Electric Puppet Theatre

The End of the Tour

2013-05-18T00:00:00Z

EPT is over for now. You can read the afterward here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 15

2013-05-16T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 14

2013-05-09T00:00:00Z

Free Comic Book Day

2013-05-04T00:00:00Z

In celebration of Free Comic Book Day, we've added free PDF and CBZ copies of chapter one to the extras page for your offline reading pleasure. Please take advantage of our Creative Commons license (CC-BY-NC-SA) and share them with your friends.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 13

2013-05-02T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 12

2013-04-25T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 11

2013-04-18T00:00:00Z

Cyborg Thriller

2013-04-15T00:00:00Z

K.B. "Otter" Spangler has finished her first novel, The Digital Divide, and it's everything one would hope for from the razor wit behind A Girl and Her Fed. Pick up this treat of a sci-fi cyborg detective thriller in pdf, epub, or kindle format.

Excellent Pairing

2013-04-15T00:00:00Z

Ron "Monkey Island" Gilbert's bookshelf -- copies of his games nestled between Orson Scott Card's Characters and Viewpoint and Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics trilogy -- now that's good taste.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 10

2013-04-11T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 9

2013-04-04T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 8

2013-03-28T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 7

2013-03-21T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 6

2013-03-14T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 5

2013-03-07T00:00:00Z

Celebratory Doodad #2

2013-03-05T00:00:00Z

Want to make comics but can't find the time? Here's a tutorial for how we make comics on the go.

Celebratory Doodad #1

2013-03-02T00:00:00Z

We are pleased to present EPT Kazoo 1.0 for all of your comic lettering needs.

A. ni A7

2013-02-28T00:00:00Z

Check out Shaenon Garrity's killer fungus comic.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 4

2013-02-28T00:00:00Z

100

2013-02-27T00:00:00Z

EPT just hit 100 pages (not counting covers). Stay tuned for some celebratory doodads later this week.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 3

2013-02-21T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 2

2013-02-14T00:00:00Z

Woogie Boogie

2013-02-09T00:00:00Z

The downtown Berkeley BART station is the hot place to discover new music. A few months ago, we caught Deep Chatham, and last night we were treated to a raucous performance by The John Brothers Piano Company. Evoking brothers Harpo and Chico, the Johns hurtle through original compositions a la Yann Tiersen and the Tin Hat Trio with pandemonic energy. Check out their live show and album.

More Noir

2013-02-08T00:00:00Z

The Q&A session from Laura J. Mixon and Steven Gould's reading at SF in SF is now up.

Storyboards

2013-02-07T00:00:00Z

Candorville's Darren Bell takes on The Sandman.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 1

2013-02-07T00:00:00Z

Impulsive Bidding

2013-02-05T00:00:00Z

Con or Bust (a fund for diversifying science fiction conventions) is auctioning off a copy of new book Steven Gould's new book, Impulse (an awesome, read-in-one-day adventure). Not only is this a signed hard-back, but if the bids go high enough, Gould will throw in an appearance in his next book, complete with "[being killed] in a spectacular or embarrassing way, if desired". You can place your bids here.

A picture is worth a thousand words

2013-02-02T00:00:00Z

Succinct.

Digital Noir

2013-01-31T00:00:00Z

Last week, we saw Steven Gould and Laura J. Mixon (aka Morgan J. Locke) read at SF in SF (a San Francisco venue that raises money for charity by combining science fiction readings with easy access to a cash bar). The first reading is now up at the Agony Column podcast: Laura reading from her novel-in-progress: Child Left Behind.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 5, Page 0

2013-01-31T00:00:00Z

Glory Lane

2013-01-25T00:00:00Z

The Escape Pod podcast brings you Shaenon Garrity's Punk Voyager -- the best alien visitation since Invisible Thread.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 24

2013-01-24T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 23

2013-01-17T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 22

2013-01-10T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 21

2013-01-03T00:00:00Z

A Comic

2013-01-02T00:00:00Z

Penny Arcade on speech.

New Year's Resolutions

2013-01-01T00:00:00Z

Celebrate the new year with some new wallpaper!

Or visit the extras page for older wallpaper.

Lost both books

2012-12-27T00:00:00Z

We just found Gpick, the swiss army knife of palette editors. Among other hard-to-find features, it supports "painter's" color wheels, automatic color naming, arbitrary color mixing, and dragging colors directly into Inkscape. For a full tour, take a look at this in-depth review.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 20

2012-12-27T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 19

2012-12-20T00:00:00Z

Incubated EPT

2012-12-18T00:00:00Z

Our 2012 Web Comic Secret Santa present is a sweet and sexy rendition of Ed and Louis by Hushicho of Incubus Tales (click here for full image):

You can check out Hushicho's comics here.

Sausage

2012-12-13T00:00:00Z

If you're interested in how EPT is made, here's a short screencast of setting up and starting to ink today's page.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 18

2012-12-13T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 17

2012-12-06T00:00:00Z

Web Comic Secret Santa

2012-12-05T00:00:00Z

If you have a web comic, you still have a few days left to sign up for the Web Comic Secret Santa Exchange and receive a sweet piece of gift art like this!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 16

2012-11-29T00:00:00Z

Big Buts

2012-11-26T00:00:00Z

A review of the new comics anthology The Big Feminist But, featuring a complete preview of Shaenon Garrity's My Horrible Heroines. You can check out the anthology's Kickstarter here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 15

2012-11-22T00:00:00Z

Lizzie 500

2012-11-20T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to Dave Shabet on page 500 of Dead Winter. As usual, he's celebrating with a groovy animation.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 14

2012-11-15T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 13

2012-11-08T00:00:00Z

What a MESS

2012-11-07T00:00:00Z

John "Lit Brick" Troutman is Kickstarting the first volume of Mary Elizabeth's Sock. The first 36 pages are available as a free CBZ for your previewing pleasure. The printed volume will include the first 89 pages plus bonus material.

Pardon Our Dust

2012-11-07T00:00:00Z

Tweaking the site layout a bit -- we've added navigation buttons to the top of the single-page view and the latest page of the comic to the homepage. Love it? Hate it? Let us know!

Vote!

2012-11-06T00:00:00Z

US General Election -- Tuesday, November 6th, 2012. Be there or be square!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 12

2012-11-01T00:00:00Z

Of/By/For

2012-10-25T00:00:00Z

Jorge Cham has posted a great animation about Open Access Week featuring Jonathan Eisen.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 11

2012-10-25T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 10

2012-10-18T00:00:00Z

Signal > Noise

2012-10-16T00:00:00Z

A quick update on the Humble e-Book Bundle -- 5 webcomic collections have been added to the "pay more than average" bundle (xkcd, 2x SMBC, and 2x Penny Arcade). Act now and revel in Randall Monroe's cryptic marginalia!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 9

2012-10-11T00:00:00Z

Signal/Noise

2012-10-10T00:00:00Z

The folks from The Humble Indie Bundle (aka, a nifty way to get Braid for Linux), having previously broadened their horizons with The Humble Music Bundle, are doing it again. Cory Doctorow has curated two short story collections and four novels (including his own Pirate Cinema) for the pay-what-you-like, DRM free Humble e-Book Bundle. But wait, there's more! Pay more than the average (currently $12.34) and they'll throw in John Scalzi's Old Man's War and...

...Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean's Signal to Noise in sparkly high-res glory! (This alone is worth the price of admission)

Available on the Humble Bundle site through October 22nd, 2012.

Oh, It's the End of the World

2012-10-08T00:00:00Z

A new comic from Matthew "Chairs" Bogart starts today!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 8

2012-10-04T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 7

2012-09-27T00:00:00Z

Legendary Drop

2012-09-22T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to Andrew "bunnie" Huang on receiving an EFF Pioneer award. Details here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 6

2012-09-20T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 5

2012-09-13T00:00:00Z

A Comicus Brief

2012-09-06T00:00:00Z

An amicus brief, filed in comic form.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 4

2012-09-06T00:00:00Z

Fluoride (Prophylaxis)

2012-09-02T00:00:00Z

We finally got around to fixing the Electric Puppet Bass. Here is a self indulgent solo to celebrate: (We're trying out the HTML5 audio element. If you can read this, use the direct download link below)

(download 3MB OGG audio)

(Stomp box and noise synth courtesy of Rakarrack)

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 3

2012-08-30T00:00:00Z

Puppet Update

2012-08-27T00:00:00Z

Deirdra Kiai has just updated the reward levels for Dominique Pamplemousse -- $15 gets you the sheet music and $250 gets you an original puppet from the game. The fundraiser ends this Friday, so act soon!

Dreamy Webcartoonists

2012-08-26T00:00:00Z

A lot of familiar names in today's Foxtrot.

Claymation Adventure

2012-08-25T00:00:00Z

Long time indie-adventure game designer Deirdra Kiai has a new project: Dominique Pamplemousse -- a stop motion musical adventure game! Try out the demo, go behind the scenes for the making of the music and puppets, and consider chipping in to the game's IndieGoGo campaign (featuring such fabulous rewards as the stop-motion puppets themselves).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 2

2012-08-23T00:00:00Z

Posner on Patents

2012-08-22T00:00:00Z

Interesting essay on patent reform from Richard Posner.

En Media Archive

2012-08-22T00:00:00Z

...and let's not forget: MIRV, Primus, Green Day, Save Ferris, Supersuckers, L7, Sugar Ray the Indigo Girls Action Plus, and Lard.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 1

2012-08-16T00:00:00Z

So You Want to Be a Writer...

2012-08-15T00:00:00Z

Some great interviews with some great writers:

From Wired, a short written interview and wonderfully long podcast with Diane Duane
From Neil Gaiman, his 1984 interview with Harry Harrison (who will be missed).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 4, Page 0

2012-08-09T00:00:00Z

Raccoon Pencils

2012-08-08T00:00:00Z

Pencils for the EPT 4 cover -- pre-silhouetting.

Sugaring Season

2012-08-08T00:00:00Z

This week's Tiny Desk Concert on NPR features Beth Orton playing three songs from her upcoming album, Sugaring Season, plus Sweetest Decline from her techno-folk classic Central Reservation. The new songs are haunting and hold up well against a simple acoustic guitar. Look for the record October 2nd.

Bass Auction

2012-08-08T00:00:00Z

As a fundraiser for his nephew's leukemia treatment, Primus bassist/vocalist Les Claypool is auctioning off one of his basses. Details here.

Free Wizards!

2012-08-06T00:00:00Z

In celebration of the landing of the Curiosity Rover, Diane Duane is offering a free ePub of A Wizard of Mars A Wizard of Mars is the ninth book in the Young Wizard series, one of our favorite fantasies and a big influence on Electric Puppet Theatre. (The offer is only good until midnight 8/6/2012, so act fast!)

Contact

2012-08-03T00:00:00Z

James Gurney makes a special delivery.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 24

2012-08-02T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 23

2012-07-26T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 22

2012-07-19T00:00:00Z

The Digital Divide

2012-07-18T00:00:00Z

Rum, they agreed, was too popular to be interesting, tequila suffered from delusions of grandeur, and vodka had lost its hearty Russian heritage to peer pressure from vanilla and fruit. But whiskey, good old-fashioned whiskey, still had roots running deep in Tennessee and remembered its sole purpose was to help make awkward social situations bearable.

--K. "Otter" Spangler

Head over to the AGAHF store to grab the first installment of The Digital Divide -- a novel combining the paranormal buddy cop action of Paradigm Shift with the lethal bon mots of A Girl and Her Fed. Good stuff!

Impulse!

2012-07-18T00:00:00Z

The third book in Steven Gould's Jumper series is due out this January. The first two books (Jumper and Reflex) are well worth checking out, especially if you like early Heinlein like Tunnel in the Sky and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 21

2012-07-12T00:00:00Z

Randall Monroe's Mailbox

2012-07-10T00:00:00Z

what-if.xkcd.com is off to a good start.

Electric Puppet Wallpaper

2012-07-06T00:00:00Z

This week's page was posted a bit late. To make amends, here is some free wallpaper based on panel three:

Please let us know if you'd like a different resolution.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 20

2012-07-05T00:00:00Z

Sleep Furiously

2012-07-03T00:00:00Z

It's time for another Chompskian romp with Shaenon Garrity -- Colorless Green Ideas!

Monster of the Week

2012-06-29T00:00:00Z

New comic from Shaenon Garrity: Monster of the Week -- wherein each Friday she posts a 12 panel recap of an X-Files episode ("because it's awesome")

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 19

2012-06-28T00:00:00Z

Free Vittles

2012-06-27T00:00:00Z

Tyler Nothing Better Page just dropped the Stylish Vittles 10th Anniversary Collection eBook -- a pdf of all three volumes of his first comic plus hundreds of pages of thumbnails, scripts, and sketches. Check it out here!

Dancing Solo

2012-06-27T00:00:00Z

Happy 50th page to Dancing Solo

Chynna's Broke-@$$ Mac Fund

2012-06-26T00:00:00Z

Chynna Blue Monday Clugston's computer just died. She's set up a fundraiser to buy a new one here. Remember, the sooner she can get back to drawing, the sooner we'll get another issue of Thieves Like Us!

GMOFAQ

2012-06-21T00:00:00Z

Michael Eisen is doing a series of blog posts on genetically engineered food -- looks like interesting reading.

Whiskey and Rye

2012-06-21T00:00:00Z

The internet is conversing on music. Here are the snippets that we've overheard:

From the new generation
From the old generation (also this, and we've always been partial to track 4 here)
From somewhere in between (and we're also partial to this one)

What strikes us about these essays are not simply their civility, but their length and thoughtfulness. We care, deeply and collectively about the future of music. The tenor of the conversation suggests that it is in good hands.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 18

2012-06-21T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 17

2012-06-14T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 16

2012-06-07T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 15

2012-05-31T00:00:00Z

Gource Animation

2012-05-26T00:00:00Z

Just updated our movie page with a Gource-based animation of the full EPT repository. Unlike our previous movies this one is file-based, so you can see us flitting about amongst the chapter directories and website code. As always, the video is available for download as well as on YouTube.

Zombie Western

2012-05-26T00:00:00Z

Check out the new video for Lee Van Cleef, our favorite cut from Primus's Green Naugahyde.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 14

2012-05-24T00:00:00Z

Free Socks!

2012-05-20T00:00:00Z

John Troutman has put up the first 37 pages of Mary Elizabeth's Sock as a free cbz download (yes, the comics are already free, but the download offers a nifty off-line reading experience and features images at 1.5 times the resolution of their web counterparts).

The download is available here along with suggested cbz readers for various platforms. For Linux, we suggest Comix.

Dialogue-Free Comics Day

2012-05-18T00:00:00Z

Today is the third annual Dialog Free Comics Day. As it happens, we are awfully chatty this year, but you can check out those comics hep enough to keep their yaps shut at Noel Curry's site.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 13

2012-05-17T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 12

2012-05-10T00:00:00Z

Connection

2012-05-07T00:00:00Z

Sophie Goldstein of Darwin Carmichael is Going to Hell has a new book out: Mother Ship Blues -- looks adorable!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 11

2012-05-03T00:00:00Z

Fan Art on A Girl and Her Fed

2012-05-01T00:00:00Z

Check out our fan art on A Girl and Her Fed (an original and hilarious adventure about -- no, it will take too long, let me sum up. Well worth an archive dive).

'Craft

2012-05-01T00:00:00Z

Jason Thompson has just launched The Doom that came to Sarnath, a ~20 page adaptation of an H.P. Lovecraft story, commissioned as part of the Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath Kickstarter. The first page is beautifully rendered with a woodcut feel. Check it out!

Drunken Slingshots

2012-04-30T00:00:00Z

Check out Jamie Noguchi's sweet guest art on Girls with Slingshots!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 10

2012-04-26T00:00:00Z

Silence is a Weapon

2012-04-25T00:00:00Z

Volume one of The Introvert Manifesto is now available in print by way of Indy Planet (the same service that we use for the print editions of EPT -- you can see our pictures of their print quality here).

On a related note, check out Neal Skorpen's new comic: Aethernaut.

Moral: Never Bet on an Eggplant

2012-04-23T00:00:00Z

By way of Shaenon Garrity, it looks like a mutated version of one of Daniel Pinkwater's dada fables has made it onto a standardized test.

You can listen to the original version here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 9

2012-04-19T00:00:00Z

Gav

2012-04-17T00:00:00Z

Spotted

We never could get the hang of Thursdays

2012-04-13T00:00:00Z

We are expecting very large values of Thursday this week. Possibly as large as Sunday...

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 8

2012-04-12T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 7

2012-04-05T00:00:00Z

Got werewolf?

2012-04-03T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to Dirk Tiede on the ten-year anniversary of Paradigm Shift!

Git yer trees as SVG

2012-04-03T00:00:00Z

Looks like our movie page is the second google hit for git tree svg. While that page doesn't actually address the question, we do happen to know the answer:

To render the DAG of all commits from a git repository (including unmerged branches) in SVG format:

      (echo 'digraph git {' && git rev-list --all | \
       xargs git log --pretty='format:  %h [label=ZZ%sZZ]; %h -> { %p }' | \
       sed 's/"//g' | sed 's/ZZ/"/g' | sed -r 's/[0-9a-f]{7}/\"x&\"/g' && \
       echo '}') | dot -Tsvg > ~/git_tree.svg

Layout and SVG formatting is via the dot program from GraphViz, so you'll want to install that first.

All of the business with sed is just a trick for getting proper formatting in the input that we send to dot (node names and labels need to be quoted, any extraneous quotes in commit messages need to be stripped, and node names can't begin with a number).

We now return you to your normal comix programming...

Just the First Frame

2012-04-02T00:00:00Z

Check out the hep new place to discover webcomics: Just the First Frame. Creator friendly, beautifully formatted, with just enough scripting under the hood to make it work -- definitely a class act.

Skin Horse 3

2012-04-01T00:00:00Z

The Kickstarter for Skin Horse Volume 3 hit its funding goal in about 12 hours with 55 backers, but that's no reason not to get in on the action. It's like there's a party in my toolbox and science is invited!

Drawing Dead Winter

2012-04-01T00:00:00Z

Cool animated gif of Dave Shabet drawing Dead Winter.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 6

2012-03-29T00:00:00Z

Taste the Comics!

2012-03-27T00:00:00Z

Just a reminder that there's only a week left in Keith K² Knight's Kickstarter for I Was A Teenage Michael Jackson Impersonator! Make it happen!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 5

2012-03-22T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 4

2012-03-15T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 3

2012-03-08T00:00:00Z

He Was a Teenage Michael Jackson Impersonator!

2012-03-07T00:00:00Z

Keith K² Knight, nationally syndicated cartoonist and patron saint of Bay Area comickers, has just launched a Kickstarter project for his autobiographical comic I Was A Teenage Michael Jackson Impersonator!. The incentives are awesome, and we really want to see this one drawn. Go get yer pledges in here.

The Internet is our Memory

2012-03-07T00:00:00Z

The background for today's page is based on our favorite graffiti from one of our old neighborhoods. The graffiti is long gone, but lives on on the internet. A big thank you to bemjb for preserving it!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 2

2012-03-01T00:00:00Z

Play it again, Sozer

2012-02-27T00:00:00Z

Nice interview with Matthew Bogart of The Chairs Hiatus.

He Paints!

2012-02-25T00:00:00Z

If you like our making-of movies, you should totally check out Thijme Termaat's stop motion videos of his paintings. Very cool art!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 1

2012-02-23T00:00:00Z

Happy Birthday to EPT

2012-02-22T00:00:00Z

To celebrate the one year anniversary of Electric Puppet Theatre we made a video showcasing our favorite art from the first two chapters.

There's a webm version for downloading or watching in your browser here
or you can watch it on YouTube here.

Make Comics!

2012-02-20T00:00:00Z

By way of Fleen, an inspirational post from David Morgan-Mar and a really good talk on writing for comics from Angela Melick.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 3, Page 0

2012-02-16T00:00:00Z

Jam!

2012-02-12T00:00:00Z

To fund reprinting costs, Angela Melick is having a 33% off sale on the first Wasted Talent collection -- We are the Engineers.

It has more of a sort of Scottish dagger feel to it...

2012-02-11T00:00:00Z

Tony Cliff is wrapping up the final chapter of Delilah Dirk and The Turkish Lieutenant. If you like swashbuckling adventures drawn in the lavish colors of the Flight anthology, now is a great time to hop over and read the full story.

Boing!

2012-02-11T00:00:00Z

We submitted our movie page to Boing Boing and Cory Doctorow was kind enough to post it.

To give you an idea of the kind of cartwheels we're currently turning, this is a picture of the laptop that EPT is drawn on, circa 2008:

If you're not already familiar with Cory Doctorow, his books are all at his website. Little Brother is a great place to start, as is Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now, a comics adaptation of some of his short stories.

Animating a Git Repository Revisited

2012-02-10T00:00:00Z

To celebrate EPT's second issue, we made a one minute animation of all 24 pages being drawn. You can watch the movie and see how it was made here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 24

2012-02-09T00:00:00Z

Intro 200

2012-02-08T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to The Introvert Manifesto on hitting strip #200. The drama has been ratcheting up recently, so good time to jump in if you're not reading it already.

When I woke up this morning...

2012-02-02T00:00:00Z

Happy Groundhog's Day!

Free Comics

2012-02-02T00:00:00Z

This month, buy any Skin Horse collection and get the original art for one strip (artist's choice). How good an idea is this? This good:

Also, the launch of the new King of RPGs webcomic coincides with a contest to win signed books.

Mary Elizabeth's Sock

2012-02-02T00:00:00Z

New comic from John "LitBrick" Troutman!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 23

2012-02-02T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 22

2012-01-26T00:00:00Z

The Atomic Dozens

2012-01-25T00:00:00Z

Perhaps you don't think nuclear physicists have rivalries. Perhaps you are a fool.

SOPA/PIPA Blackout Redux

2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

And, we're back up. There was a massive show of support for the blackout from the webcomics community. If nothing else, that so many could mod their sites on such short notice is a testament to the power of controlling our own means of distribution.

Here's a quick and incomplete list of what we saw: censored comics from Randall Monroe (xkcd) and Joey Comaeu and Emily Horne (A Softer World); blackout pages from Aaron Diaz (Dresden Codak), Zach Weiner (Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal), Matthew Bogart (The Chairs Hiatus), Dirk Tiede (Paradigm Shift), (and a blackout drunk from Ambs Myers (Killer Spoons)); banners from Jeph Jacques (Questionable Content), the gang at Not Invented Here, David Willis (Shortpacked), Dan Shive (El Goonish Shive), Danielle Corsetto (Girls with Slingshots) and Dave Kellet (Sheldon); words of support from Dave Shabet (Dead Winter), Sandy Debreuil (Crowbar Benson), Meredith Gran (Octopus Pie), Joseph Hewitt (Atrexia Theatre), Scott McCloud (Zot!), Jamie Noguchi (Yellow Peril), and Tycho (Penny Arcade) (plus an episode of Penny Arcade TV).

As usual, Otter (A Girl and Her Fed), nailed the commentary:

...Don't spend all your fury on this one fight just because it got a lot of media attention. Recognize that even if (when) these bills fail, the next bill might not roll by with a huge bandwagon attached to it...

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 21

2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

SOPA/PIPA Blackout

2012-01-18T00:00:00Z

We're joining these fine folks in blacking out our site on Wednesday, January 18th in protest of the SOPA (H.R.3261) and PIPA (S.968) bills pending in congress.

The site will be back up late Wednesday night when we post page 21 of Henson ex Machina. In the meantime, here are some SOPA related activities that you may enjoy:

Read the bills.
Contact your congressperson and senator.
We thought that, living in a hippie city in a hippie state, our representatives would already be doing the right thing on this one. No such luck -- our senators are co-sponsors of PIPA. If you vote in California, let senators Boxer and Feinstein know what you think of the bill (be nice, they've supported a lot of good bills as well).
Read some commentary on the bill:
- A whitepaper by Paul Vixie "Cron" and friends on how PIPA's DNS provisions will break the basic structure of the internet.
- Tom's Hardware on how the bills will affect sites that host users' reviews.
- The Dresden Codak's Aaron Diaz on SOPA and PIPA.
Make some art and share it with someone.
The basic premise of bills like SOPA and PIPA is that art is created by the few, under the aegis of the RIAA and MPAA, and consumed by the masses, who can not be trusted to consume without paying. We believe that we live in a world of artists, weaving culture through the exchange of our creations, regarding art highly enough to nourish it, intellectually and financially, of our own accord.

So go ahead, put something new into the world.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 20

2012-01-12T00:00:00Z

En Media Res

2012-01-08T00:00:00Z

After three years, Darths and Droids has finally arrived at the good trilogy.

And, in related news, here's an update on Skin Horse's ongoing Jedi showdown.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 19

2012-01-05T00:00:00Z

Prophets Update

2012-01-03T00:00:00Z

The Marginal Prophets show on Friday the 13th will feature Stark Raving Brad! The last time we saw them, this was the guy doing backflips while banging on an eight foot tower of cymbals. Not to be missed!

Keep Women in Open Source

2012-01-02T00:00:00Z

Val Aurora says that, without financial support, the Ada Initiative may have to shut down in early 2012. If you believe in a world with 50% female participation in open source projects, please consider donating.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 18

2011-12-29T00:00:00Z

Gift Art on IDGet

2011-12-26T00:00:00Z

Our Web Comic Secret Santa comic is up on IDGet! You can see the full set of Secret Santa comics here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 17

2011-12-22T00:00:00Z

Introverted EPT

2011-12-21T00:00:00Z

Check out this sweet take on the puppets by Neal Skorpen, our 2011 Web Comic Secret Santa. Be sure to check out The Introvert Manifesto and Neal's other comics.

Marginal Prophets at Cafe Du Nord

2011-12-18T00:00:00Z

Keith Knight's band, the Marginal Prophets, will be playing at Cafe Du Nord in San Francisco on January 13th, 2012. The MPs kill live -- if you're in the area you should totally check it out!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 16

2011-12-15T00:00:00Z

Sympy GSoC

2011-12-13T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to the sympy team on a very successful Google Summer of Code: 9 completed projects! If you're looking for an open source alternative to Mathematica, you should totally check out sympy.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 15

2011-12-08T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 14

2011-12-01T00:00:00Z

Language donors desparately needed!

2011-11-30T00:00:00Z

Nick Montfort has been robbed -- of his poetic impulse!

If you have language to spare, you can donate here.

410

2011-11-29T00:00:00Z

One of our programming heroes left the net last month. As far as we know, he's fine, just ready for more privacy, and who can blame him? Fortunately, he had the foresight to release his words and code in a form that others can care for, so they are still free to scatter and take root.

Web Comics Secret Santa

2011-11-28T00:00:00Z

If you have an active, publicly accessible, non-sprite webcomic with at least 20 pages/strips, you're eligible to participate in this year's Web Comics Secret Santa guest strip/fan art exchange -- looks like fun.

Thanks to Joseph Hewitt of Atraxia Theatre for pointing this out.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 13

2011-11-24T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 12

2011-11-17T00:00:00Z

Color Profiling

2011-11-15T00:00:00Z

Richard Hughes is taking pre-orders for his new invention, the ColorHug, an open-source USB device that generates an icc profile for calibrating your monitor. On the one hand, our inner biologists giggle at the idea of matching a single RGB spectrum to the diverse response profiles of real human cone cells (fun experiment -- mix a pair of monochromatic red and green light sources to match a monochromatic yellow source, then ask a friend to do the same and revel in the perceptible difference), on the other hand, our inner control freaks think this is the coolest thing since sliced bread. If the voices in your head think this would be a cool toy, head over to the pre-order page to help make it a reality.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 11

2011-11-10T00:00:00Z

Welcome Home

2011-11-07T00:00:00Z

Kicks have started for Sanitarium, a new game featuring art by Dirk "Paradigm Shift" Tiede. The "cards-as-board" motif reminds us of Mystic Wood, one of our all time favorite games.

If this sounds like your cup of tea, go check out the Kickstarter page.

Intereviews

2011-11-04T00:00:00Z

We just stumbled on a great trove of interviews/movie recommendations on the Adult Swim blog. Especially good:

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 10

2011-11-03T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 9

2011-10-27T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 8

2011-10-20T00:00:00Z

All books are Moby-Dick...

2011-10-17T00:00:00Z

...it's just that some of them are really badly misprinted.

If you're a fan of Jorge Louis Borges xor Markov models (or, more likely, a fan of Jorge Luis Borges and Markov models) you must check out Shaenon Garrity's new short story Librarians in the Branch Library of Babel.

Go ahead, it's not that long...

...and you'll be wanting to drop me a postcard to thank me for pointing it out to you.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 7

2011-10-13T00:00:00Z

A Belated Happy Ada Lovelace Day

2011-10-10T00:00:00Z

We were too unhip to remember Ada Lovelace Day this year, so instead we point you to Matthew Garrett's excellent tribute to Margaret Dayhoff. A staggering amount of our knowledge of molecular evolution stands on the shoulders of Dayhoff's PAM matrices. Why not celebrate by taking them out for a spin?

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 6

2011-10-06T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 5

2011-09-29T00:00:00Z

EPT in Print

2011-09-25T00:00:00Z

We just received the first print copy of Electric Puppet Theatre chapter 1 and it looks great. We've put up some photos here.

Get Fed

2011-09-25T00:00:00Z

Because we will jump at any excuse to animate a foul-mouthed koala:

Seriously, go read A Girl and Her Fed -- it is uniquely milk-out-the-nose funny.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 4

2011-09-22T00:00:00Z

Fan Art on Lit Brick

2011-09-21T00:00:00Z

Check out our fan art on Lit Brick. For those not in the know, Lit Brick is John Troutman's MST3K-ish jaunt through the Norton Anthology of English Literature (or, as it is known to the literati, The Chronicles of She-Jesus).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 3

2011-09-15T00:00:00Z

Kickstart Kadath

2011-09-11T00:00:00Z

In the late 90s, Jason Thompson drew a 5-part comic adaptation of HP Lovecraft's The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. It is a beautiful piece, full of painstakingly detailed linework whimsically rendering reptilian moon-men and eldritch horrors from the unfathomable depths. If you've ever yearned for a Winsor McCay with a little more ichor, this is the book for you, and you'll be pleased to know that Thompson is reviving it as a graphic novel, complete with three additional Lovecraft stories. Find out more on the project's Kickstarter page.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 2

2011-09-08T00:00:00Z

Green Naugahyde Review

2011-09-05T00:00:00Z

We were lucky enough to score a copy of Primus's latest album last week. Read our review in comic form.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 1

2011-09-01T00:00:00Z

Musical Chairs

2011-08-29T00:00:00Z

Matthew Bogart just finished drawing his beautiful short story, The Chairs Hiatus, and is offering it as a "pay what you like" cbz/pdf download. If you liked Scott McCloud's Earth Stories or Charles Snow's Sordid City Blues, you must check this out.

Apropos of Today's Cover

2011-08-25T00:00:00Z

Ignorance of your own culture is not considered cool.

-- The Residents

EPT Volume 1, Issue 2, Page 0

2011-08-25T00:00:00Z

Pitch in for Dresden Codak

2011-08-23T00:00:00Z

Aaron Diaz's computer just died. If you want to see more Dresden Codak (and who doesn't) go do science to it.

Animating a Git Repository

2011-08-21T00:00:00Z

To celebrate EPT's first issue, we made a two minute animation of all 24 pages being drawn. You can watch the movie and see how it was made here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 24

2011-08-18T00:00:00Z

New singles from Primus and Kittie

2011-08-17T00:00:00Z

Tragedy's A'Comin', the first single from the new Primus album Green Naugahyde (out 9/13/11) is live at Spin.com -- it's in a similar vein to Rumble of the Diesel from Of Whales and Woe with nice solos from Les and Ler.

And as long as you're in a head banging mood, check out We are the Lamb and Empires (part 2) from Kittie's new album I've Failed You (out 8/30/11).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 23

2011-08-11T00:00:00Z

Music: A Mathematical Offering

2011-08-10T00:00:00Z

Today's strip owes a huge debt to David Benson's awesome book Music: A Mathematical Offering -- a whirlwind tour through the math, physics, and biology of music with a healthy dose of synthesizer programming -- go check it out!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 22

2011-08-04T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 21

2011-07-28T00:00:00Z

Howl at The Cartoon Art Museum

2011-07-23T00:00:00Z

We just saw the Howl exhibit at the Cartoon Art Museum. Amazing huge non-photorealistic 3D renderings of stills from the animation, tons of concept art and story boards (including, surprisingly, work from The Norm's Michael Jantze), and photos of beat poets taken by other beat poets. Totally worth checking out if you're in downtown San Francisco.

(Fans of the poem will also want to track down the Kronos Quartet's Howl USA, featuring avante garde string music over recordings of Allen Ginsberg, I.F. Stone, J. Edgar Hoover, and more).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 20

2011-07-21T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 19

2011-07-14T00:00:00Z

The Electric Puppet Crossword Generator

2011-07-11T00:00:00Z

Prompted by T. Campbell's invention of the cruciverbacomic, we are pleased to present the Electric Puppet Crossword Generator, a free program for automatically generating crossword puzzles from a starting grid and a dictionary.

Read more, and download the program here

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 18

2011-07-07T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 17

2011-06-30T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 16

2011-06-23T00:00:00Z

Narbonic: The Perfect Collection

2011-06-16T00:00:00Z

The Kickstarter drive for the two volume omnibus collection of Narbonic has begun. It's a steal at $50 for six years of one of the funniest, certainly the best plotted, comics on the net.

Dead Winter 400

2011-06-16T00:00:00Z

Congratulations to Dead Winter on reaching page #400!

S. Dave Shabet's really pulled out all the stops for the limited animation this time around. Check it out here.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 15

2011-06-16T00:00:00Z

Googling with a Camera

2011-06-14T00:00:00Z

Google Image Search can now take actual images as queries. Try it for yourself (but do take a look at Google's statement about storing uploaded images first).

Fan Art on King of RPGs

2011-06-13T00:00:00Z

Our fan art has been posted on King of RPGs (you'll need to scroll down past the awesome tattoo-style rendering of role-playing monsters). If you're not familiar with King of RPGs, you can find the original mini-comic here or check out the sample pages from the shiny new books.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 14

2011-06-09T00:00:00Z

Still Sucking After All These Years

2011-06-08T00:00:00Z

Primus will be releasing Green Naugahyde, their 11th disc and first studio LP in 11 years, on September 13th, 2011. You can read the press release here.

If you haven't heard Primus before, They Can't All Be Zingers is a Rhino-quality best of, but for the full psychedelic polka experience we recommend the EP/DVD Animals Should Not Try to Act Like People, featuring the claymation masterpieces Southbound Pachyderm and The Devil Went Down to Georgia. For a preview of new/old drummer Jay Lane, check out Live Frogs: Set 1.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 13

2011-06-02T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 12

2011-05-26T00:00:00Z

EPT is Creatively Common

2011-05-24T00:00:00Z

Electric Puppet Theatre is pleased to announce the release of our comics under a Creative Commons attribution non-comercial share-alike license (cc-by-nc-sa). Full details are in the FAQ.

Of course, when it comes to stylish licensing notices, no one can hold a candle to A Girl and Her Fed:

"You are free to share, distribute, copy, and transmit this work under the Creative Commons License but that dude who writes for Fringe should really knock it off."

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-05-24T00:00:00Z

Well, this has been a long time coming.

The Dangers of Sharecropping

2011-05-24T00:00:00Z

BeamItDown Software, makers of the iOS based iFlow Reader, are going out of business. According to their website:

The key point here is that all sellers now get a 30% commission and Apple now wants a 30% fee, which is all of our gross margin and then some.

The full statement is worth reading, as is this CNET interview. Artists and entrepreneurs take note: if your success depends on the good graces of a monopoly, you will eventually get screwed.

On a more positive note, from Jonathon Coulton:

Here are some things I do differently from some other artists: I own all my music 100%, which means I have complete control over how I sell it (or not). I can give it away, I can bundle it on a USB key or in a zip file, I can allow people to make and post music videos, and I don't have to deal with lawyers or labels to do any of that. I also get all the profits.

Again, the full post is worth reading.

Fan Art on Skin Horse

2011-05-21T00:00:00Z

Shaenon Garrity, magnificent human being, has posted our fan art on Skin Horse today. In the unlikely event that you aren't already reading Skin Horse, you can start here (and then you'll be wanting to check out Smithson and Narbonic).

Fabrice Bellard's JavaScript x86 Emulator

2011-05-20T00:00:00Z

Fabrice Bellard, transcendental constant of cool things, has done it again! His JavaScript PC Emulator emulates a 486 well enough to run a Linux operating system (including vi and "emacs", plus a C compiler) inside of your web browser (Firefox 4 and Chrome 11 are recommended due to W3C Typed Array support, but it works for us with Firefox 3.6). Enjoy!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 11

2011-05-19T00:00:00Z

Dialogue-Free Comics Day

2011-05-13T00:00:00Z

Today is the second annual Dialog Free Comics Day (not to be confused with last week's Free Comic Book Day, which did feature Jim Woodring's dialog-free Weathercraft and Other Unusual Tales). By happy coincidence, pages 10 through 16 of Electric Puppet Theatre are dialog free, and we are thrilled to unwittingly take part.

You can check out the rest of the comics at Noel Curry's site.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 10

2011-05-12T00:00:00Z

Nukees 2000

2011-05-11T00:00:00Z

Nukees just hit its 2000th strip. Congratulations, Gav! This makes over 14 years of consistently funny comics, which you can start reading here.

(We note in passing that King Luca must be unfamiliar with that most venerable of relics, ucthesis.cls)

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 9

2011-05-05T00:00:00Z

Booker T. Jones Tiny Desk Concert

2011-05-02T00:00:00Z

Booker T. Jones plays Green Onions and talks about learning to play the Hammond B3 at NPR today.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 8

2011-04-28T00:00:00Z

In the Dark

2011-04-27T00:00:00Z

Check out the sweet layout in today's Dead Winter.

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 7

2011-04-21T00:00:00Z

Fan Art on Paradigm Shift

2011-04-18T00:00:00Z

Check it out -- Dirk Tiede has posted our fan art on Paradigm Shift! If you aren't already reading Paradigm Shift, why not start at the beginning? Come for the backgrounds, stay for the banter!

(Of course, the acme of Paradigm Shift gift art is due to Shaenon Garrity).

Buddy Holly Teaser

2011-04-15T00:00:00Z

And the movie based on Bradley Denton's Buddy Holly is Alive and Well on Ganymede inches one step closer to reality with this development teaser trailer. If this doesn't strike you in immediate and Pavlovian fashion, it's probably because you haven't read the book. Easily remedied -- Denton has made the book available in all its stranger-than-Buckaroo-Banzai glory in myriad formats at ManyBooks as a free (by-nc-nd) download. Enjoy!

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 6

2011-04-14T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 5

2011-04-07T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 4

2011-03-31T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 3

2011-03-24T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 2

2011-03-17T00:00:00Z

Comic Relief Resurrected as The Escapist

2011-03-13T00:00:00Z

Legendary Berkeley comic book store Comic Relief closed recently, three years after the death of founder Rory Root. The inventory has been purchased by Dark Carnival owner Jack Rems and will be used to open a new comic book store, The Escapist, on March 15th (opening night details at the store's website).

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 1

2011-03-10T00:00:00Z

EPT Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 0

2011-03-03T00:00:00Z