Garuda, an online comic by Orange Radius is a story about Bhairo, an adolescent Yamaduta rose in the deserts of Naraka. It is set in the Bronze Age and starts after the 10th Devasur Sangram. Many pre-harappan cities and races are intertwined in the never ending cycle of war. Haunted by his traumatic past, Bhairo starts searching for his remaining family and discovers that his army stands against his only surviving family, his twin sister Vishakha.
“Back in my MBA days, I participated in a superhero marketing contest with a Title called ‘Garuda’, in 2009. In 2013, while I was still working as a project manager, I happened to revisit this document named ‘Garuda.ppt’. I don’t know why, but I started working on it again. I researched Vedic Mythology extensively and from a Superhero title, it transformed into an epic set in the pre-harappan age,” expounded Garuda comic, writer Priyank Loonker.
The comic is still in the production process. Garuda has been written by Priyank himself, Tarun is the illustrator whereas the letters and colour has been done by Suri and Naval respectively.
“I am working with a very light team to keep production swift. The story has been created as an epic with multiple races, characters, plots and sub plots, but at this point we are only focused on getting the first Issue out. Depending on its initial acceptance, we will either tell the long or short version of the story,” added Priyank.
The Orange Radius is primarily using its Facebook page for marketing this new venture. “Soon we will syndicate our content across web comics publishing sites. I do see a lot of teenagers consuming manga online. I am targeting them as my primary consumers,” revealed Priyank.
The 150 pages long printed copy of Garuda will be released in 2015, at Bangalore comic con. But one doesn’t have to wait till then as Orange Radius will be publishing three pages every week till 14 June 2015, on its website.
“As it is a webcomic, I am not bound by rules of print where the number of characters is bound by your plan for the immediate and the next issue. Garuda is driven by its characters. I plan to launch many characters in each issue as there are so many of them and I love surprising my readers,” stressed Priyank.
Its earlier comic Parshu has received a phenomenal response at comic-cons and now the team is also working on the 5th issue of it, along with Garuda. Parshu #5, Warriors will be launched at Mumbai Comic-Con this year.
“We are part of the fantasy/character based entertainment industry and so we have miles to go. With all our properties, we try hard to keep our input costs low and will take steps according to the feedback from market. Plus, we are doing multiple titles and have other verticals to diversify risk of comics facing losses,” ended Priyank.
