Upcoming Post

The next post up is going to be about how to research copyrights for free (instead of having a lawyer do it for you) something almost everyone forgets about and is AMAZINGLY important for North American Publishers, and something a lot of people overlook.  For fans of the blog outside the US I'll try to look up some of the information for you as well.  I should also have the website for the publishing company up.

In the meantime. . .

For our friends outside the us or if you don't get the joke see the comments section.  It should hopefully explain the joke. 

Day 25.3 Marketing info (CC: Comic Creators)

Hello and welcome to the middle of the film.

Sorry for the delay in post. Going to the range to blow off steam with my shotgun became quite the reverse when a live round got jammed in the chamber and the slide release wouldn’t open. . .so essentially it became like defusing a bomb.  A very ‘shotgunny’ bomb, but I digress.  

Anyway, let’s get into it, at work and don't have much time.  Today is mainly about marketing your comic, especially the theories of paying for marketing versus grassroot ‘free’ or ‘very low cost’ marketing.

If you’ve been reading the blog for awhile, you may recall that I worked up some marketing materials, mainly bookmarks, that have the blogsite  and facebook listed on it.  The theory was it didn’t cost anything (day job let me print out the bookmarks on extra card stock we had) and comic book readers, well, read.  So If I gave them a free bookmark that had the site information in it, it would, logically draw more traffic.  So far my feelings are mixed.  I’ve gotten them handed out at comic book shops and one of my friends, Ben (from http://frogofthunder.blogspot.com/) dropped out what was left of my bookmarks at the San Deigo Comic Con marketing materials table since I couldn’t attend this year.  And while I saw a slight increase in traffic, it didn’t seem like it was being generated by the bookmarks, but rather by my internet efforts.

At this point I’m thinking digital efforts for all of my marketing efforts.  I seem to get a wider reach and as an independent comic publisher, I need everything I can get, and obviously I don’t have a lot of time to do it in. 

One great thing that’s come up recently that may assist with this is Google.  Blogspot is owned by Google and apparently I’m picking up enough traffic that I just received $100 free Google Adsense.  I’ll be thoroughly reviewing the information once I get home and as long as there is no strings attached be trying this out. I’ve thought about using both Adsense and the Facebook ads to draw more people to the site.  IF Adsense seems to garner in traffic, I’ll definitely think about putting some money into both. 

On a side note, in a discussion with one of my retailer friends, we discussed ads in Diamonds Previews.  And his advise which I have to concur with was: don’t.  If you are unaware of what Previews is, it’s a large monthly catalog that goes to retailer shops and that they select comics out of (Diamond Distribution is the worlds largest comic distributor, at least at the time I write this. . .in a few years it may be iTunes which really bums me out but more on that discussion in a later post).  The problem is that Previews USED to be how comic fans picked out the comics coming out; you’d go to the store, look at their copy (or buy yours) and tell the retailer what you wanted. . .now with sites like comic related, newsarama, comic book resources, etc.  most comic fans already know about up and comic comics and just walk in or email their comic shop what they want pulled. 

So in a nutshell: I recommend internet marketing over physical marketing, I’ll be using Adsense soon so I’ll post my results in a bit, and recommend getting the word out on your comic by using internet news and trend sites over paying for it.

I’ll have a post with more panel art, scriptwork, and whining about not being able to get to San Deigo for Con for the first time in years later. . .actually nothing on that last part, skip that.

L8R ZINOS!

-T

Day 25.2

Did a quick 10 minute 'keep my sanity at work' sketch.

Day 25.1 Taste of things to come

Either tonight or tomorrow morning I should have a decent post about about marketing a comic; doing it for little or no cost, how effective no cost options are compared to billable options, some more sketch art, and possibly a penciled page.

If your at the Con, have fun and definitively download the Con App if you have a smartphone. It will make scheduling your day much easier, (and sometimes has information only on the app!), and I find it makes networking easier for professionals as you can go from specific booth/artist to booth.

Oh and one of my good friends dropped of some of the Zombie Dinosaur bookmarks on the marketing materials table, feel free to grab a couple.

Day 24.5: Comic Related's podcast on Kickstarter (CC)

If you've been following this blog, you know how much a fan I am of Comic Related.  They industry experts are insightful and top notch.  Also you probably saw how I'm planing on using Kickstarter to attempt to at least partially fund the comic.  Originally I was waiting till a large chunk of the comic was done, so I had more to show thus better 'sales pitch' but it seems many other comic creators had similar ideas.  No I fear I may lost in a wash of other comic pitches. Thankfully my concept seems fairly unique, but I will have to get on the ball getting my stuff set up and over to Kickstarter. . .sigh. One more thing on the ever growing list.

In any even the 48 min podcast is worth listening to.  Again Comic Related is run by the guys that put out Blue Line Pro materials, of which I am also a great fan (their boards erase better than everyone else I've tried, which for someone that screws up as much as I do it important. . .I hate using process white [1].)

So without further ado:
http://comicrelated.com/news/12687/sketch-podcast-50

[1] process white, is a substance that, similar to Jesso for painting, that is painted over a mistake ridden area, and allows the penciler to draw over it in pencils. Kinda like white out but it doesn't 'tear' the same way.  A lot of tech savy artists. Simply draw the panel on a different board now, and place it in the page over the 'afflicted' area once it's done.  I like both methods, but since I'm fairly old school I do like using process white when I can. . .

Day 24: What does a Carnotaurus eat? Whatever it wants (ZF)

Had a touch of writers/artist block last night.  Wanted to work on boards, but most of my warm ups just simply failed.  Did have one that came out okay, which I brought with me to work and scanned there. As such I scanned a color (where you can see the red photo pencil I used) and a black and White copy which came out really sketchy looking (which I like sometimes).

In any even the zino is a dino I discovered yesterday ( I try to keep a substantial visual reference library.  . .you know OTHER than the internet.  Something I really recommend to all comic artists and graphic designers) flipping through a kids book was the Carnotaurus (the name means 'flesh-eating bull'), which might become one of the more dangerous Zinos. Basically a TRex with horns. Let me repeat that a Trex with HORNS >shudders<.  Can't think of anything more frighting of the top of my head. . .

Black and White scan

Color

Quick Post: Day. . .Something-or-other; Thumbs (CC)

Have two seconds (I have no idea how) at work so thought I'd post something up after getting into a debate with a penciler friend of mine, namely over thumbnails.  While I try to keep the blog at a minimal on the 'how-to-draw' style, I wanted to address this 'issue' because of how it deals with time management.

If you've followed the blog for any length of time, you probably are aware that may day job takes up a majority of my time (roughly a minim 12 hour day, that typically is around 14-18, and that's not including the 2 hours a day it takes me to drive from Santa Clarita to Santa Monica), so getting this comic done is almost an exercise in time management and efficiency more so than an artistic endeavor (which brings to mind; once this comic is done I don't think anyone can tell me they can't find time to work on their pet projects, but I digress).

My friend argues that he prefers to not work with thumbnails, because they slow him down, and he can always make changes on the boards as he goes.  He's also a much better artist than I am, so it could be this works for him. I typically like to take the time out to do thumbs, specifically because I'm not the greatest at backgrounds. I have a solid knowledge of perspective, but typically the scenes I create look to artificial, so when I thumb, I try to focus on the backgrounds first, and then put the characters in that perspective shot, instead of vice versa. Again this is my particular method, but I would argue the extra time it takes me to do thumbnail sketches, means less time correcting mistakes, and I can get a better idea of problems I may encounter when dealing with the full page's layout.

As an example here is a scan of some of the thumbs I did for the splash page (i.e. a full page panel) for page 1.  Keep in mind these were done very quickly so I didn't spend much time, but it solved a problem for me; originally I wanted to have the background slightly warped (or wall-eyed) and distorted to increase the sense of quick movement.  After laying it out in a thumbnail I decided to go with a traditional perspective shot (bottow Right hand corner) because it would better once the characters are in the panel.

I apologize for the roughness of the scan, I was using a non photo blue pencil and a 4h so I had to change the scanner settings for it to come through okay.

In any case, my argument is that if you are starting out, or don't have the confidence of a Greek God, Rockstar, or Professional Penciler thumbnails are the way to go, despite the extra time it's adding to your schedule.  Additionally remember to number your thumb pages and panels (my scan cut off how I do it unfortunately) .  The reason I recommend this is helps you avoid doing the same 'shot' more than once in the same comic (and doing it too often in a running series is bad too) and organizing your thumbs always helps if you have to back to it while working on that issue or later on in the series. . .which means I just pretty much said what I said before. >Sigh< Gotta stop updating this thing at work. 

Anyway, who has two thumbs and recommends using thumb(nails). . .this guy.

Later.

Day 22: Digitize. . . you mean like in Tron? (CC)

This weekend was a mess, so I didn't get a chance to do any work of substance on the comic, apologizes.  However I mentioned a few posts ago, that I had a discussion with one of my associates, an Eisner winning retailer (the Eisners are like the Oscars/Emmies for comics if you're not aware), and thought the info may be good to share.  It mainly relates to a post I did during the first month of the blog when I was figuring out the budget.  My associated, whom we'll call 'A!' (unless he states it's okay to mention him by name), basically was doing the push for digital comics (which seems for odd for a guy that works for a retail store, but whatever), and did advise even on a great run for indie, you're only looking at a sale of about 800 units.  Hrmm.  This does go with the information I've gotten from other sources, publishers, who often also push for digital.

Here's the thing; I hate digital comics.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm almost certaily going to make a digital copy of the comic, possibly in color (the only reason I'm doing black and white for the physical is time and cost. I do feel color is a better product), but it opens up a whole can of worms.  First off many digital comics aren't scanned at a high enough resolution, due to file size, and it can really kill the look of the art.  Secondly I can not stand how the reader is constantly forced to 'move' the comic when reading it.  It kills the natural flow of sequential art. I have not yet downloaded DC comic's new digital offerings; if they manage to make a 'workable' comic, I'll have to try to determine how they got there viewer to flow, and go from there.

Now this isn't to say if your thinking about self-publishing, you shouldn't go to digital.  Quite frankly it's the next evolution, it just happens to be one I hate.  Go digital makes sense.  You can reap all of the benefits of getting your comic out there, at little to no cost, meaning a much wider profit margin.  And as long as you can market your digital outputs, you can really bring people in; at no point in a day, is someone not goofing off on the internet.

So yes, I will be making the comic digitally available, but probably AFTER the brick and mortar comics are out first.  I generally like putting the best foot forward after all, and feel the printed version is going to look far better than my digital.

As always all comments are appreciated.
More later.
-T

Day 21: 3 more script pages

Work has been non stop, coupled with a friends funeral among other little setbacks, but the comic should be back on track.  To start with here are three more pages of the script.  I'll put more up this weekend, which, I don't want to jinx it, but I may actually have off for. . anyways here's pages 8-10.  Enjoy, and as always comments are appreciated, this is just the rough so you (the reader) can influence the comic!

PAGE 8

Panel 1: POV over Mikey’s Shoulder

Mikey pumps round after round into the oncoming zino horde.

                                    Mikey

                        Whatever – just go!

Panel 2: Claire’s jumped up on the higher part of the shipping/receiving dock and is firing as well.

                                    Claire

                        C’mon, I’ll cover you.

Panel 3: Mikey turns and runs as Claire gets a head shot on of the zinos (close panel)

                                    Mikey

                        Hope these supplies were worth it

Panel 4:  Mikey’s gotten to the docks and is jumping up as Claire is pounding on the rolled metal door

                                    Claire

                        Open up, now!

Panel 5: Int. Docs. We see the inside of the docs where Suicide (spitter: see character design sheet)armed with a hockey stick and Paul (Dryosaurus again see character sheet) armed with an Uzi.  The docs are two staged, with the second, higher, riser being accessible only by stairs, as it’s caged in.  Paul is standing next to the switch which activates the door on the elevated stage and Suicide is standing by the door.

                                    Suicide

                        What’s the secret password

Panel 6: Cut back to the pair outside shooting frantically

                                    Mikey

                        (yelling) Now Damn it!

Panel 7: CT interior dock.  Motioning for Paul to flip the switch.

                                    Suicide

                        That’s the one.

PAGE 9

Panel 1  Ext. Docks.  Hordes getting closer.

                                    Claire

                        Anytime ladies!

Panel 2  Int. Docks. Suicide is spinning around, as the gate hasn’t opened yet.  Paul is hesitating at the switch, which looks like the large levers they use on movie electric chairs.

                                    Suicide

                        C’mon Pointdexter, move it!

                                    Paul

                        But if I open the door we’ll get swarmed

Panel 3:  Suicide bounding up the steps.

                                    Suicide

                        Damn it you coward, MOVE!

Panel 4: Small Panel: See switch being flipped.

Panel 5: Ext. Docks.  We can see the metal gate slowly lifting, as Mikey & Claire are on the docking bay trying to slow the onrushing zinos.

                                    Mikey

                        Finally, Claire go!

Panel 6: Suicide’s running back down as we see Claire trying to slide through the opening.  Suicide is yelling at Paul over his shoulder.

                                    Suicide

                        Covering fire!

           

                                    Paul

                        But I’m down to 10 rounds!

Panel 7: Suicide grabs Claire and is trying to help pull her through.

                                   

P7(con’t)

                                    Suicide

                        So much for in and out huh?

Panel 8: Ext. Dock: Mikey is in a solid fight as some of the zinos have reached the dock and are on it.

                                    Mikey

                        C’mon. C’MON!

PAGE 10

Panel 1: Mikey manages to duck under the opening gate, but so do some of the smaller Zinos (compys and the like) Paul is blasting away without aiming, out of fear, using up the last of his ammo.

                                    Mikey

                        I’m in, close it!

Panel 2: More of the zinos are managing to get in trough the opening, as Suicide

Is slap shooting a group of Compies back outside

                                    Suicide

                        . . .he scores!

                                    Mikey

                        Paul close the door!

Panel 3: Pauls got his full body on the lever

                                    Paul

                        What does it look like I’m trying to do? It’s stuck

Panel 4: Claire runs up the steps to help.

Panel 5:  Clair and Paul stain and manage to get the switch down.

           

                                    Claire

                        Got it

Panel 6: Long panel: of Mikey and Suicide at the bottow level trying to fend of the zinos that got in.

                                    Mikey

                        Little busy.