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'€˜H20'€™ marks growth of digital technology

Pandji Pragiwaksono - JP/Jerry AdigunaThe industry has been suffering from a massive downturn since the 1990s, with increasingly fewer local comics achieving commercial success, resulting in many comic artists being unable to rely on their craft for a stable income

Hans David Tampubolon (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Mon, April 20, 2015

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'€˜H20'€™ marks growth of digital technology

Pandji Pragiwaksono - JP/Jerry Adiguna

The industry has been suffering from a massive downturn since the 1990s, with increasingly fewer local comics achieving commercial success, resulting in many comic artists being unable to rely on their craft for a stable income.

In the past few years, however, the number of local artists who have chosen to publish their works digitally has been on the rise, a means that has allowed young artists to showcase their skills and build a solid readership.

One of those successful digital comics is H20 (Hanoman 2.0), a comic authored, written and illustrated by Pandji Pragiwaksono and Shani Budi Pandita.

Pandji and Shani created H20 in 2010 and they have been publishing it regularly on their website, KolamKomik.com, ever since.

The success of the digital publishing of comics prompted Pandji and Shani to publish the paid printed version of the comic with the help of the Bentang Pustaka publishing company.

'€œH20 is a modern twist on the classic [Indian] epic of Ramayana,'€ said Pandji, who is also a standup comedian, during the recent launch of the printed H20 comic in Jakarta.

The storyline in H20 takes inspiration from the classical Ramayana comics authored by legendary Indonesian comic artist RA Kosasih.

While Kosasih, in his Ramayana comic, tells the epic based on its original mythical ancient Indian poem, Pandji and Shani shift all of its characters and time period into a more modern and dystopian universe.

The modern touch is clearly visible from the manga-inspired drawing style used by Pandji and Shani.

The free downloadable digital version of H20 is divided in chapters. So far, 25 chapters have been made available in the digital version.

JP/Jerry Adiguna
JP/Jerry Adiguna

The printed version of H20, on the other hand, comes in the form of chapter bundles. For now, two bundles have been made available in major bookstores. The first bundle consists of chapter one to 10 and the second consists of chapter 11 to 17.

In H20, the main character, Rama, is a genius university student based in Bandung '€“ not a prince.

Rama is the son of Maruto Regawa, one of the world'€™s most influential product designers. Since Rama was a boy, he has shown interest in robotics and programming. With his father'€™s support, he finally becomes one of the best robot programmers at a young age.

The antagonist in the story is Riza Alengkadiredja, a businessman who initially persuades Maruto to open a robotics museum.

It turns out that Riza'€™s real goal is to exploit Rama'€™s genius mind to create weaponized robots for war. Upon learning about this scheme, Maruto tries to discourage his son from working with Riza.

One of the weaponized robots that Rama creates is called Hanoman, which is modeled based on the monkey king character in the Ramayana epic.

Hanoman is programmed by Rama to be only loyal to him and therefore, this robot will do whatever it takes to preserve the life of its programmer.

The dynamics between Rama, Hanoman along with several protagonist characters, such as Laksmana, a very loyal aide, in fighting and revealing Riza'€™s evil ploy is the main theme of the comic.

In several chapters, Pandji and Shani pay homage to Kosasih with vintage-like illustrations.

Other than H20, the launch also showcased other locally made digital comics.



For example, comic artists Beatrice Naolo and Nadia Kusumadewi showcased their comic titled The Book of Rainbow, which tells the story of a monochromatic world. In the story, several children try to find the truth about colors.

Another work was Super Santai, written by Nikki D. Wardhana and illustrated by Benny Maulana. This comic tells the story of a group of easy going young people who like to procrastinate but save the world from an alien invasion.

Pandji said he hoped the success of H20 would encourage more comic artists, such as Beatrice and Nadia, to start showcasing their works digitally so they could build a solid readership before securing a print deal with a publishing company.

Pandji and Shani also plan to turn kolamkomik.com into a digital comic publishing company that would cater to young comic artists.

He said they had several other titles in the pipeline and planned to create an adult division that would digitally publish comics with more adult-oriented themes.

'€œWe aim to make Kolamkomik the Marvel or DC Comics of Indonesia,'€ he said, referring to comic publishing giants that have had their titles adapted into films.

 '€œAre we satisfied with the fact now that H20 has been published in a printed version? Yes, but we want more. We want to see this become a movie and so on. You have to dream big.'€

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