Read Gempak Starz Comic Online
Arleen Jerdee
Look at other successful Malaysian comics creators. For example, Mimi Mashud, Hwei Lim (lalage), Kaoru and Fishball. Each of them are different and make different comics, yet they have achieved amazing things, gotten awards, have a respected audience, and are just generally geng.
I cannot emphasise how important your creative rights are. Creative rights determine who owns your comic, and who can do what with your comic. Creative rights determine the way your comic can be published, distributed to bookstores, optioned to adapt for film or TV, who gets to edit or change your story, etc.
You can of course sell away or share some or all of those rights to a third party, but you must be PAID. You must be paid for what you give. In this case, try to make sure the deal favours you, or is balanced between the third party and yourself.
1. There are many free platforms online. The most well-known are Line Webtoons and Tapastic, which are established across Asia, are able to reach an international audience, and have systems like tipping to provide ad revenue. If your work is good and extremely popular, you may be promoted to Featured Artist, or commissioned to produce an original webcomic exclusively for them.
2. Hiveworks Comics is a webcomics and graphic novel publisher that provides you hosting (with a custom URL) and ad revenue, in exchange for displaying ads on your website. They also provide services like organising a Kickstarter for your comic, editorial, merch production/distribution, and licensing for European translation. They represent webcomics from across the globe. Disclaimer: I work for them as an editor and manager.
I personally highly recommend getting an agent. Not because of the pitching thing, though it helps. I recommend getting an agent for their experience in the industry. Their ability to read legal language in contracts and negotiate terms (rights, payment, etc) that benefit you more. Their willingness to do the hard things for you, like complaining to a publisher (in a diplomatic way). Their insight to help you refine your pitch, to nurse through your anxiety in creating a book, and more.
Editors are there to help you refine your comic to its best potential. They pick up errors that you may have missed, spot storytelling or artwork inconsistencies, suggest ways to fix those, and work with you to make sure your message and your story are said in the best and clearest way possible.
It is a well-researched and realistic article. As a freelance artist in Singapore, I can relate alot to it ?
I sucks at social media and self-marketing, so hopefully you will have articles about them too.
thankyou for share.
Reimena Yee, your post is resourceful and well inform. i start my self create manga few month ago. looking arround local book industry, scare me with the low pay. make me wondering other way to do.
She writes and illustrates quite a few webcomics and graphic novels. When not making books, she lulls away her time with essays on craft, life and experiences in the publishing industry. Some of her thoughts of art and life are rather unstructured and will evolve over time as this blog matures, as they should be.
Starting any new endeavour requires strong basic knowledge. In order to gain that, the best and fastest way is to use a textbook or any resource that teaches you the basics. Preferably, one should have a grasp on how to read and pronounce Malay words as well as some common vocabulary and grammar before diving head-on into immersive learning.
This website by pgoh13 is such a blessing! The creator has compiled the basics of the Malay language and presented them in easy and digestible lessons that are highly comprehensive. This website also frequently does some comparing and contrasting between the Malay language and the Indonesian language. I would say this website is a good stepping stone for Malay learning.
Now that you know some basics in Malay, you can maintain your interest in the language by engaging with things made for natives. This is also a litmus test to gauge where you are in your language-learning journey. But how can you learn while immersing yourself in Malay content? The following are some helpful tips.
The objective of this exercise is to familiarise yourself with the way the language is spoken; where the natural emphases occur, where the pauses appear, and how natural speech sounds. By repeating aloud, your tongue will also soften to the way the language rolls off of it, and your ears will learn how to parse meaning from the sounds.
Yes, it sounds laborious. But in order to make watching TV an active learning tool, this can be one of the more effective ways. Passive watching can be good too, but it will take you longer to achieve any sort of improvement.
Of course you can just memorise songs to sing along and enjoy, which will still give you the opportunity to familiarise yourself with the sounds of the language and its words, but you can also go the extra mile and memorise the meaning of each word in the lyrics.
I know how daunting reading in a new language can be. You either feel too inadequate to ever read anything written for native readers, or overestimate your skills and tackle something too much only to end up giving up halfway.
The language in these comic books adheres to Malay grammar but still sounds casual. These are also great reading materials that will prepare you to eventually read materials with formal written language, like academic papers and the news.
You can get comics of a variety of genres published by Gempak Starz, which are beloved by many Malaysians due to its usually humorous nature, or you can read free comics online at MatKomik, a platform for amateur comic artists to publish their materials. The quality might vary, but I saw a few good gems on it.
Different areas will hold different creatures and have deeper bottoms. Do not feel intimidated by unfamiliar words and unknown phrases. Remember, swimming through the waves is all about feeling the water wash over you.
In Malaysia where multi-ethnic groups live side by side and people communicate daily in their respective languages, what kind of books are read and how do people like to read? Mr. Hasri Hasan, with over 30 years of experience in book publishing, will give us a brief tour on the publishing industry in Malaysia: popular genres and authors, reading trends by age group, new platforms for creative activities and others.
Malaysian readers are divided into several groups, the biggest of which read in Malay while the rest read in English, Chinese and Tamil. Malay is the main language due to official policy, but the uniqueness of Malaysia is we also have Chinese medium education (up to private universities) and Tamil (in primary school). Many private colleges use English, and most English readers are from the urban middle class.
The literacy rate in Malaysia among the ages of 15 and above is very high at 95%. An interim study of reading habits by the National Library of Malaysia (PNM) in 2014 announced that Malaysians read an average of 15 books a year. This high number is due to the Nilam program (a book-reading encouragement program in schools). In Nilam's report that year, students read an average of 21 books a year.
A 2019 study by Picodi (an e-commerce research firm) says that 76% of Malaysians buy at least 1 book a year. This puts Malaysian book buyers in sixth place out of 41 countries. In fact, Malaysians buy more books compared to neighbouring countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines.
In the general fiction and non-fiction book categories, local books are more popular than imported books. Imported books are mostly from the United States, United Kingdom and India (cheap books in English). The books in Chinese are mostly from China and Taiwan. Books in Indonesian are also bought by many Malaysian readers (especially novels) because Malaysian readers can understand the Indonesian language.
For English books, best-selling fiction titles are usually by popular writers such as JK Rowling, James Patterson, John Grisham, and so on. For non-fiction books, writers who have many followers in Malaysia include Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell and Robert Kiyosaki. As for Indonesian books, popular authors include Hamka and Andrea Hirata.
There is also a demand among readers for the Malay translations of international works. In the 1980s, the translations of notable foreign works were done by government publishers such as Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka before it was taken over by the National Translation Institute (later renamed the Malaysian Translation and Book Institute (ITBM)) in the 1990s and 2000s. Recently, this role has been taken over by private publishers such as PTS, Inisiatif Buku Darul Ehsan (IBDE) and The Biblio Press. It is expected that in 3 to 5 years to come, more people in Malaysia will read in Malay, and thus the demand for translated international bestsellers will increase. Previously, the translation of international bestsellers was not as robust as in neighbouring countries such as Indonesia and Thailand, as many Malay readers could read the imported English versions.
Typically until 2018, adult readers were fond of novels, especially in the genres of romance, thriller, and history. Many novel publishers cater to this demand, including Alaf 21, Kaki Novel and Karya Seni. The trend is due to the many adaptations of these novels to the silver screen as well as television series. The cross-promotion between novels and dramas helped popularise these titles. The main readers of this category are usually women aged 25 to 35 years.
For young people, comics are the most popular category. Two popular comic publishers are Komik M and Gempak Starz. Komik M publishes comics on the adventures of school students in an Islamic-compliant way. Apart from that, there are also humorous comics led by Bekazon, a legacy from the famous cartoon magazines of the 80s and 90s, namely Gila-Gila and Ujang, as well as newcomers such as Maple Comics. The popular title of Gempak Starz is the comedy series 'Lawak Kampus' and translated Japanese manga. The success of Gempak Starz convinced the large Japanese content provider Kadokawa Corporation to take a controlling stake in 2015, so it is now known as Kadokawa Gempak Starz.
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