With the success of apps like comiXology showing just how much mileage there is in digital comics, it’s no wonder creators are keen to get on board!

Today comic book legend Alan Moore (the eccentric brains behind Watchmen, V For Vendetta and other classics) has announced that he is partnering with a team of creators and funding bodies to produce a digital comics app called Electricomics — which will launch with four original comic titles and, somewhat surprisingly, an open-access platform for comics creators to develop digital comics of their own.

Partners on the project include Leah Moore, who has worked in both digital and print comics, as well as Alan Moore and Mitch Jenkins’ company Orphans of the Storm, which produced the Jimmy’s End cycle of films successfully funded on Kickstarter. Financial support will come from the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts.

According to a press release:

“Moore is pushing boundaries again with Electricomics – an app that is both a comic book and an easy-to-use open source toolkit. Being open source and free, the app has wide potential not just for industry professionals, but also businesses, arts organisations and of course comic fans and creators everywhere.”

Alan Moore notes that:

“Rather than simply transferring comic narrative from the page to the screen, we intend to craft stories expressly devised to test the storytelling limits of this unprecedented technology. To this end we are assembling teams of the most cutting edge creators in the industry and then allowing them input into the technical processes in order to create a new capacity for telling comic book stories. It will then be made freely available to all of the exciting emergent talent that is no doubt out there, just waiting to be given access to the technical toolkit that will enable them to create the comics of the future.”

Comics announced for Electricomics include Big Nemo, which will be set in the 1930s, “modernist horror” Cabaret Amygdala, Garth Ennis-penned Red Horse, and time travel adventure Sway.

As with much of Moore’s work these days, the project is highly experimental, and its goals are to explore the possibilities of the comics medium, outside of the mainstream publishing world.

Source: Bleeding Cool