"I've been a big fan of comics for as long as I can remember," begins Guy Delcourt. "I didn't think I would make them my profession. I went to business school. But that led to me having a job at a bank in LA. It was so boring that I started to do work as a journalist. I started interview comics creators and also movie people."
"When I came back to France, I pursued that," he adds. After a few years, I worked at he French magazine Pilote and when they kicked me out, I started my company."
Delcourt, the founder of the French publishing house that bears his name, is attending this year's Comic Con as part of his new-found appreciation for the rapidly growing world of digital publishing. At this year's show, Delcourt revealed that his company will be offering up English translations of his books through the massively popular digital comics distributor Comixology.
"We have an ambitious program." says Delcourt. "One-hundred and fifty books for the first year, and just as many for the second year. It will be a long term commitment. It's exhilarating to be able to do that."
But while Delcourt appears to be all-in on the digital front, the lifelong devotee to physical books took some convincing. "We are a little converitve as a country and have such a great network of bookshops," he explains. "In France, you can find comics almost anywhere, in supermarkets and general bookstores. There's probably a less immediate need for digital because comics are so accessible."
Ultimately, however, Comixology won the industry veteran over, thanks in no small part to the Guided View technology, which presents comics pages panel by panel. "Guided view was a big thing for me," Delcourt says. "Having comics on the phone - especially large French comics - seemed incompatible with smartphone [screens]. But Guided View is a very smart and easy to use system."
The long list of titles largely consists of books that initially appeared in printed form, with the notable exception of Josephine, a book that began life on Delcourt's company blog. "Josephine, which is one of the first books we're releasing in the US in English, was created by Pénélope Bagieu, who is one of the most famous French bloggers," says Delcourt. "She created this comic on our blog and then we did a print edition. It did extremely well."
Stay tuned to T-Lounge all week long for more from Comic-Con 2015.
Be sure to follow T-Lounge on Twitter and visit our Facebook page.
