Opus (comic Strip) - Artwork and Availability

Artwork and Availability

The original syndication contract for Opus stipulated that the strip occupy an entire half of a newspaper page. According to The Washington Post Writers Group, this was to provide "space for Breathed to offer richness and depth, similar to the breathtaking imagery in his popular children's books." While this style can appear hand-painted or airbrushed, it is actually rendered by Breathed on a computer using Adobe Photoshop. The half-page requirement was subsequently lifted, and the strip scaled down by most newspapers. Its original illustration style has also been largely abandoned in favor of a more hand-drawn look, much like that of Breathed's previous strip, Outland.

Initially, in an effort to help boost physical newspaper sales, the strip was barred from appearing online; however, in 2005, that too changed and Opus became officially available on the web.

On August 26, 2007, the strip featured Lola Granola wearing a headscarf, explaining that she was now a "radical Islamist." The cartoon was not printed by the Washington Post and many other papers. The following week's strip was also censored. Both strips were replaced by more innocuous strips in the printed versions, but the 'objectionable' strips relating to Lola's religious beliefs were offered in a variety of Internet comics sites, including Breathed's homepage and the "My Comics Page" site (this site now requires a paid "pro" registration for access to the censored strips, but free access to the censored strips is still available via http://www.salon.com/comics/opus/2007/08/26/opus/index.html and http://www.salon.com/comics/opus/2007/09/02/opus/index.html).