SPX, NYC, 10,000, and JOM

Hey. So been a while. Yup.

What's going on. Hey, American Eh #2 is on its way to being done! That's something. It's slow going, but getting there. I'm working on page 12 right now, out of an anticipated 17. I'm going through the predictable "why am I bothering, this sucks" phase now that I'm 2/3 of the way through, but I'm trying not to let that get to me.

Keep going, right? At least I'm drawing and inking and trying to get better.

American, Eh? #2 details how I ended up leaving after my sophomore year at the University of Windsor, Ontario and moving on a whim to a room in a house in Quincy, Massachusetts, which is just outside of Boston. I did not exactly think this sudden, very dramatic move through, as you'll see.

Some panels, though, I do think came out really nice.

I sent off registration and a big hunk of my personal savings to the Small Press Expo last Friday. Jodi (of Rottin Rotti and others) and I are going to come together in October under the umbrella of Acute Studios, our working company name. I hope people buy stuff, because the thought of the printing costs and other big gulps of my savings floating away to prepare for SPX, well, I just hope that at least, I can break even. Making a bit of money would be cool too, but mostly I just want to be a part of the community, even if for a weekend.

M is also coming to help hawk our shit - he'll be behind the table with us, pointing at AE books and yelling "Hey, I'm in this! Did you see? Get over here!" His dream come true. (Do you know how many years he's been asking me when I draw: "Is that me? Is that me? Why don't you do a comic with me in it?" Well, HERE. It's a whole frickin' series!!)

Besides three planned issues of American, Eh? the plan is to possibly have one or two other mini-comics to sell, possibly poems / images done in ink washes, possibly something else. I'm focusing on AE right now, so I'll decide later. Jodi will have her Rottin Rotti comics, her Julie Light comics, and I don't know, maybe Fighting Divine? And Jodi and I are collaborating on my kid's story, Juniper Key and the Very Serious Girl - I wrote and created, she's gonna illustrate. Hopefully we can get that together because that would be extremely cool to have something by the both of us to display.

Besides all this preparation, M and I and our friend Net (who is featured in AE #2) went to New York City two weeks ago, my first time, and I completely fell in love with the city, the food, the atmosphere. I am already plotting my return - I think I started plotting on the train back to Providence:

And I've dropped some weight, which was a pleasant surprise. It was weird though, to suddenly be a size 8, struggling to keep pants up, after years of struggling at size 10, going vegetarian, working out every day, counting every calorie and nothing ever changing. Then bam! Down 10 pounds? How??

People have asked, and I've thought about it, and I guess it happened slow over the past six months due to stuff like this:

-stopped eating fast food altogether, except on very rare occasions

-have much less soda on a weekly basis. Drink lots of tea instead.

-cut down on dairy to just cereal in the morning, yogurt in the afternoon, and a glass with dinner.

-started eating a real breakfast, usually fibre-full cereal and juice, instead of Carnation Instant Breakfast

-starting making things like cookies and other sweets myself instead of packaged. Also stopped eating things like microwaveable dinners and Hamburger Helper and now make fresh dinners every night.

-started listening to my body when I ate, and when I start feeling full, I stop.

Since I realized I lost the weight (which was Christmas, and on Jodi's Wii Fit in Canada. I was "WTF" for the whole day after that - sorry Bean!) I bought a pedometer and I'm trying to walk more - leave my office at the college twice or three times during the workday and just walk around for 10 minutes. I think it helps, though I don't know how the hell you can hit 10,000 steps a day, like they suggest. I hit 6,000 on an active day. 10,000 is balls.

And hey, did you hear? I have a new little nephew. Mr. Jack Oliver McCallum.

SPX and Big Kids

It's been a few weeks now since SPX, and I didn't write about it like I said I would, so I'm doing that now whilst I'm sleepy and alone in my coffin-office.

I don't know if I can emphasize enough how much that convention changed my opinions, inspired me, and really made me feel like I found a community I fit into. Artistic, slightly-to-full nerdy, some shy, some friendly, most with a weird sense of humor, just trying to get their stuff out and make some contacts - how is that not me? I wish I could hang out with those people all the time.
Those conversations I had with certain artists (as listed in a below blog entry) really made me come out of my shell and try and present myself and my stuff with a bit more confidence. It was rad.

I'd never actually been to a comic convention before, so to have two full days of slowly persuing the tables, the artwork, and going to panels that focused specifically on art and the independant comic scene was awesome. I have to say that the panels weren't as good as I was hoping - the topics were kick-ass, like a panel on Small Press Publishing, a Center for Cartoon Studies workshop, and Q&As with people like Bryan Lee O'Malley of Scott Pilgrim. But I found that despite the topics, most of the people on the panel, regardless of their great qualifications to be on said panel, really had trouble speaking. That is, they were quiet, vague, didn't really answer the questions all the time, and generally gave off the impression that they'd rather be somewhere else. Which was disappointing, for the most part - I was hungry for information and it came in small moments. Though I did get some good advice here and there.

Like on the Small Press panel: if I'm going to do this, I have to get more web-savvy. Put up sample pages and free previews. Cross-promote on other sites. Maintain the blog and have the ability for people to order things online. And promote the shit out of my stuff. I need more output, so I have a variety of things to show people (and publishers) rather than just one dinky book. There was some talk on how to sell on Amazon, how much ISBN numbers were, and how getting reviews from people in the community for back-cover quotes are key (must look into that). Going to lots of shows, trying to sell in lots of shops, just getting it out there is key. One guy said it took five years for his small press to accumulate enough of a backlist to really make a profit in selling.

I learned a lot from just going around the tables too. Everyone, it seemed, in addition to their books, had some kind of other promotional material that was really cheap. Buttons, stickers, T-shirts, original art. One girl had scones for sale with her books. There was one guy selling teeny comics for a penny (and they were actually some of the best comics I'd read!).

And probably the comic guy who had the most influence on my attitude was James Kochalka of American Elf (http://www.americanelf.com/). Now James is a guy who M and I have been reading online for years and years, and so we were a little star-struck when we first went into the convention, and there in a hot pink T-shirt is James to the right. I was still wicked shy, so I didn't say anything when we both the newest book from him. But I went back later and looked at his mini-art, and had a bit of a conversation (slightly surreal to talk to someone that you feel like you know, but clearly you don't). He was very nice, if a little shy seeming (like me, I guess).

In his Q&A panel, James said something that made everyone around, both Pas and Bean, give me elbows in the side. He said: "The best thing is to not care if your art is good or bad. You have to get to the level of confidence where it doesn't matter to you, you're just doing it." He also said "People come up and give me their mini-comics all shy and saying it sucks - but if you don't think that you're awesome, who will?"

Point taken, James.

So while working out American, Eh? #2 in my head, I've taken on another little project.

I thought, for a change, it'd be cool to do some really mini comics - 4 pages or so. As you can tell, I was really inspired by SPX, and got all these ideas of mini-comics I could do, and to do some really small stories while I'm plotting out and drawing AE #2 would be fun.

So I've sketched out a four page comic, and it might be the first of several stories about growing up with my brothers and sister (6 of us in total); I'm tentatively calling it "Big Kids."

More cartoony, less detail than AE, and hopefully funny. This first one is about an infamously gross event between my brother Jon and I. I will post it when it's done.

SPX - Just a Taste

Some pictures to come when I get them from Pas, but in the meantime:

Weekend was so good. Very educational too. And the best people I met:

Ben Towle (Midnight Sun - http://www.benzilla.com/) - so nice! And spoke to me for a good ten minutes about art, was very patient when I asked him questions about his tools and scanners.

Mike Dawson (Freddie and Me - http://mikedawsoncomic.livejournal.com/) - This was early on Saturday, and I was still stiff with fear at handing out my comic. He was really encouraging and told me to get it out there, and not worry about it.

Alex Robinson (Tricked, Box Office Poison, Too Cool to Be Forgotten, etc. - http://www.comicbookalex.com/) Talk about being intimidated! I'm a huge fan - M and I have every one of his books, and he's one of the big guys exhibiting at the SPX. But the nicest guy! Really friendly and unassuming, chatted to M and I as he signed our book. We forgot to ask him what he was working on next.

All in all, I handed out about 40 of my comics to various people. And I got really good feedback overall! They seemed psyched to get it, which was cool.

It's a good start, and now I know I have to keep at this shit, and get American, Eh? No.2 figured out. Have ideas for other mini comics as well.

SPX This Weekend!

Not only am I going to my first real comic convention...

Not only is it specifically geared towards independant and small press comics, which is unspeakably awesome....

Not only do I actually have a mini comic of my own to bring....

But it's a road trip with the husband I love, friend that makes me laugh, and best friend from Canada, to a place I've never been before, through states I haven't driven through before.

What's better than that??