Unfinished Comics
Posted By Scott at 9/04/2013 10:13 AM
Posted By Scott at 9/04/2013 10:13 AM
Life certainly has taken a few interesting turns these past few months. As I'm starting a new job (working from home), my wife has started her own business (I worked on the website of course), and as new comic opportunities are beginning, one unfinished chapter has been nagging at me for quite some time...
Around the time Fablewood was just hitting store shelves, and my involvement in Popgun was coming to light, I was approached by a writer whose work I admired, and asked if I'd be interested in drawing a kid's comic for him. Now for anyone starting out, this seems like a golden opportunity. You get your name out there, you get tons of exposure, and your just steps away from quitting your day job. Right?
I have to be up front and say that I was never that naive. I loved the idea of having a whole book that I drew up on my shelf. I enjoyed this writer's work, and it would have been great to be involved with a project he was putting together. I had no allusions that I'd be rich and famous making this book. I know for every Walking Dead, there's hundreds of creator-owned books that only make a few issues before folding, if they even get off the ground in the first place.
A pretty common thing new (and old) artists in comics will see is writers approaching them promising half the rights to a creation if they'll just draw the book and get it out there. When the book isn't making any money, this is 50% of nothing. Now, I'm not necessarily against this out and out. There are different situations, different people involved and different factors in all situations. Were you to write, draw, color, and letter your own creation, and it still didn't make a cent, you'd have 100% of nothing. Sometimes, the collaboration can be a learning experience, sometimes having a team to promote something lends some synergy to the project, sometimes the project just sounds awesome. I believe it's your right 100% to be paid for the work that you do, but I also believe that waiving that right or potentially postponing it is well within reason as well. I will always entertain a pitch if it's with people I admire and respect, even if there's no money up front to do so. It's never black and white, as they say.
The other thing I have to be honest about is the fact that I worked slow. Working a day job, and having a semblance of a life means that you don't have time to sit and draw everyday, all day. Some pages can take me 5 hours, some pages can take me 10 hours. If you only have one or two hours spare time at night, well that's a snail's pace. The one thing I have always been, however, is honest about that. Whenever I enter into a new project, I let people know that I'm still working a full-time day job, and that will effect my output. So this project saw about 25 pages completed over the course of 2 years. I wasn't proud of that fact, and I'll own up to that being disappointing. To be fair, about half way through, I started to get the wind knocked out of my sails which may have slowed me down, but I'll get to that later. Recent stresses at my previous job have also been the reason the site hasn't been updated in quite a while. I think that's a fact that's shaped my style a bit. I could work day and night, trying to be as detailed or amazing as Jim Lee, but the fact is I'll never have the time. So I focus on stylizations that are perhaps easier and more natural for me.
So, as this project progressed, it became clear to me that the writer was very put upon. The whole world has conspired against him; all of the talented artists he's worked with have disappointed him, and he'd be a famous writer by now if he didn't have to deal with all the nonsense around him. There was not a pleasant thing to be said about anyone who he was working with at the time, some of them artists I've admired for years. In fact, he had had (and has had since) some pretty public falling outs with artists he's worked with. Now, I'm a huge fan of music, and I've always said that there are artists whose work I'd buy sight unseen, but I'd probably never want to meet them. The art can sometimes be sullied by the personality. That's what happened to me. The idea of completing this project, with someone who didn't seem like he wanted to be there, who didn't have a single encouraging thing to say (I can only imagine what was said about me), was waning. So I manned up, and bowed out, freeing the writer to find someone else to complete the project. Quite a bit of vitriol, and threats of finding some kid out of college who could complete it in three months, and I was free to move on. So I did.
Some time later, as positive press about the writer's other books was coming out, I dropped him a note, asking how things were and congratulating him on everything that was coming out. Again, I always did enjoy his work. What came next shocked me. I was offered a "work for hire" arrangement to move the project forward (something I had just assumed had happened without me). This took the shape of 5% of the movie rights to the project, or $100 to sign over the concepts and character designs I had come up with. I was stunned. First, I couldn't imagine a new artist wanting to come on board and not take a crack at their own designs: I didn't create Spider-Man... these weren't iconic designs, just some people, locales and creatures I was personally proud of. Next, I was insulted. Doing the math again, 5% of nothing is still nothing, and $100 hardly seemed worth it. So I declined, explained I'd rather just hang on to the designs for the creatures etc., and that a new artist would probably be chomping at the bit to start over. A lot of the concepts I came up with actually influenced and changed key moments in the story. I know a lot of artists would love that opportunity.
The response I got was expected, but disappointing none the less. I really hadn't emailed to drudge up all that nonsense again, just to pass on my congratulations. I recognize that passing those designs on would be a great wrap up point and way to allow the work done not to be wasted. However, I took issue with the fact that that work could be so under valued. I offered to discuss a reasonable value for those designs, as well as the concepts I contributed that helped shape the story, but received no response.
I sat on those concepts for over two years. It wasn't until the writer made headlines this past March with some shady Kickstarter practices around another one of his other projects, and that I saw how he had respected that artist (of whom I'm a huge fan), that I decided to put up my concepts, designs and finished work for everyone to see. I can't see why I should let the work I did go to waste, just because of the sour way things went down. I may re-use some of the creature designs I did in future stories. A lot of the design work was done independent of any story elements laid out. It was done more as a world building exercise than as a direct result of the script (of which there was only 10 or so pages at the beginning). I also ran with some concepts based on the ideas of the book, sort of suggestions for locales or characters met along the way.
You can view everything in the comics section of the website under "Unfinished Comics" (hopefully the only entry going forward), or by clicking here.
As I'm moving forward with life, and enjoying the experience, it is nice to get this weight off my chest and some of this work that I've always been proud of out in the open.
Around the time Fablewood was just hitting store shelves, and my involvement in Popgun was coming to light, I was approached by a writer whose work I admired, and asked if I'd be interested in drawing a kid's comic for him. Now for anyone starting out, this seems like a golden opportunity. You get your name out there, you get tons of exposure, and your just steps away from quitting your day job. Right?
I have to be up front and say that I was never that naive. I loved the idea of having a whole book that I drew up on my shelf. I enjoyed this writer's work, and it would have been great to be involved with a project he was putting together. I had no allusions that I'd be rich and famous making this book. I know for every Walking Dead, there's hundreds of creator-owned books that only make a few issues before folding, if they even get off the ground in the first place.
A pretty common thing new (and old) artists in comics will see is writers approaching them promising half the rights to a creation if they'll just draw the book and get it out there. When the book isn't making any money, this is 50% of nothing. Now, I'm not necessarily against this out and out. There are different situations, different people involved and different factors in all situations. Were you to write, draw, color, and letter your own creation, and it still didn't make a cent, you'd have 100% of nothing. Sometimes, the collaboration can be a learning experience, sometimes having a team to promote something lends some synergy to the project, sometimes the project just sounds awesome. I believe it's your right 100% to be paid for the work that you do, but I also believe that waiving that right or potentially postponing it is well within reason as well. I will always entertain a pitch if it's with people I admire and respect, even if there's no money up front to do so. It's never black and white, as they say.
The other thing I have to be honest about is the fact that I worked slow. Working a day job, and having a semblance of a life means that you don't have time to sit and draw everyday, all day. Some pages can take me 5 hours, some pages can take me 10 hours. If you only have one or two hours spare time at night, well that's a snail's pace. The one thing I have always been, however, is honest about that. Whenever I enter into a new project, I let people know that I'm still working a full-time day job, and that will effect my output. So this project saw about 25 pages completed over the course of 2 years. I wasn't proud of that fact, and I'll own up to that being disappointing. To be fair, about half way through, I started to get the wind knocked out of my sails which may have slowed me down, but I'll get to that later. Recent stresses at my previous job have also been the reason the site hasn't been updated in quite a while. I think that's a fact that's shaped my style a bit. I could work day and night, trying to be as detailed or amazing as Jim Lee, but the fact is I'll never have the time. So I focus on stylizations that are perhaps easier and more natural for me.
So, as this project progressed, it became clear to me that the writer was very put upon. The whole world has conspired against him; all of the talented artists he's worked with have disappointed him, and he'd be a famous writer by now if he didn't have to deal with all the nonsense around him. There was not a pleasant thing to be said about anyone who he was working with at the time, some of them artists I've admired for years. In fact, he had had (and has had since) some pretty public falling outs with artists he's worked with. Now, I'm a huge fan of music, and I've always said that there are artists whose work I'd buy sight unseen, but I'd probably never want to meet them. The art can sometimes be sullied by the personality. That's what happened to me. The idea of completing this project, with someone who didn't seem like he wanted to be there, who didn't have a single encouraging thing to say (I can only imagine what was said about me), was waning. So I manned up, and bowed out, freeing the writer to find someone else to complete the project. Quite a bit of vitriol, and threats of finding some kid out of college who could complete it in three months, and I was free to move on. So I did.
Some time later, as positive press about the writer's other books was coming out, I dropped him a note, asking how things were and congratulating him on everything that was coming out. Again, I always did enjoy his work. What came next shocked me. I was offered a "work for hire" arrangement to move the project forward (something I had just assumed had happened without me). This took the shape of 5% of the movie rights to the project, or $100 to sign over the concepts and character designs I had come up with. I was stunned. First, I couldn't imagine a new artist wanting to come on board and not take a crack at their own designs: I didn't create Spider-Man... these weren't iconic designs, just some people, locales and creatures I was personally proud of. Next, I was insulted. Doing the math again, 5% of nothing is still nothing, and $100 hardly seemed worth it. So I declined, explained I'd rather just hang on to the designs for the creatures etc., and that a new artist would probably be chomping at the bit to start over. A lot of the concepts I came up with actually influenced and changed key moments in the story. I know a lot of artists would love that opportunity.
The response I got was expected, but disappointing none the less. I really hadn't emailed to drudge up all that nonsense again, just to pass on my congratulations. I recognize that passing those designs on would be a great wrap up point and way to allow the work done not to be wasted. However, I took issue with the fact that that work could be so under valued. I offered to discuss a reasonable value for those designs, as well as the concepts I contributed that helped shape the story, but received no response.
I sat on those concepts for over two years. It wasn't until the writer made headlines this past March with some shady Kickstarter practices around another one of his other projects, and that I saw how he had respected that artist (of whom I'm a huge fan), that I decided to put up my concepts, designs and finished work for everyone to see. I can't see why I should let the work I did go to waste, just because of the sour way things went down. I may re-use some of the creature designs I did in future stories. A lot of the design work was done independent of any story elements laid out. It was done more as a world building exercise than as a direct result of the script (of which there was only 10 or so pages at the beginning). I also ran with some concepts based on the ideas of the book, sort of suggestions for locales or characters met along the way.
You can view everything in the comics section of the website under "Unfinished Comics" (hopefully the only entry going forward), or by clicking here.
As I'm moving forward with life, and enjoying the experience, it is nice to get this weight off my chest and some of this work that I've always been proud of out in the open.
Labels: comics, Escalator, the future
Tiny Victories & Busywork
Posted By Scott at 2/15/2011 1:22 PM
Posted By Scott at 2/15/2011 1:22 PM
One very taxing project at work and a few busy weekends and I've let my intentions of finishing one piece a week go completely off the rails. However, in this case it's given me some time to think. A friend commented once that they enjoyed the fact that I can self-evaluate and try to learn from it, at least in regards to my art. So that's what I've been doing recently.
I started this blog roughly five years ago after a long lapse from art, mostly through University (full time classes and work will do that). Comics were just a glimmer in the distance. Until expanding my horizons, and discovering things like the Flight anthologies, I thought I had to draw like Jim Lee to even break into comics. For the longest time now, I've been busying myself with what I call "tiny victories"; small, digestible chunks of "success" to trick me into thinking I'm accomplishing something. This has taken the form of an admittedly poorly drawn web comic, submitting finished art to forums, Drawer Geeks, deviantArt; anything at all. I also have a bad habit of taking on busywork, namely agreeing to work with any writer who asked. Not that any of these things are bad per se, but they are distractions from bigger picture items.
From writing lyrics in my high school band, to drawing comics, to all the media I consume in my spare time (movies, tv shows, video games, music), the theme has always been the same: storytelling. I've got characters and ideas running around in my head at all times. They've kept me up at night, distracted me countless times, and never seem to want to calm down. So what have I done about it? Taken every opportunity I could to put off putting pen to paper. Why would I do that?
The same reason I've put off or walked away from all other things I've really cared about doing: being scared to the core of failing.
Even when getting stories published in Fablewood or Popgun, and getting generally positive feedback, it was easy to shrug off as just being a small part of a whole. I've never had to stand on my own with only my work to bolster a project. The irony there of course is I can't think of anything more satisfying: putting yourself out there and having some measure of success doing something you love.
So here's what I'm going to do... I will still try to produce something each week. I may try my hand at single page comics, using Illustration Friday topics as a jumping off point. If not doing that, I will be working away at my own stories, finally getting these characters out of my head and running around for everyone else to see. No current idea how or when these ideas will see the light of day, but I have a few ideas. No more busywork; all my tiny victories will be my own, failure be damned.
I started this blog roughly five years ago after a long lapse from art, mostly through University (full time classes and work will do that). Comics were just a glimmer in the distance. Until expanding my horizons, and discovering things like the Flight anthologies, I thought I had to draw like Jim Lee to even break into comics. For the longest time now, I've been busying myself with what I call "tiny victories"; small, digestible chunks of "success" to trick me into thinking I'm accomplishing something. This has taken the form of an admittedly poorly drawn web comic, submitting finished art to forums, Drawer Geeks, deviantArt; anything at all. I also have a bad habit of taking on busywork, namely agreeing to work with any writer who asked. Not that any of these things are bad per se, but they are distractions from bigger picture items.
From writing lyrics in my high school band, to drawing comics, to all the media I consume in my spare time (movies, tv shows, video games, music), the theme has always been the same: storytelling. I've got characters and ideas running around in my head at all times. They've kept me up at night, distracted me countless times, and never seem to want to calm down. So what have I done about it? Taken every opportunity I could to put off putting pen to paper. Why would I do that?
The same reason I've put off or walked away from all other things I've really cared about doing: being scared to the core of failing.
Even when getting stories published in Fablewood or Popgun, and getting generally positive feedback, it was easy to shrug off as just being a small part of a whole. I've never had to stand on my own with only my work to bolster a project. The irony there of course is I can't think of anything more satisfying: putting yourself out there and having some measure of success doing something you love.
So here's what I'm going to do... I will still try to produce something each week. I may try my hand at single page comics, using Illustration Friday topics as a jumping off point. If not doing that, I will be working away at my own stories, finally getting these characters out of my head and running around for everyone else to see. No current idea how or when these ideas will see the light of day, but I have a few ideas. No more busywork; all my tiny victories will be my own, failure be damned.
Labels: Art, comics, the future
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