It's under active development too - each update brings cool new features and refinements, and I pay attention to every bit of feedback. If you've got a question or suggestion, reach out and say hello!

Chunky wants to take the friction out of reading comics on your iPad - it's jammed full of little features designed to make your comics look as good as possible and make reading them a pleasure.

FAQ

What kind of comics can Chunky read?

It can handle CBZs, CBRs, CBTs, and PDFs, and if they contain CBI/ComicbookLover or ComicRack tag info it'll read and use that too.

If you have a choice of formats, CBZ should be your first choice - it has the least potential for weird problems (and really CBR and CBT have no reason to exist at all).

What do I get if I buy the Pro upgrade?

You get the ability to download comics directly from your PC/Mac in a variety of ways (SMB, AFP, FTP, SFTP, OPDS, Calibre, Ubooquity and ComicStreamer), the ability to tweak the app's colour-scheme, the option to auto-crop page borders, zap watermarks from some PDFs, download a folderful of images as a single comic, and a warm fuzzy feeling from supporting an app you (hopefully) like.

How do I switch reading direction?

Hit the little arrow at the bottom-left, under the page number.

How do I connect to a Ubooquity server?

First, go to 'Advanced' in Ubooquity and switch on 'Enable OPDS feed'. Hit 'Apply and restart server' for this to take effect.

Now open the 'General' section and make a note of your network address.

In Chunky, add a 'Calibre / Ubooquity / OPDS' account. In the dialog that pops up, in the server field enter your Ubooquity server's network address, and add opds-comics onto the end of it. It should look something like this: 192.168.1.100:2202/opds-comics.

How do I import comics from my PC or Mac over wifi? (Pro upgrade required)

First, share the folder with your comics on your PC or Mac

In Chunky, hit 'Edit' or '+' at the top left of the cloud menu, and pick 'Windows shared folder'

Hit the little radar button in the dialog that appears, and you should get a list of local computers including yours

Pick your computer and fill in your username and password for your computer (or if you shared the folder with everyone, try leaving them blank)

Now hit 'Connect' and if all is well, navigate to the subfolder you want to add to Chunky and pick 'Select'.

If you get stuck, don't hesitate to get in touch via the Tools menu and ask for help

Ugh, is there a simpler way?

Yep, you can try Chunky's web interface (Pro upgrade required)

Turn on the app's web-server using the switch at the bottom of the cloud menu. Enter the address it gives you into a web-browser on your computer and you should get a web-page with an area you can drop comics into to send them to Chunky.

Does Chunky run on the iPhone?

I spent a while on this, but it was no fun to work on and not much fun to use so I eventually gave up. I might come back to it someday but probably not for a while. Sorry.

How about an Android version?

Sorry, I'd really love to support more platforms but I don't have the time and energy to do a good enough job of it.

Desktop?

Again, no time or energy, and I don't really have any good ideas about how to make a great desktop reader either.

I'm on iOS7 and don't want to upgrade - can I still try the app?

Yep, but you'll be stuck with version 2.3.2 which has a few bugs (but nothing too bad).

Open iTunes on your PC or Mac, find Chunky in the App Store, and hit 'GET'. It should now show up for download on your iPad in the 'Purchased' section of the AppStore app.

Can Chunky talk BitTorrent Sync?

It's an awesome protocol and I'd love to support it if they every release an SDK (which is apparently in the works).

Why doesn't Chunky do [X]?

Get in touch and ask! I can't guarantee I'll add what you need, but most of Chunky's best features exist because someone asked for them.

Where do I get DRM-free comics?

Image Comics is home to a big range of crazy-good comics and all their new releases are available DRM-free. And Chunky can browse and download directly from your Image account so your whole library is always close-to-hand.

2000 AD also has a great online store for all your Ol' Stony Face needs.

Top Shelf has released a first wave of DRM-free books, including the excellent 'Heck' and 'Crater XV'.

Humble Bundle do incredibly good-value comics bundles and they change often so you should check back regularly. Protip: You can import comics from your library directly using Chunky's webview.

Many Golden- and Silver-Age comics are now in the public domain, and The Digital Comic Museum and Comic Book Plus both do great work collecting and publishing these online for you to download completely free.

There are also a ton of interesting independent and auteur comics and publishers out there who've gone DRM-free; a few to check out include Panel Syndicate, Double Barrel, The Bunker, Thrillbent, Manta Ray, The Uniques and Rainbow in the Dark.

Got a comic or publisher that you think should be on this list? Tell me!

I forgot my passcode, how do I get past the parental lock?

You can do an emergency unlock like so: Connect your iPad to your PC/Mac, open up iTunes, browse to your iPad and click the 'Apps' tab. Scroll down and find and select Chunky in the File Sharing section. Now you need to drop a file named "iforgotmypasscode.txt" into Chunky's Documents window - this can be a blank file you make with TextEdit or whatever, but make sure it's name exactly matches, including it being all lower-case. Now in Chunky hit 'Parental Lock'.

Note to naughty kids reading this: The last 3 emergency unlocks will be listed in the parental controls section, so your folks are probably going to notice and have some difficult questions for you.

I got the upgrade but it didn't do what I expected it to

I can't refund you directly, but Apple is normally really good about giving refunds, no questions asked - I'd much rather you get your money back than have an unhappy customer. Check here for how to ask Apple.

Why 'Chunky'?

No good reason. I like chunky knitwear, chunky rice, chunky bacon, Chunk from The Goonies. Plus it comes early in the alphabet so you don't have to scroll too far down the iTunes file loading screen.