Comics

Background

When the iPad was announced in 2010, comiXology knew it would be a huge leap forward for digital comics. As part of Plausible Labs, our team was commissioned by comiXology for both the design and engineering of Comics for iPad prior to the iPad’s public release. With only the aid of screenshots from Apple’s keynote presentation and a computer-simulated iPad, Plausible produced a full iPad version of Comics in only two weeks — just in time for the official iPad launch.

The app rocketed to the top of the App Store, giving comiXology the confidence to bring their app to the next level. For the next year, Plausible Labs worked closely with comiXology, acting as their full service mobile development and design team and producing a new digital comic shopping experience for iOS and Android. The resulting Comics app became the Top Grossing iPad app — storewide — of 2012.

Comics 3.0

The Store

With over 12,000 titles available and exclusive partnerships with Marvel and DC Comics, comiXology needed a storefront that made navigating their vast collection easy for both new and seasoned comic book readers alike. We decided to break the Store into a category-based tabbed interface to provide as many exploration points as possible. Not sure where to start but know you like Horror? Go to the Genres tab. Really into content from Boom! Comics? Go to the Publisher tab.

Breaking up the Store into tabs also allowed for increased real estate to showcase curated content, since each tab had it's own Featured page that comiXology could change at will.

Additionally, we created a template for "ad hoc" pages to showcase curated collections beyond the standard set of categories. These pages could be linked from ad blocks and styled with their own header graphic and custom color scheme.

Download management and social sharing options were also added.

My Comics

We wanted collecting digital comics to feel just as magical as the real thing. Big, beautiful images showcase each comic's cover art, brought further to life with gloss overlays and staples mimicking the print version.

The Reader

Comixology's unique panel-by-panel reading experience ("guided view") pulls the reader into the story. For the iPad, we made it easy to switch between full pages and "guided view" with a simple double tap.

Branded Applications

In additional to their flagship Comics app, comiXology leveraged their platform to produce custom applications for individual publishers — including Marvel and DC Comics. On the mobile side, we implemented a CSS-like styling system to easily change colors, fonts, and graphics for these branded applications.

iPhone

All the features of the iPad app, optimized for small screens.

Android + Kindle Fire

After the iOS release, we helped comiXology bring their digital comic book store to Android smart phones and tablets. It's everything you love about Comics — in-app purchasing, personal comic collections and panel-by-panel reading — all uniquely tuned for the Android platform.

TK | Portfolio