On many occasions in recent months we have been talking about electronic book formats, such as the popular ePub. But in this case, we will focus on another way of reading certain digital content on our devices through the CBR and CBZ files.
We must bear in mind that in these times we have the possibility of subscribing to a multitude of platforms that offer us a huge number of electronic books. The truth is that there are several types of file format that are used, either to "rent", or to sell these digital books. Perhaps the most popular are those mentioned ePub, widely used in novels and all kinds of eBooks.
However, lovers of reading around the world, perhaps not only focus on books in general, novels, or magazines, but there are other preferences. Precisely there is where the file types come into play in which we want to focus on these lines, the CBR and the CBZ. To begin we will say that these are two widely used formats to be able to read comics on our electronic devices. This is something that we carry out in a similar way to what we do with eBooks, so we will also have to use certain specific programs for all this.
What are the CBR and CBZ files for?
Therefore, surely comic book lovers, who are not few, will be glad to know that they also have their own dedicated digital formats to enjoy these. To begin we will tell you that, if you look closely, both types, CBR and CBZ, start the same. This is because the first two acronyms, "CB", correspond to Comic Book, followed by the letters Z or R that refer to the type of compression used in its creation.
Once we know what the acronyms that form this file format correspond to, it is also important to know that the other two letters correspond to compression. That is, Z for the ZIP format, and R for the RAR. And we must know, before continuing, that these types to which we refer, actually have a behavior and operation very similar to the popular compressed files.
However, while in a conventional compressed file that we have been using for years, we "introduce" all kinds of files and folders, these CBR and CBZ focus on the images. Therefore, as it is easy to imagine, in these files what we find are a series of images that are really those that are part of the comic as such that we will enjoy later. Thus, each of these images contained, refer to the scenes or pages that make up the comic as such.
To say that together with these, we can find other similar formats, such as the case of CB7, which are actually 7z tablets. However, the first two that we have mentioned are the most common and used at the moment.
How to open or create these specific comic files
Therefore, as they are compressed files, we can open them with any manager of this type of files in particular of which most of us have installed on the PC. Therefore, in the beginning to open and see the images that make up any CBR or CBZ, we can use WinZip, WinRAR, 7Zip, BandiZip, etc. Then we can visualize the images that make up the comic as such one by one, but this is not the most appropriate system for this type of reading. That is why later we will talk about some more suitable solutions to enjoy reading your comics in the best way.
And this method we are talking about through a file compressor and a photo viewer, is a way to see the content, but not the best to read, nor the most comfortable. But we'll move on to that later. What we do want to comment now is that, as you can assume the creation of your own digital comic files, it is a fairly simple process. To do this, if we have these contents on paper, the first thing will be to digitize them to be able to transfer them to a new file in image format, yes, page by page. Then, once we have the digitized comic in its entirety, we can compress it in one of the two formats mentioned above, ZIP or RAR.
How to create a CBR or CBZ file
Thus, to end the creation process, we will only have to rename that file, depending on the type chosen a priori, to CBZ or CBR respectively. At that moment we will already have our comic, which we had stored on paper, in a digital format that we can read or lend whenever we need it, and without it being damaged. Of course, it is preferable that we place each of the pages in their correct order before adding them to the compressed file. This is something we can do by modifying its name in a specific format "title_comic_page", for example.
Thus, as we have verified, we will have the possibility to digitize our entire collection of comics that we have accumulated over the years. Of course, we will have to have a little patience, since the scanning process, page by page, cannot be said to be the most fun. Then we will also have to place the pages based on their name, and combine them in the compressed file. Although a bit tedious, the process is quite simple, and the results will surely be worth it in the future.
In the next article we are going to discuss the best programs to read comics in CBR or CBR format.
