip to the cover. You have to cycle through each page (ie each image file) to get to where you want. Mercifully it remembers where you left and when you get to the end, it will cycle back to the first page (image file). But this is a limitation when combined with Kindle's slow image handling.
ALTERNATIVELY USE A PDF
The Kindle has better navigation facilities for pdf files. It gives you a number of zoom options. You have the 'GO TO' option that allows to to skip to the page you want. So if you prefer, you can print all your images to a pdf file for a similar result. But to be honest, it's not worth the trouble. Viewing a comic as a collection of images is the best comic experience on the Kindle by far.
CONCLUSION
Navigation is now quite slick.... well... considering the refresh rate of the Kindle. Panning down the entire page requires 3 clicks of the joystick. Half a page is almost entirely visible on the Kindle screen... almost. The second click will show you almost all of the bottom half. The third click only exposes the very bottom of the page you're reading. The forth will take you to the top half of the next page.
A major limitation is you can't skip to the cover. You have to cycle through each page (ie each image file) to get to where you want. Mercifully it remembers where you left and when you get to the end, it will cycle back to the first page (image file). But this is a limitation when combined with Kindle's slow image handling.
ALTERNATIVELY USE A PDF
The Kindle has better navigation facilities for pdf files. It gives you a number of zoom options. You have the 'GO TO' option that allows to to skip to the page you want. So if you prefer, you can print all your images to a pdf file for a similar result. But to be honest, it's not worth the trouble. Viewing a comic as a collection of images is the best comic experience on the Kindle by far.
CONCLUSION
I have an iPad at my disposal. So the iPad will be my preferred option for reading comics. However, I was pleasantly surprised at how well the Kindle performed for this media. If there is a use for the image viewing capabilities of the Kindle, this would be it. I imagine Kindle 3 would do even better.
Anyway, have a try and see what you think.
