New York City in 1983 to meet with Archie Goodwin of Marvel Comics, who had seen Akira and wanted to publish it in America. Shimizu said that Kodansha had received offers from many other publishers, including the newly established Viz Media, but Otomo chose Goodwin because he was really close to French artists that Otomo was a fan of. Otomo did not want Akira to be seen as some "strange thing from Japan," leading to a meticulous and now-"unimaginable" process of altering the art and coloring to make it accessible to American audiences. Because Japanese manga is read right-to-left, the artwork had to be flipped to read the other way. But the process was not as simple as mirroring, backgrounds had to be redone in order to remove the Japanese sound effects and reshape the word balloons to fit the Roman alphabet. So Otomo went in and made substantial retouches and adjustments that are specific to the American version. Japanese manga is largely in black and white, but it was decided to fully color the artwork in the English version of Akira to match most American and European comics. The coloring was done by Steve Oliff at Olyoptics, who was hand-picked for the role by Otomo after being introduced by Goodwin. Otomo sent Oliff illustrations that he colored with markers as samples. Oliff had also received slides from the anime film adaptation of Akira to use as reference. At one point, Otomo visited Oliff in Point Arena, California and worked alongside him for several days, but after the first 5 or 6 issues, Oliff said he was given free rein. Oliff persuaded Marvel to use computer coloring. The coloring was more subtle than that seen before and far beyond the capabilities of Japanese technology of the time. It played an important part in Akiras success in Western markets, and revolutionized the way comics were colorized. Coloring lasted from 1988 to 1994, being delayed by Otomo's work on Steamboy. Akira was the first comic in the world to be colored digitally, using computers. Its release in color led to the widespread adoption of computer coloring in comics and Oliff's work on Akira earned him three consecutive Harvey Awards for Best Colorist (1990–1992) and the first Eisner Award for Best Coloring (1992). Akira began being published in the American comic book format in the United States in 1988 by Epic Comics, an