Holy crap, somebody went and made Ana-Tomix. Chris Onstad is, once again, ahead of his time. Let me know when you’ve got the three-ball option, or the counterintuitive uniball model.

Okay, so the Harvey Awards. The ballot got announced yesterday and again there’s the inexplicably high number of nominations for one publisher (Valiant this time) due to block voting (it’s part of the game)¹, and again there’s an inexplicable set of nominees for the webcomics category. Let’s take a look:

Best Online Comics Work

• Albert the Alien, Trevor Mueller and Gabriel Bautista
• Battlepug, Mike Norton
• Bloom County 2015, Berkeley Breathed
• Oh Joy, Sex Toy, Erika Moen and Matthew Nolan
• Zombie Boy, Mark Stokes

Where to start, where to start? Once again, nominees are distinguished solely by their medium for distribution, with no regard to length, format, genre, or purpose. The longform Battlepug and Albert the Alien are up against the strip-based Bloom County and Zombie Boy, and the educational, page-oriented Oh Joy, Sex Toy. Could there someday be a recognition that OJST should be in the educational category (okay, the Harveys don’t have one, but the Eisners do, if memory serves), or at least matched up against educational comics like Your Wild City and Battlepug against Dr McNinja? Also, how is Bloom County nominated for both Best Online Comics Work and Best Syndicated Strip or Panel? The one really should preclude the other.

Then again, complaining here has no value, since this is based off of how many people nominated their own work and got their friends to do likewise. Get organized and see what you can do for next year. And while you’re plotting out the takeover of the webcomics category next year, check out the webcomickers that are competing in the print arena:

• Giant Days (written by John Allison, art by Lissa Tremain and Max Sarin on art) and The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl (written by Ryan North, art by Erica Henderson) are competing for Best Continuing or Limited Series against the likes of Bitch Planet and Saga
• The Less Than Epic Adventures of TJ and Amal (written and drawn by EK Weaver) is contending for Best Graphic Album Previously Published against five Valiant books²
• Giant Days again, up for Best Original Graphic Publication For Younger Readers versus Lumberjanes and Over the Garden Wall (although, mysteriously, nothing by Raina Telgemeier or Kazu Kibuishi)
• Lissa Tremain is up for Most Promising New Talent, to complement Giant Days (again!), up for Best New Series

It’s John Allison’s year, people. We’re just living in it.

Balloting for the Harveys is open until 8 August, with comics professionals eligible to vote. The awards will be presented at Baltimore Comic-Con on 5 September.

Spam of the day:

truTV PR: Media Alert: truTV’s Impractical Jokers Invade San Diego with Fan Events

Heh — Gmail has categorized an actual PR email blast as Be careful with this message. Similar messages were used to steal people’s personal information. Unless you trust the sender, don’t click links or reply with personal information. Awesome.

_______________
¹ Then again, I see that both Terry Moore (for Rachel Rising)and Stan Sakai (for Usagi Yojimbo) are nominated as Best Cartoonist, without publisher-wide blocks behind them. That’s gotta be purely the respect of their peers, and well deserved, too.

² Take that, voting block!

If there’s a better way in webcomics to work on your craft and get noticed outside your usual audience than getting that one idea you’ve got perfectly polished and tight and accepted by an anthology full of super-skilled people, I don’t know what it is. Examples follow:

• We were just talking about Beyond Press the other day and look what happened over the long weekend: they went and launched the Kickstart for an anthology that looks pretty damn impressive. Elements: Fire is going to present stories from the speculative fiction end of the spectrum (your basic sci fi, but also horror, cyberpunk, and the like) featuring characters — and, crucially, creators — from the underrepresented end of the talent pool¹:
  

  Elements looks to add to the current conversation happening in the book industry: yes #WeNeedDiverseBooks, but #WeNeedDiverseCreators too. We are no longer just the sidekicks or token characters, we’re creators with our own stories to tell. In Elements we’re the main characters, dismantling tropes with our own stories that see people like us saving the day. Be it quelling a volcano, learning to fight with our brand of love, or breaking cyberspace, we want to let these stories and characters take center stage.

  The contributor’s list features names that I recognize — Aatmaja Pandya, Der-shing Helmer, edited by Taneka Stotts with an assist from Shing Yin Khor — and a bunch more that I don’t, which is great (cf: above, about getting noticed). Taking a cue from anthology maestro C Spike Trotman, Elements: Fire will be offering bonuses to its creative team based on funding levels, which is becoming a welcome trend².

  Since launch on Friday (and over a long holiday weekend with people away from their computers), the campaign has cleared 58% funding on a US$30K goal and attracted enough early support to qualify for the Fleen Funding Formula, Mark II, which now predicts a total of US$50K +/- $10K (this is the first time numbers have ever turned out so beautifully round), which would mean bonuses of US$100-$300 per creator/team. The opportunity to discover killer talent with an experienced editor, and everybody gets paid? Time to make with the clicky and support.

• Speaking of anthologies, the Spike-helmed New World anthology got some damn good notices over at The AV Club today courtesy of Caitlin Rosberg:
  

  Though each creator’s style is different, the level of skill and talent is consistently high and there is something for every reader’s taste….But all 24 of the comics are excellent in their own right.

  If there’s one thing that ties all of the pieces together beyond the genres they fit into, it’s that each forces a character or characters to make an incredibly weighty choice….Each of the pieces has a clear perspective and message, as much speculative fiction does, but every single one of the creators avoids heavy-handed manipulation and preachiness, two common pitfalls for less skilled sci-fi/fantasy creators. Rather than lecturing the reader, they start a conversation by shifting perspectives and inviting introspection, which is speculative fiction at its best.

  New World is available in both print and PDF from the Iron Circus store.

• Anthologies need not even be big ol’ book; they can fit into floppy-style comic books as well. We mentioned previously that Faith Erin Hicks would be doing a Ms Marvel/Squirrel Girl story in an Avengers annual due in August; now it appears that other creators (Natasha Allegri! Zac Gorman! Scott Kurtz! Chirp Zblarglblarg!) will be adding their own takes as Ms Marvel gets to share all her in-universe fanfic.
• Tomorrow is First Wednesday, meaning it’s time for the second of the previously-announced TopatoCo Summertime Funtime Drink ‘n’ Draws, and what is a drink ‘n’ draw but an anthology of people instead of stories? Making the trip to Easthampton will be special Drinker/Drawers Meredith Gran and Mike Holmes; fun starts at 7:00pm at Eastworks, runs until 10:00pm, and is unfettered by filthy cover charges. All in the Pioneer Valley area, go and have fun.

Spam of the day:

Limited Time: 60% Off Silicone Wedding Bands

So millennials don’t want to buy diamonds, and your counter is to try to market unsized squeezy bits of medical material that behave like slow-acting tourniquets? Okay.

_______________
¹ Anybody that’s sputtering about Why aren’t there anthologies for white creators? can leave now. Door’s to your left.

² Also to be noted for bonus payments: Erika Moen & Matt Nolan.

It appears that most of Webcomickia has taken off early in anticipation of the holiday on Monday (USAians) or because today is the holiday at the start of the long weekend (Canadians), and who am I to fight that? See y’all back next week. Have fun, don’t eat or drink so much you cease to enjoy it, and try to pet a dog. Everything’s better with dogs.

No spam of the day. Happy National Holiday!