Kody goes On The Page!

While visiting Los Angeles about two weeks ago, I was asked to be a guest on the 'On The Page' podcast, one of my favorite screenwriting podcasts. Give it a listen (episode 193), and don't forget to subscribe free on iTunes, it's the bombdiggity.

Join me for the Kickstarter panel at Comic-Con

I'll be participating in a panel at Comic-Con about my experience using Kickstarter, and offering tips and suggestions for those looking to start a Kickstarter project of their own. Here's the official description:

Kickstart Your Comic! (Saturday 6:30-7:30pm) Room 7AB
Producing an independent comic requires not only a huge time commitment, but also a sizable financial investment to cover the printing, promotion, and distribution costs incurred before your book even hits the shelves. Recently, some creators have discovered a new and effective way to raise start-up capital for their comics online. Since it's founding in 2009, Kickstarter.com has been helping artists in all media find financial backing for their projects through user donations. Join Kody Chamberlain (Sweets), Steve Earnhart and Pat Loika (The Villain), and Steve Bryant (Athena Voltaire) as they discuss their highly successful Kickstarter campaigns and offer advice to help you fund your own comic through Kickstarter.com

Interview

New interview up at True Believer Reviews! Lots of questions about SWEETS and a bit about the writing process.

Anyone want to break into comics?

Digital Webbing Presents is returning!

The anthology is looking for quality work to publish, both short stories and serialized stories. Shorts or chapters should be in the neighborhood of 8 pages, content should be PG-13 at most. For those that don't know, Digital Webbing Presents is where I got my start, my first two published works were in that anthology.

Interested? Hit the forum and get involved.

Crowdfunding

I'm entertaining the idea of crowd funding to help generate a little marketing and promo cash for SWEETS. Conventions, direct mail, ashcans, posters, etc can all be very expensive ventures.

Listen while you work

I've been listening to quite a few podcasts lately while I work on comic art. It's a great way to keep up with what's going on in the world and pick up a few new tricks and techniques. I happened upon the Visual Artist Podcast Network last week and thought I'd share the link. I was already a regular listener to a few of the podcasts on the list, but it really does include some of the best on the web.

Here's the blurb from their site.

"Welcome to The Visual Artist Podcast Network!

If you like to listen to podcasts while you work on your latest masterpiece, then you’re in for a treat, because 6 of the best visual arts podcasts have joined forces to keep you informed, inspired, and entertained with hours of valuable content every week. On top of that, you’ll find articles, tutorials, and other useful resources that you won’t find anywhere else.

Whether you’re an Illustrator, Graphic Designer, Animator, or all of the above, you’ll find something to fall in love with here at VAPN.

Take a look around and familiarize yourself with the great podcasts on this network, and be sure to visit each show’s individual website for more of what they have to offer. As we go, we hope to add more podcasts to the group, so stay tuned and grow along with VAPN!

Just select the show of your choice to start exploring!"

Upcoming appearance

For those of you in South Louisiana, I'll be speaking at the NetSquared Lafayette meeting at the Travis Technology Center Mar 9th at 6pm. Topics will include: Comics, technology, social media, etc. Plus a Q&A at the end of the event.

Visit http://www.meetup.com/Net2LFT for more info on NetSquared Lafayette.

Travis Technology Center

110 Travis St Ste 100 · Lafayette, LA 70503
(337) 289-3000 · Fax: (337) 289-3388 
http://www.lofttwelve45.com

Books I reference often

Here's a stack of books I reference more often than the rest on my shelf, and I thought it'd share them on the blog. Sadly, all of the Andrew Loomis books (bottom) are out of print, but PDF versions are available if you spend a bit of time searching Google. I'm now the proud owner of all the printed Loomis books, and if you can find them, they're well worth the price of admission.

Full page!

Here's a finished page from the pitch. (Click the graphic to enlarge) Someone asked recently about the spatter effects I'm getting on the pages. Those are all done on the original page. After penciling, I dip an old toothbrush in masking fluid and scrape my thumb across the toothbrush to spray the fluid in certain areas. The masking fluid protects the paper from the ink. I also dip my quills and brushes in the masking fluid to create what will eventually become white lines on the page. It's almost impossible to find a quality white ink that's easy to work with, so this is just an easier and faster solution for me. Once I'm done inking the entire page, I can just rub off the masking fluid to reveal the white paper underneath.

Once I'm done rubbing away the masking fluid, I dip the toothbrush into my india ink and spray a bit of black around the page. It's subtle, but I enjoy having a bit of spatter and texture in my work. Since this is a gritty crime story, I want that edge to the work. Clean slick lineart just doesn't work for me on this type of story. Whenever possible I do try and keep it all on the original art page, but I have created a set of spatter brushes in the past for this type of thing. I used them a bit on the Luke McBain comic I just finished for 12 Gauge Comics. If you're interested, you can grab those brushes here. Sorry, but I offer no assistance on using or installing these brushes except that you should only click once to create the spatter. Dragging the brush will not work properly. Hit Google and look for some Photoshop Brush tutorials, they'll have a ton of helpful info.

Color experiments

Some color experiments using the iPhone app called Peppermint. I do these when I'm stuck waiting in line somewhere or when I take a little break. It's a good way to take a quick break from drawing and avoid wasting time on Facebook or Twitter. I've included a screen grab of the Peppermint app so you can see one of the color wheel tools.

Anytime I need a new color palette for an illustration or design, I pull these up to help speed up the process. Adobe's Kuler works in a similar way and ties into all the Adobe apps, but I do find the Peppermint iPhone app a bit more convenient since I can play with it just about anywhere and quickly crank out a few color experiments.

Panel borders

Sure, it might seem like a dull topic to some, but panel borders can be a significant asset or liability in comic storytelling. When done poorly, they're obvious and  distracting, but when they're done right, they're completely invisible and seamlessly blend into the story. In an attempt to understand why some panel borders work and some don't, I pulled out a few dozen random comics and spread them out side by side on my table. It's interesting to see the many variations in gutter size, panel spacing, line thickness (or complete lack of line). Some gutters are white, some are solid black, others are filled with various colors. Give it a try sometime, you'll be amazed at the many variations.

My opinion is that any variation in panel border design 'can' work as long as it's done with intent and control. I've been using solid black borders for quite some time, but since I intend to use a lot of heavy blacks in SWEETS, black borders can sometimes disappear into the artwork a bit too much and the reader may not see enough separation in the panels. I'll likely settle on using a combination of solutions depending on how much black is dumped into the panel and what kind of mood I'm going for. As I start posting artwork, keep your eyes on my panel borders, I'm going to be working hard to find the right balance with every new page.

Marketing and Promotion

Before getting into comics, I earned a B.F.A. in Advertising Design and spent about 8 years in the advertising industry working my way up the food chain as a Junior Designer, Designer, Art Director, and eventually started my own advertising and design studio around 1999 where I did EVERYTHING including design, copywriting, media buying, research, web development, photography, bookkeeping, and everything else that needed doing.

By far, my favorite thing about advertising is you learn all sorts of new things about a lot of different industries. Monday might be spent working on a print campaign for a major online hockey store, Tuesday might be spent designing a logo for a local drum shop, while Wednesday is spent designing a point of purchase display for a new BBQ sauce.

It's amazing how much you can learn by meeting with new clients and picking their brains about their industries. But a big part of marketing that BBQ sauce includes talking with retailers about what they need to sell the product, it's something that often gets overlooked in the research process.

So with that in mind, I decided to approach a few comic retailers with an open mind to get honest opinions on what works and what doesn't from their point of view on the front line. The answers I got back were filled with useful information and tips, and some even contradicted other answers.

0003 - New Orleans and the Script

0003 - New Orleans and the Script

This is the 3rd 'Official' entry into my little production journal, but I think I may start adding in a few 'informal' entries here and there. Shorter bursts if info that may not really have a home in a longer entry. Those will likely only be done on the official BLOGGER page since I'll mostly be doing them from my iPhone. But the bulk of the content will still be distributed throughout the webmosphere. :D

Here's the usual disclaimer: "In No Particular Order" is a production journal by me, Kody Chamberlain, for my creator owned comic titled "SWEETS." The blog will include other info, but it's centered around that project specifically. I'm not an expert on any of this, but with a bit of confidence, smarts, and help from my friends, I can work my way through most of it. These journal notes are NOT intended to be perfect, essay style entries. Comic book deadlines are hell, so I make no promises on the quality of the information I'm presenting. You'll find typos, grammar problems, logic errors, constantly contradicting information, and all sorts of things that will annoy and offend those with an eye for perfection. I publish these entries in several different places, please feel free to choose your favorite and stick with it, or jump around if you'd like.

| Digital Webbing Forum | Blogger | WordPress | DeviantArt | MySpace |

So toughen up, don't sweat the small stuff, and enjoy the process of making comics, presented in no particular order:

- - - - - - - - - -

Took a trip to New Orleans two weeks ago with my wife and our good friends Rob and April Guillory. For those that don't know, Rob is the artist on CHEW, a fantastic new book with writer John Layman.

Our first night there there, we showed up at The Blue Nile to catch a Marco Benevento (piano) show with two of my favorite drummers Johnny Vidacovich and Stanton Moore. Lucky for us, an all-star lineup showed up to play the gig including Anders Osborne (guitar/vocals), Big Sam (trombone), Kirk Joseph (sousaphone). Easily one of the most talent packed shows I've seen in my lifetime.

The next morning we fought a thunderstorm to have breakfast at one of my favorite spots, Camellia Grill, and then "BAM," we had Dinner at Emeril's later that night. Lots of walking, shopping, galleries, and even ran into a few friends from Lafayette. We took the 'Pepsi Challenge' and had beignets at Cafe du Monde. They were fantastic, as always, but I can go on record and say my wife cooks a better beignet. Bold statement, right?

I also shot reference. Lots and lots of reference. There are several locations in SWEETS that I wanted to recreate, so that's the bulk of what I shot while in New Orleans. But it was also important for me to walk, drive, and study those locations again to make sure they felt right in the script. I won't be trying to create the locations exactly, they don't have to be real, I just want them to 'feel' real. When I got home, I made a few tweaks to a couple of the scenes based on impressions I got while walking the locations. Fresh angles, lighting ideas, etc. I have a blast doing this kind of thing, and I hope it shows in the finished comic.

In the last few weeks, I spent a lot of time tweaking the 5 issue script to make it stronger, and used a lot of the notes I got from friends and colleagues. I also ignored a lot of notes. Sometimes you just have to go with your gut. In the end, I think the second draft is far stronger than the original.

In my quest to make this project top notch, I decided to send it off to a professional script consultant for a review. This particular consultant mostly does feature length screenplays, but I was able to talk my into having my comic book script reviewed instead. Apparently this will be the consultant's very first opportunity to critique a comic book or graphic novel script, and it seems there's some honest excitement about the opportunity on both ends. Our phone discussion of the script happens tomorrow.  I will be taking detailed notes during the conversation, and I'll try and show some of those once the book starts to come out. Don't want to give away any story spoilers before anyone reads it, so I'll hold that back for a while.

Time to get back to work, but for small chunks of nonsense, feel free to follow me on Twitter or Facebook .

0002 - A rundown of where things stand today.

0002 - A rundown of where things stand today.

Here's the usual disclaimer: I don't claim to be an expert on any of this, but with a bit of confidence, smarts, and help from my friends, I can probably work my way through most of it. These journal notes are NOT intended to be perfect, essay style entries. Comic book deadlines are hell, so I make no promises on the quality of the information I'm presenting. You'll find typos, grammar problems, logic errors, constantly contradicting information, and all sorts of things that will annoy and offend those with an eye for perfection. I publish these entries in several different places, please feel free to choose your favorite and stick with it, or jump around if you'd like.

| Digital Webbing Forum | Blogger | WordPress | DeviantArt | MySpace |

So toughen up, don't sweat the small stuff, and enjoy the process of making comics, presented in no particular order:

SWEETS - This new project is all about story, and until my story is solid, the pencil stays in the box. I've been rolling this script idea around in my head for about 6 or 7 years. I had a few false starts and it's been shelved a dozen times so I could take on freelance comic work.

But as of today, I've written the script. It's done. It's 5 issues, about 116 pages. I sent it out to a few friends for feedback and got some amazing notes. For the last couple of weeks I've been going through those notes and making tweaks, moving a couple of things around, and overall I think it's headed in the right direction. A big thanks to everyone that contributed their time and passion to reading this thing: Josh Fialkov, Rob Levin, Keven Gardner, Ford Gilmore, Chris Kirby, Troy Wall, and my amazing wife, Kristie. It's nice to have friends, ain't it? The script was written on my very old titanium PowerBook G4 also known as the Ti-Book.

[ TIP ] Use a crappy computer for writing so you don't get distracted! Apple makes a great product, and the fact that this old PowerBook is still running after all these years of heavy use and abuse really impresses me. I ran my graphic design studio with this machine for many years, and it's served me well. But with an 800MHz processsor and 768 of RAM, it's a relic. The reason I use this old PowerBook is because it's amazingly outdated, and therefore, painfully slow. Doesn't perform well doing anything except text. So it's a GREAT writing machine, and a BAD design/game/video/web browsing/music/torrent machine. Great way to eliminate distractions, yes? [ END TIP ]

The script is a detective story, set in New Orleans. I'm going to do my best to dance around story spoilers, so forgive me if I write cryptically about story points. I'll discuss story in more detail once it hits the shelf and everyone's had a chance to read it. So in the meantime, this creative journal will focus on actually making the comic with a few hints here and there to keep it interesting.

One of the big goals of this journal, and the comic itself, is for me to keep learning and growing as a creator. I've made a lot of friends through the years, and one of the side effects of making friends is you end up with a network of professionals you trust and respect. Along with other comic creators, my professional network includes marketing professionals, graphic designers, engineers, software developers, social networking gurus, accountants, investors, lawyers, small business owners, etc. I'll be reaching out to this network and bringing them in for short interviews and tips. My gut tells me this is going to be a whole lot of fun.

Here are a few bullet points about what's already happened:

• I've talked with a few publishers that have shown great interest in this project, haven't officially signed with anyone yet. No need to rush through this, but I'm certainly leaning in a certain direction.
  
• I've done five full color test pages for the story, but will likely redraw them because of story revisions.
  
• Everyone that's read the story seems to be impressed. I'm not sure if they're impressed with the story itself, or the fact that I actually finished it. Time will tell.
• I've played around with logo designs, and I've got one that I've been using as a temporary logo. I'll be redesigning this eventually. You'll see the progress throughout.
  
• I've had conversations with retailers about marketing and promoting creator owned work, and some of the things they respond to and the things they're likely to ignore. 
• Through the years, I've been compiling a detailed spreadsheets of retailers and media contacts. I've been tweaking it through the years, adding and removing as I go. No, you can't have it.
• I have also been developing a detailed marketing plan. This includes a timeline of when things need to happen, and where information needs to go. Once I establish a marketing budget, this marketing plan will evolve and expand. I haven't yet decided if this is something I want to share in public, or keep to myself. It's been a very large investment of time and something I'll continue to use and develop as I move forward with new projects. 

There's more to come, but deadlines call.
Thanks for reading!

— Kody