Or, I suppose I should say, front load waste container-emptying truck since This Is How You Die has taught me that Dumpster™ is a trademark of Dempster Brothers, Inc. Thanks, TIHYD! Speaking of which, my TIHYD autograph count now stands at 1, Meredith Gran, who illustrated ROCK AND ROLL. I should also note that the first copies of To Be Or Not To Be are available at the TopatoCo book and a lovely fellow brought one by to get Meredith (and Jon Rosenberg’s) autograph, and one of Meredith’s two illustrations is for the ending where (spoiler alert!) Ophelia just starts killing the crap out of everybody until half of Denmark has personally been murdered by her and it is hilarious.

• Speaking of Ms Gran, I asked about her Gender & Comic Books panel, later today at 1:00pm in room 28DE and it turns out she never agreed to be on this panel and is trying to figure out why the heck she’s listed as a participant. I’ll be double-checking with her to determine if she’s going to participate, but at this point I’d kind of doubt it.
• Still at the Dumbrella booth, Rich Stevens has two samples (one hardcover, one softcover) of his Oni Press reprint collection, I’m A Rocker, I Rock Out (the first of a series of themed collections — this one focuses on Indie Rock Pete[r Gaylord Wiener]), and they are beautiful to behold. It’s my understanding that Oni have a limited number of copies of the collection at their booth, in the 1800 aisle, underneath the giant hanging banner that features Red Robot.
• The endlessly cheerful Kazu Kibuishi looks good; this time last year he had a health crisis that came pretty close to killing him, but he’s bounced back. I’ve known people to have faced bad health situations and subsequently fall into a never-ending cycle of worry about what goes wrong next; Kibuishi has decided to be happy.

  He’s happy to be working, happy to see the positive reactions to the Harry Potter book covers¹ he’s done (the latest gets released today), happy that he got to do back-cover images for the books², happy to be working on Amulet again, happy to see his kids growing up healthy and safe. He hopes to finish Amulet 6 by December or so (print lead times meaning we may see it in a year or so) and is working out ideas for volume 7 and beyond. At this point, there’s no limit to the series and he is full of stories to share; after knowing that he is well again, that’s the best possible news.

• As mentioned earlier, Kibuishi is sharing booth space with Gallery Nucleus, Olly Moss, Scott C, various Flight contributors, and the entirely adorable Becky and Frank at the back of the 2700 aisle.
  Becky and Frank have a limited number of a new resin toy (see photo at top) at their booth (sharing with ) in multiple colorways, and the possibility of vinyl later. They’ve also got a gallery show (arranged by Nucleus) in Pasadena that is launching near the end of the month, a show that will see Becky’s work shelved alongside Dr Suess originals. Details aren’t released yet, so keep your eyes open on that one.
• Back in Webcomics Central, there’s a lot of people thrilled by their recent/ongoing Kickstarter successes: Sam Logan, Evan Dahm, Kris Straub, Aaron Diaz, David Malki ! (who has an actual Machine of Death, ready to predict your demise), Ryan North — taken together they’re responsible for something on the order of US$2.5 million of creative commerce.

  Speaking with Make That Thing Benevolent Dictator For Life Holly Rowland, we ballparked an estimate that MTT may hit US$1.5 – 1.6 million of project shepherding in 2013, their first year of operation. While we were having that bit of conversation over booth construction, the hardest working man in comics, Jim Zub wandered by and we were able to talk about Samurai Jack and Skullkickers.

• With respect to the former, it’s hopefully going to be an ongoing title, not just the five-issue limited that’s been announced. As Zub put it If they keep buying, we’ll keep making it. He’s excited about the storytelling and visual experimentation that Jack (which was experimental on both counts) will lend itself to, and noted a model for a five issues/one issue production pattern (much like Skullkickers, which consists of five issue story arcs, followed by one issue of guest short stories) that I’m not entirely certain I’m allowed to share right now, so let me just say that you want this 5/1 model to come to fruition. You don’t even know how much those 1s will rock.

  Speaking of Skullkickers, the fourth story arc just wrapped, the fourth guest issue is on deck, and Zub is busy working on the fifth arc (we’ve seen the basic sword/sorcery arc, the urban intrigue arc, the pirate arc, and the jungle arc; this one will be the frozen north/viking/barbarian arc). He’s hoping to mostly get the two remaining arcs (the sixth will be … the kitchen sink, throw everything in there, find out what the hell has been going on …) done in 2014, which means that 2015 can be the wrap-up tour, comprehensive omnibus collections for everybody, and letting the next project (there’s always a next project with Zub) come to the fore.

  If the timing works out right, the online MWF reruns of Skullkickers will catch up and finish about the same time the last issue sees print. That’s not only a neat way to wrap up the project, it may be a necessity: Zub’s primary artistic partner, Edwin Huang, has been getting a lot of inquiries and requests on various projects, and may be very busy if Zub doesn’t get him on the remaining issues quickly. Dang, good work leading to attention and more work — doesn’t suck.

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¹ The request to do the covers came along at a time when after-effects of his illness made writing difficult, but drawing was still possible.

² He had an image that he really loved for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire but was perhaps too subtle for the cover; he offered to rework it as a back cover image, and it worked so well that he continued the experiment for the other six volumes.

It’s the little touches that you notice, the ones that say I’m paying attention, like turning a piece of wall art into an impromptu superhero in a classy, understated way. Well done, San Diego.

• For those of you in (or coming to) San Diego, you now have one more thing that you should include in your to-do list: on Friday morning at the Hachette booth (#1116, around the corner from Webcomics Central), there will be a This Is How You Die signing, with eight of the writers and artists from the book in one place for your convenience. Additionally, there will be another eight contributors on the show floor at various places and times, a checklist of which David Malki ! has helpfully provided for you. One possible correction to that checklist: it has Braden Lamb at booth #2734 and he may in fact be at booth #2235 due to the previously-mentioned Great Booth Swap of Aught-Thirteen. I’ll check around today and get back to you on that.
• Speaking of booth #2743, Scott C will be there, and you may want to ask him about something cool coming in October. The only thing that could make a second volume of Great Showdowns better is if it included the amazing Pacific Rim Showdown from yesterday, but an October release date means these books are already in the printing pipeline. Oh well, guess that means that there will have to be a third collection in a year or so. Darn.
• Finally, those of you looking past the end of SDCC and who will be in New York in a couple of weeks, and are sick of the extremely hot summer already, Kristen Siebecker has announced her latest learn to drink the good stuff class, this time on the topic of pairing wine with warm-weather foods. You get booze, you get snacks, you get a convenient new location at the West Elm Market in DUMBO, Brooklyn, you get 10% off the class with the code EMAIL10, and 15% discount in the market after the class. August 7th, 6:30pm, at 50 Washington Street in Brooklyn.

For the rest of the week, expect postings throughout the day, as often as I can make them happen.

If all is working correctly, I am on a flight from Newark to San Francisco, and thence to San Diego as this post goes live. This will also serve as a reminder that I’ll be on Pacific Daylight Time for the next while, and postings may be later than you are used to. Then again, I may just post throughout the day rather than try to stick to one update per day, so come back here regular-like and you’ll be fine.

• In the now-ish timeframe, I am thrilled to report that Kris Straub’s Broodhollow Kickstarter cleared goal around the six hour mark, is already knocking down stretch goals, and is trending high on Kicktraq¹. Speaking of spooktacular Kickstarts, Abby Howard’s campaign for The Last Halloween is in its final minutes and may well hit the US$130,000 mark. The C and the D could not be any more cranked.
• Also happening roughly now, Paul Southworth recently spent some time drawing people that responded to him on his Twitterfeed, and is now opening the opportunity up to all:
  

  Digital Cartoon Portrait Studio’ is open for business! http://southworth.bigcartel.com/ Digital cartoon portraits starting at $35.

  Speaking as the owner of a Southworth original (from the Ugly Hill days), that’s a frickin’ bargain. If you get a portrait from him, see if you can talk him into including the Eyes of Liquid Rage.

• The Cartoon Art Museum will again be hosting some of the greatest talents in comics at their SDCC home, booth #1930, and will also again be hosting the CAM Sketch-A-Thon. For a suggestion donation of just ten bucks you can get a drawing from your favorite creator! Preliminary schedule now up on the CAM website, although circumstances may require last-minute changes, so check back there regularly.

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¹ Obligatory disclaimer: the early Kicktraq predictions are wildly higher than almost any project will actually make good on; give it another 24 hours and apply the Fleen Fudge Factor and we’ll have an idea where it’s headed.http://www.jspowerhour.com/li

Of course it does, just as I’m trying to get things together for SDCC 2013. Well, let’s see what we’ve got.

• Probably the biggest news of the day is the release of the official Harvey Awards nominees, wherein indy- and web-type creators are killing it:
  • Creator-owned SAGA takes seven nominations, including Best Writer, Best Artist, Best Colorist, Best Cover Artist, Best New Series, Best Continuing or Limited Series, and Best Single Issue or Story.
  • Longtime independent creator Terry Moore has been justly recognized for Rachel Rising, which has unfortunately now gotten fully into the “critical lauded, but nowhere near widely read” territory. Seriously, if you backed The Sleep of Reason or read Broodhollow you should be reading Rachel Rising, which is nominated for Best Cartoonist and Best Continuing or Limited Series.
  • Ed Ryzowski, who colors Evil, Inc, The Gutters, Looking for Group, and Terminals, is nominated for Best Colorist alongside colleagues from Marvel, Image, and Archie.
  • Adventure Time is tabbed for Best New Series (against the aforementioned SAGA and the critically-acclaimed breakout hit of the year, Hawkeye), Special Award for Humor in Comics (okay, that’s actually a nomination for writer Ryan North, who is competing with Jim Zub for Skullkickers among others), and Best Original Graphic Publication for Younger Readers.
  • That last category, Best Original Graphic Publication for Younger Readers? Other nominees include Cow Boy (where artist Chris Eliopoulos is also up for Best Letterer), Amelia Rules, and Drama; this category is an embarrassment of riches.
  • Most directly relevant to this page, the nods for Best Online Comics Work have been given to:
    • Bandette, Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover
    • Battlepug, Mike Norton
    • The Dreamer, Lora Innes
    • Nimona, Noelle Stevenson
    • Sheldon, Dave Kellett

  And that’s just scratching the surface. Every year there’s talk about the Harveys getting gamed by publisher block-voting, but this year appears to feature a hell of a lot of strong work. Fleen congratulates all the nominees.

• Speaking of Broodhollow, it just keeps getting better and better, and the first arc of the ongoing story finished up today and oh man did Kris Straub deliver up a satisfying twist to the story. End of the arc seems a good place to make a book, and coincidentally the Kickstarter for Broodhollow Book One: Curious Little Thing launched about four hours back.

  My guess is that as good as Broodhollow is (and it is very, very good) three days a week, it is going to be even moreso to devastating degree in large chunks. It is one of the most prickling-unease-crawling-at-the-back-of-your-brain stories that you will ever read, and I urge you in the strongest possible terms to back it now. Also, to keep the patterns and check all the doors and look directly at that which haunts you because then it can’t get you.

• Speaking of Ryan North, The AV Club gave an absolutely glowing review to This Is How You Die, which North edited along with Matt Bennardo and David Malki !. Remember, TIHYD drops tomorrow, and if you’re flying to SDCC your mission is to see if it can be purchased in an airport bookstore.
• Speaking of Jim Zub, I’m a little late on this one, but did you see that he’s going to be writing a Samurai Jack comic series for IDW? I don’t feel so bad about him getting jerked around by DC back in January now, since I imagine he’ll have far more creative independence working on Samurai Jack than he would have in an environment driven by editorial fiat.

  In other news, that’s another book I’ll have to add to my pull list come October, and with any luck it’ll go from five-issue miniseries to ongoing. That’s more likely to occur if lots of us buy it, and more Zub is always a good thing, so write yourself a note to buy it when it comes out.

• Lastly, best of luck to the Team Venture crew (a significant fraction of whom are the creators of Little Gamers as they set out on the first leg of their drive to Ulan Bator. You can follow their progress here, where it seems that they’re currently in the Czech Republic, in a corner of the world where Western infrastructure (beer, wifi, democratic regimes) are reasonably common and the countries fit into single time zones. They’ve got a long way to go yet, and vast open countries to cross, and we at Fleen wish them safe travels and sane adventure.

Of course, there are storms, and then there are storms, and terrifying as your basic sharknado is, I’m not sure that it’s actually scarier than the five-day pop-culture death-march that is San Diego Comic Con, which will be kicking off a little more than 120 hours from now. We’ve mentioned who’s going to be there, where to find them, and what panels to attend, so all that’s remaining is getting everybody out to SoCal and preparing for the onslaught.

Actually, one last clarification regarding SDCC exhibitors is warranted: What Pumpkin, the business arm of Andrew Hussie’s personal brain fancies, is in fact going to be there. I had no luck finding them in the exhibitor lists, but that’s because I didn’t read between the lines carefully enough in the ShiftyLook offsite announcement. Not only will Andrew Hussie be doing autograph sessions at the Gaslamp Hilton terrace, What Pumpkin will be engaged in acts of boothing there.

For those looking for things to do after the Great Westerly Nerd Migration, The Toonseum just announced that their third annual specialty beer has reached fruition: the 2013 edition of Illustration Ale by Pittsburgh’s East End Brewing Company is a bottle-conditioned Belgian-style ale, limited to 1500 bottles, with six different labels from local Pittsburgh artists.

East End Brewing and the ToonSeum will unveil the 2013 Illustration Ale with a special tasting session at the ToonSeum on August 3rd. Guests will not only get the first sips of the special brew, but will also be able to meet past and present label artists, have their bottles autographed, and enjoy the current exhibit, 65 Years of Legends: Six Decades of the Reuben Awards.

Tickets to the tasting are $25.00 and include one free bottle of from the artist of your choosing; fun times start at 7:00pm.

Final note before we call it a week: Fleen’s domain shift will take place over the weekend, so if you can’t find us, give DNS a chance to propagate and maybe clear your browser cache. If you find any problems in the new site, let us know in the comments. We already know about the following:

1. The mail form on the contact page needs configuring.
2. Ditto the RSS feed (we’ll let you know when it’s time to resubscribe).
3. Images associated with posts before the end of August 2008 won’t be there; this isn’t associated with the server shift, I noticed it on the old server as well. As near as I can tell, the images are all still in the media library, but the HTML code that includes them in the appropriate postings is gone from the database. I expect that I’ll have time to recreate those approximately never.

That’s it. Enjoy your weekend, and see a whole mess o’ you next week.

The inestimable Scott C dropped a tweet this afternoon that may save a lot of confusion for those attending SDCC 2013 next week:

Booth change for #SDCC! @gallerynucleus will be #2743! i will be there with the gang… @ollymoss @sirmitchell @boltcity @beckyandfrank

Going back to our floor guide, it’s more than a case of just shifting around a couple of booth numbers, because Booth #2743 was already occupied by BOOM! Studios, which is now listed in the SDCC Exhibitor Guide as now being at Booth #2235, which was formerly occupied by … Gallery Nucleus.

Everybody got that? Gallery Nucleus and BOOM! have swapped places. Changes have been made to the earlier posting.

• Speaking of Olly Moss (who will be part of the Gallery Nucleus/Bolt City group in their new home), a lot of his work is done for Mondo, the in-house art gallery/design shop of Alamo Drafthouse¹, who will be situated at Booth #936 on the show floor. Mostly I’m mentioning this because that’s where you’ll be able to see the work of Moss and his fellow designers, retro-styled posters for movies that put the actual work of studios to shame. Seriously, check out Moss’s take on Spirited Away and tell me you don’t want to live inside that image.

In less SDCC-related news, webcomics seem to be making themselves known in quiet ways.

• On the one hand, the Humble Ebook Bundle II [link good for the next six days or so] is halfway through its two week run, and today announced four new books for those that pledge more than the average amount (presently sitting at US$10.24). Two of the four are xkcd volume 0 and the first Machine of Death anthology.
• On the other hand, WordPress today released an official theme just for webcomics; dubbed Panel, it features a mechanism for strip publishing, strip-related blogging, archiving, and integration with social media channels.

  It’s still too soon to tell if it will overtake the excellent Comic Easel plugin from Phil “Frumph” Hofer³ which focuses on functionality inside any theme; like so many other things, it will likely come down to ability vs ease of use. Those that host their comics at WordPress.com will probably find Panels to be a simple approach; those that run their own WordPress installations and like lots of rich features — and are willing to do more of the work themselves — will find that Hofer’s toolbox lets them build interesting and powerful things.

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¹ Possibly the greatest movie theaters in history, Alamo Drafthouse also sponsors Badass Digest² and promulgates what is definitely the greatest theatergoer behavior code in history. [A/V, NSFW]

² Who in turn run the work of possibly the greatest living writer on film, Film Crit Hulk.

³ Hofer has been very kindly aiding me in figuring out how to migrate Fleen to its new hosting for the past week; he is generous with his time and knowledge, and I can vouch firsthand that he knows what the hell he is doing and if you’re anything like me, he will save you days of flailing about and trial-and-error. And since time and knowledge should be rewarded, I clicked on the button marked Donate and sent him an amount equal to the value of the time he saved me.

We’ve mentioned a lot of webcomic-centric people and events at SDCC 2103 over the past week or so, and there’s still things to mention.

• ShiftyLook’s off-site events include hours-long Andrew Hussie autograph sessions (Thursday 4:00pm; Friday 3:30pm; Sunday 1:00pm); livecasts with Chris Hastings, Ryan North, and Alex Culang (Thursday 7:00pm), Rob Paulsen and Scott Kurtz (Friday 7:00pm), Zach Weinersmith and Jennifer Hale (Saturday 7:00pm); and spotlight sessions on Mappy with Scott Kurtz and Kris Straub (Saturday 6:00pm) and Wonder Momo with Jim Zub and Erik Ko (Sunday 12:30pm).
• The creators behind SMBC Theatre, Cyanide and Happiness, and other video chucklemongers are going offsite for an evening of japery, lessons learned, and sneak peeks. No Laughs Allowed is sponsored by Callback Comedy and will take place at Reading Cinemas Gaslamp 15 Theater on 5th Street, Saturday at 7:00pm. Get yer tickets now.
• For the third year in a row, Tr!ickster will be providing an offsite space for creator-owned stuff to not be lost in the hell of giant media conglomerates. They’re going to be at East Village Tavern Bowl, about eight blocks from the convention center, from Wednesday afternoon to Sunday.
• For those trapped on the con floor and feeling all desire for continued existence slipping away, [Adult Swim] may actually have a solution for you. Yeah, yeah, panels, famous people, etc., don’t care. Here’s the good stuff:
  

  Fans can also stop by the Adult Swim booth #3721 to enjoy free mini massages and a place to escape from the hectic pace of the convention floor. [emphasis mine]

  Oh man, what if they had a little dark, sound-insulated room with comfy couches? That would rule.

In other news:

• Question of the Ages: Just how much do people like porn? Possible answer, going by the relative amounts raised by the Smut Peddler (porn) and Sleep of Reason (not porn) Kickstarts, run by the same person and featuring many of the same creators: the porn raised US$83,100 and the not-porn raised US46,925, meaning that people preferred porn by a ratio of approximately 1.77:1.

  Another way to look at things? Using the same more-money-raised-means-bigger-bonuses-for-creators scheme, porn makers got paid an extra US$650 to not-porn makers getting US$300 or a 2.17:1 incentive the next time your favorite creator is wondering what the next project should be.

• Finally, a quick note that Fleen should be completing its transition to new hosting this weekend; if you notice anything broken, you can be sure to let me know. Also, I’d like to thank Brad Guigar for putting up a WordPress Newbies Guide today at Webcomics Dot Com … after I’d learned most of his lessons through trial and error. Great timing, Brad!¹

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¹ Awww, like I could be mad at him. C’mere, Brad, give me a hug.

I gave you an extra post on Sunday, so I’m taking a day today; server migration is a process. Not hard or impossible, but precise and picky and detail-oriented, and it’s past time I should have learned all of this. See you tomorrow.

Oh, okay, one piece of news: Sam Logan raised the money for his Omnibus Collection within twelve hours of launch, is closing in on 200% funding as I write this, and has already added four stretch goals worth of extras to make the books nicer. Initial guess as to total amount in four weeks: US$130,000 to US$260,000 per the Fleen Fudge Factor¹.

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¹ Look it up.

Did you see the Friday and Saturday SDCC programming notes I posted yesterday? Because you totally got a weekend posting out of me. We’ll get to the Sunday programming down below, but first let’s get some other things squared away.

• Book Thing The First: Howard Tayler¹ has opened pre-orders for his ninth collection, Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic. Tayler’s comics always deliver highly on both the print quality per dollar and laugh-chuckles per dollar scales, so give ‘er a look.
• Book Thing The Second: David Malki !, Ryan North, and Matt Bennardo are aiming to make a whole passel o’ people official New York Times #1 best seller authors. Much like how the first collection of the Machine of Death became the #1 seller on Amazon and gave Glenn Beck a sad, This Is How You Die is aiming to front-load sales across all distribution points to debut in the Times in the top slot. Let’s let North give you the details:
  

  This will be especially awesome since, like the first volume, this will be the first publishing credit for most of the authors in the book. We honestly don’t know if this idea is possible. But we know it’s possible to try.

  Every sale from today onwards counts towards our NYT status. If this book at all interesting, and you think you might like reading inventive and memorable stories curated by a dude whose comics you like, then why not head over to Amazon.com (or .ca or .co.uk) and get the book? They’ve got it on sale for 30% off retail. [emphasis original]

  On top of that, publishers Grand Central Books have released a sweet, hilarious, mayhem-filled book trailer video that nicely explores the premise of the titular Machine and especially the fact that it has a cruel sense of humor. I liked the fourth segment (TIME TRAVEL) best because of an especially good twist, but you can decide for yourself after viewing².

• Book Thing The Third: Sam Logan launched a Kickstart about four hours ago to fund the printing of what may be the largest webcomic collection to hit paper so far — a 1500+ page omnibus edition of the first seven years of Sam and Fuzzy. Naturally, in that time he’s hit 58% of a relatively hefty US$27,000 goal (those 1500+ page omnibii don’t come cheap), which should surprise exactly nobody.

  What is a bit surprising is the rather high per-backer pledge, which as of this writing sits at US$115.14; granted, some of that is because the basic version of the omnibus is gonna set you back US$49, with increasingly fancy versions at US$69 and US$95, but all of those fall below the average.

  Nope, the average can only be explained by the highly-personalized rewards (custom avatars and portraits) available at the US$160+, and the already-claimed tiers that promise original production artwork (US$750 and US$850). Lessons to draw from Logan’s campaign include:

  • Big, exciting projects capture the imagination
  • Having a backlog of demand for never-before printed material is good
  • One-of-a-kind rewards will elicit a siren song whose chorus is Give me money
  • If you’re going to have to send a bunch of books that weigh 3 or more kilos, it’s a good idea to have Make That Thing in your corner

  In fact, I’ll make one last observation here about Make That Thing (a division of TopatoCo) from their announcement³:

  After Kickstarter backers receive their rewards, the softcover books will be sold online through TopatoCo, who are fortifying their warehouse’s foundations this very moment.

  TopatoCo is the United States’ third-largest publisher of independent comics products. Based in Easthampton, Mass., TopatoCo creates books, apparel, gift items, and novelties for over fifty of the world’s most popular web-based creators.

  Did you catch that? TopatoCo is the United States’ third-largest publisher of independent comics products. I’m guessing that the first two have names like Top Shelf or Fantagraphics, and what’s more TopatoCo does far more than just printing comics. The scale of it all is a little boggling.

Sunday Programming

Funky Winkerbean’s 40th+ Anniversary
10:30am – 11:30am Room 8
I was going to list this solely to ensure that Chris Sims wouldn’t miss it, but sadly he tweeted this morning that he has a conflict. Even when he’s not reading the strip, Sims is crushed by the despair of life conspiring against him.

How and Why to Write a Great All-Ages Comic Book
11:00am – 12:00pm Room 28DE
By the time Sunday rolls around, you start to see some repetition in panel topics especially considering that this day’s programming skews towards kids. But you’d be a fool to pass up the chance to listen to Andy Runton, Jimmy Gownley, Katie Cook, and more.

Faith Erin Hicks in Conversation with Jeff Smith
11:30am – 12:30pm Room 8
The appeal should be self-evident.

Shattering Convention in Comic Book Storytelling
1:30pm – 2:30pm Room 23ABC
The title disguises the intent a bit — it’s about how there can actually be comics characters that aren’t white guys. Features Brandon Thomas, Gene Luen Yang, and Gail Freakin’ Simone.

Keenspot 2013: Red Giant Expands to Consume the Earth
2:00pm – 3:00pm Room 4
Wouldn’t be Sunday at SDCC without the Keenspot panel.

First Second: Gene Yang and Paul Pope In Conversation
3:30pm – 4:30pm Room 26AB
The title says it all; it’s a shame it’s been shuffled off to nearly the very end of the con when people are honestly thinking about getting home (if they haven’t thrown in the towel already).

Get Comics Anywhere
4:00pm – 5:00pm Room 28DE
Tablets and phones — are you making your comics look good on them? Why the hell not?

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¹ As far as evil doppelganger’s from a parallel universe go, he’s the best I could have hoped for.

² Other deaths: OLD AGE, PARACHUTE FAILURE, HOT GIRL, BEAR.

³ I would have written up this Kickstart regardless, but the announcement from MTT Public Affairs Supremo Sara McHenry is a work of beauty and it seems a shame not to share it.

As a quick heads-up, there’s a lot of media presentations on Friday and Saturday, and the comics-related topics take a bit of a back seat.

Friday Programming
Writers Unite: Pitching and Writing Creator-Owned Comics
11:00am – 12:00pm Room 23ABC
It’s got a series of creators that are identified by both corporate-owned properties they’ve worked on and their creator-owned projects. Most importantly, Jim Zub will be there.

CBLDF: Raising a Reader
12:00pm – 1:00pm Room 30CDE
Want kids to get interested in comics? Give them comics¹, and you could hardly do better than made by the panelists.

Drawing Stories: What’s New in YA Graphic Novels
12:00pm – 1:00pm Room 25ABC
Vera Brosgol, Gris Grimly, Faith Erin Hicks, Hope Larson, and Paul Pope. What more do you need?

Celebrating Strangers in Paradise’s 20th Anniversary with Terry Moore
4:00pm – 5:00pm Room 23ABC
To paraphrase something I said with respect to Jeff Smith’s spotlight panel on Thursday, this is what a twenty year independent career looks like.

Digital and Print: Friends or Foes?
6:00pm – 7:00pm Room 9
I want to go see this one to see if the consensus has shifted since I moderated Webcomics: Threat or Menace? at NYCC in — goodness! — 2008.

Rise of the Independents
6:00pm – 7:00pm Room 32AB
Sounds good, but a caveat: they’re using “independents” to refer to non-Big Two publishers like Image, Dark Horse, and IDW.

Axe Cop
8:00pm – 9:00pm Room 6DE
Premiere episode will be screened and there will be staged battles by cosplayers choreographed by Malachai Nicolle which should be awesome. Also, ready to feel old? Malachai is now nine, he dreamt up Axe Cop when he was five, which means he is rapidly approaching having spent half his life as a comic creator and he’s not even in junior high school yet.

Saturday Programming
ShiftyLook: Video Games/Webcomics Amalgam Extraordinaire!
2:00pm – 3:00pm Room 28DE
Given that this session combines Zach Weinersmith, Kris and Scott (Scott and Kris), and Andrew Hussie, I fear that the room may be too small. Judging from the maps, Room 28DE (waaay over to the left, past the Sails Pavilion, past Ballroom 20, in the upper-left corner) has a capacity of 200, tops.

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In fact, for the first time, I’m noticing that most of these sessions I’m recommending are over the southern half of the convention center. Allow for an extra 15 minutes or so to get there.

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Mainstream Talent and Indie Spirit
2:30pm – 3:30pm Room 5AB
Looks pretty similar in tone to the Writers Unite panel on Friday morning, but if there’s one thing you can’t have too much of, it’s Jim Zub.

comiXology Submit: The Future of Self-Publishing
3:00pm – 4:00pm Room 23ABC
Oddly, a big part of the pitch for this session references — quoting here — Kickstarter sensation Rachel Deering², which definitely involves a different kind of self-publishing than the comiXology kind. Odd.

Adventure Time Comic Book Panel
3:30pm – 4:30pm Room 8
Ryan North, Shelli Paroline and Braden Lamb, Meredith Gran, and Natasha Allegri. I was hoping they might have Yuko and Ananth also to talk about their imminent six-part miniseries of PepBut and Cinnamon Bun in a noir mystery, but you can’t have everything.

Spotlight on Vera Brosgol
4:00pm – 5:00pm Room 4
I’ll be the guy asking how much money she wants to finish up Return To Sender.

Jeff Smith and Terry Moore
5:30pm – 6:30pm Room 24ABC
To paraphrase something I said with respect to Jeff Smith’s spotlight panel on Thursday, and also Terry Moore’s retrospective panel on Friday, this is what two twenty year independent careers look like.

Financing Your Dream: Kickstarter Fundraising
6:00pm – 7:00pm Room 23ABC
Everybody involved in this panel appears to have been part of a major property like Star Trek or Battlestar Galactica; low chance of it addressing the scale of the individual creator.

Stripped: The Comics Documentary
7:00pm – 8:00pm Room 28DE
Last year Dave Kellett revealed that he’d gotten an email interview with Bill Watterson; a few months back he made it known that he’d upgraded that to a voice interview. I am almost afraid to guess what he might drop on us this year, but wouldn’t you want to be there when “Dave Kellett” removes the lifelike mask covering his face and is revealed to be Bill Watterson!?³

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¹ As I write this, it’s the day after my youngest nephew received as part of his birthday present a stack of Adventure Time and Road to Oz comics, along with both volumes of Astronaut Academy and Drawing Comics is Easy! (Except When It’s Hard). He’s five and I hope to be starting him down a long, enjoyable road.

² I wasn’t familiar with Ms Deering so I searched for her; if I’ve found the right person, she’s run two projects, both successful, for a total of just over US$32,000. I don’t wish to minimize her achievement, she’s funding her comics, that’s admirable — but whoever wrote that copy needs to adjust their definition of “sensation”. Here is a small sample of projects that I feel would better qualify for that word.

³ That’s not going to happen. Probably. Maybe I should check with Dave’s wife to be sure.