Bubble: A plain-text format for comic book scripts.
Bubble is a plain-text format for comic book scripts.
This means that you can write your script without worrying about numbering pages and panels, centering dialogue, or getting character names into uppercase. By learning a simple syntax, you can write your script quickly and then automatically format it when it is complete.
Bubble is designed to be unobtrusive and require the minimum number of keystrokes to achieve completion. It works around your writing, doesn’t get in the way, and doesn’t break your creative flow. It is great for blocking out pages and panels because it doesn’t care where you leave blanks to fill in later.
Bubble is platform and editor agnostic. It is portable, flexible, future-proof, and free.
Bubble works great with cloud storage services like Dropbox and Evernote, so you can store your scripts online and access them from anywhere.
The Bubble format is simple to learn and readable when it hasn’t been formatted.
Bubble’s formatted output is in HTML. You can easily style this to your liking using CSS or you can convert the HTML into any other format you like.
Run the Bubble Plain Text Comics Markup Application in your browser. Write a short script in Bubble and try it out! If you want a walk-through, here’s a video of the plain text version of Bubble in action…
Bubble is implemented in PHP and an API will soon be available so that you can include Bubble formatted text in your website or link Bubble to your application.
What inspired Bubble?
Inspired by Markdown and Fountain.io, Bubble’s aim is to enable comic book writers to use any plain text editor to create scripts, safe in the knowledge that they will be able to convert them into an industry-standard format at any time.
Because scripts are plaintext you can use tools on them for version control and collaboration that aren’t available on other platforms.
Who made Bubble?
Bubble was created by UK comics writer Chris Lynch (that’s me).
After many years of trying different editors, from Microsoft Word to Final Draft and Celtx, Chris decided that a Markdown-like solution was what he really wanted. When he realised that one didn’t exist, he created it. Bubble was born.
Why is Bubble free?
Bubble is free because it should be. Nobody should be paying tens or hundreds of pounds for software to format their script the “right” way. Take Bubble, make comics.
I wrote Bubble back in 2015 and it has been freely available online in various forms ever since. A little while ago, when I began stripping down and amalgamating my web presence, Bubble was a short-term casualty. To be frank, I had no idea people were still using it or that people were still looking for a solution to formatting their comic book scripts.
It took a stranger filling in the contact form on my website to remind me that Bubble needed a home.
So, I’m happy to say that Bubble is making a comeback and will also be getting some upgrades very soon. The original version was written in PHP but, as I’m becoming more and more interested in Javascript and node.js development, my first job will be to convert Bubble’s code to Javascript and create a version that you can download and run in your browser without an internet connection of any sort.
Welcome back Bubble, and welcome back Bubble users!
