What's This?

This is a tutorial to create and transfer comic books into your iPhone/iPod Touch using the app "ComicZeal."



I am not affiliated with the creators of ComicZeal. I'm just a fan of the app who had to figure out how to use the program by myself (with the help of the guys at ComicZeal. They are really good at writing back if you have a question).

I am writing this tutorial because I wish there had been something like this when I first started using the app.

How to create your own comics?

You can create your own comics for your iPod app "ComicZeal" with ComicZeal Creator (download here). The process is quite easy, but not very intuitive.

1. Open ComicZeal. Close it.

2. Go to "My Documents." Creator will have created a folder there called "ComicZeal_Creator." Delete it. (I am not sure where the folder is created on a Mac.)

3. Open ComicZeal again. Open the folder My Documents/ComicZeal_Creator and copy your cbr/cbz files into the folder "Comics."

4. On ComicZeal Creator, click on Convert Comics. That's all you have to do. You don't need to drag your files, or open them, nothing. The program knows where the files that you want to convert are, and converts them automatically. That is why you have to delete that folder every time you want to convert a new comic book.

5. Your finished files will be saves in the folder My Documents/ComicZeal_Creator/CreatorOutput. They have an extension .cbi

6. You're done!

How to transfer your comic books into your iPhone

You can only transfer comic books that you have created with ComicZeal Creator. If you try to transfer a file that hasn't been created with the most updated version of ComicZeal Creator, your app will crash.

1. Open SyncDocs.jar (download program here).

2. Drag your converted cbi files from My Documents/ComicZeal_Creator/CreatorOutput into SyncDocs.

3. Start ComicZeal in your iPhone/iPod Touch. Tap on "Add" on the upper left part of your window. Tap on "Sync," and then tap on "SyncDocs." ComicZeal should start transfering all your files automatically.

Watch the Syncing Demonstration video from the ComicZeal website here.

If you have problems transferring your files, there's a chance that the file you are trying to transfer is corrupt or is not the correct kind. Make sure you have the newest version of Creator and that you don't rename your files after you convert them.

How to create cbr/cbz files

All you have to do is create a folder with your images and compress them into a .zip or .rar file. Then rename the file's extension from .rar to .cbr or .cbz.

That's it!

There's a good collection of new .cbr comic books at bdgames.net