For those of you in the Portland area, Comics Month (as declared by Mayor Hunky) is in full swing, and that means it’s nearly time for the Stumptown Comics Fest to get under way. The exhibitor list may now be cross referenced against a map, and there’s only a few zillion webcomickers gonna be there.

• Among the attendees (“Guest”, if you wanna be pedantic, presumably “of Honor”) will be Hope Larson, whom some of you may be able to see at the West Coast iteration of Drink and Draw Like a Lady (with props to Dylan Meconis for local organization and Hurricane Erika for the poster — if you see Erika, ask her to do a shot in honor of me pre-ordering her book).
• While there, you might want to congratulate Larson for her latest news. As surely all have heard by now, she’ll be adapting Madeleine L’Engle’s classic of YA SF, A Wrinkle in Time as a graphic novel. This is terrific news, as I can’t imagine anybody less talented than Larson able to tackle a book that’s so widely read, so intensely beloved, and which contains concepts and characters that are so difficult to visualize, forcing every reader to come up with mental images that are surely unlike anybody else’s.

  Handled poorly, everybody that picks up the book would protest That’s not what travelling through a tesseract/Mrs Which/IT looks like!, but I have every expectation that Larson will rise to the challenge and produce something her own, yet recognizably familiar to all and sundry.

  Still doubting? Consider that every work that Larson has done has somehow been stronger than the previous. If, a few months ago, I thought that Larson had reached a peak of visual storytelling with Mercury, I previously thought the same of Chiggers, and Gray Horses, and Salamander Dream. True, adaptation is a different kind of beast, but I’m hopeful.

• Speaking of Mercury, might it be possible that one of you creative types could ensure that it’s properly considered for a Harvey Award? Nominations (from anybody who writes, draws, inks, letters, colors, designs, edits, or otherwise makes comics) remain open until the 23rd of April, so hop to it. While I’m on the topic, any number of people over there to the right are also probably deserving of your nomination.
• Finally, this: having previously been made into an opera, Dinosaur Comics (which sometimes gets no love from the arbiters of taste) has now crossed over into the ultimate of musical expressions: a marching band routine via the justly-famed¹ (and slightly deranged) Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band.

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¹ It wasn’t me; I was still in high school and can’t even play the trombone.

Okay, who’s up for something absolutely friggin’ beautiful today? The first Abominable Charles Christopher book is up for pre-order, leading to a few thoughts in no particular order:

• Dang, that’s pretty
• Via Kerschl’s twitter, a peek at the gatefold from the back of the book
• Rassa-frassin’ exchange rate parity — I remember when pricing in Canadian dollars meant a significantly smaller number in ‘Merican bucks
• Along those lines, PayPal apparently believes that today’s exchange rate is approximately 2.5% less favorable than it actually is; if you feel like trying to time your purchase to daily fluctuations (or would rather let your credit card company take the skim instead of PayPal), there’s an option that allows we Staties to charge the purchase in Canadian

In other news …

• Robert Tracy is a busy dude. Over at Webcomics Community, there’s what might be the first attempt to determine from an actual survey whether or not shaking hands at a con is a vector for disease. Given the lack of reported outbreaks from PAX East (thanks to the semi-official no-handshake policy) despite an outbreak of poop disease, and given some anecdotal reports that some who attended last weekend’s MoCCA Art Fest (which had no such prohibition) are feeling under-the-weather heading into this weekend’s C2E2, the answer can’t come soon enough.

  Then on top of that, Tracy posted a big-damn-interview with Chris Crosby yesterday — lot of stuff there, worth reading through to understand one of the long runners of webcomics.

• Another guy doing a lot of good for the community? Frumph (or Philip M. Hofer if you’re his mom). Spontaneous tributes to his skills flow like water, and he’s just done a rebuild of Shortpacked! that shows exactly how powerful the WordPress/ComicPress combo is. What made me really want to point out his work, though, is my recent experience loading that very feature-rich Shortpacked homepage on my phone — fast, clean, acting pretty much like on my desktop. I just figured it was time for a little Frumph-love (most places, you gotta pay extra for the Frumph-love).
• Recognition achieved: Todd Allen has been inducted into the Mystery Writers of America for his webcomic, Division and Rush:
  

  Oh, don’t be so shocked. It’s not like I’m the first. Tim Broderick’s not just a member, he’s VP of the Mid-West chapter and he’s best known for his Odd Jobs webcomic. You can even get the collected print edition of Odd Jobs at the Chicago Public Library. (I did.) I also somehow doubt that Dick Tracy, Ms. Tree or Road to Perdition were held against Max Allan Collins, even if Collins was already an accomplished novelist prior to his comics work.

  Moral of the story: times are changing and definitions of professional credentials are changing. The Mystery Writers of America accept that professional writing is professional writing, be it prose, a movie/television script or a comic strip. And it’s an affirming thing to be recognized by your higher profile peers and be told “yes, you’re a professional just like us.”

• Finally, and only peripherally related to webcomics, this from the mailbag … JG Brin attempts the impossible:
  

  [A]bout a week or so ago, you linked to David Morgan-Mar’s post where he gave his views on the board game Monopoly. Well, I’ve waited for nigh on a half-fortnight for someone in the webcomics world to provide a rebuttal, but to no avail. I fear the responsibility has landed on me. While I don’t feel worthy, I’ve nevertheless taken a shot at it, in the hopes of defending the virtue of my favorite board game.

From my reading, Brin likes those aspects of Monopoly that most (right-thinking) people loathe about the “game”, but let it never be said that we at Fleen won’t give full time to contrary views. Monopoly-haters, meet your principled opposition.

Everybody’s gearing up for Emerald City Comicon, with a more-than-healthy contingent of webcomickers slated to be in attendance. Alice Bentley has done her usual bang-up job compiling a list of said reprobates, with the TopatoCo crüe providing a handy-dandy map of where to find their associated creators.

Speaking of TopatoCo, they’ll be sponsoring a special Live ! performance of Tweet Me Harder ! starring Kris Straub and David Malki ! at the night-before pre-party. Judging from the Dr McNinja book release party in San Diego last summer, TopatoCo know how to throw a serious party.

• Wired weighs in on the nature of webcomics (haven’t found a link at their site, so enjoy a photo instead). Not sure that I get the claim that Octopus Pie tends towards esotericism and Achewood towards accessibility, but what the heck. Jump in and start quibbling.
• Webcomic book review reviews book of webcomic. Recursive film at eleven.
• I need a ruling on awesomitude. Is this more or less awesome than this? Both feature doctors with blades on motorcyles, although one does also feature helicopters, which are known to be severely awesome. Show your work and give examples.
• The second part of the guide to effective Ustreaming (brought to you via the efforts of Rob Tracy, driving force at Webcomics Community, and rumored backup Thunderbird pilot) is now available. All who wish to broadcast their arting, have a gander here.

Things not happening today: bank counter hours, mail delivery, my usual job, much reading of webcomics. Things happening today: a whole lotta errand-running. Fortunately, the things I wanted to mention don’t require a whole lot of due diligence. Contrary to the view of some, the slightly dashed-off nature of this post does not make today “just another Monday.”

• The SMILE launch party was on Saturday, and an official Good Time was had by all. In case you could doubt such an outcome, there’s photographic proof. While we’re on the topic of Raina Telgemeier, I wish to draw your attention of one of her retweets: kids comic creators who are going to be at Wondercon in April are wanted for a panel; ping Jenni Holm if interested.
• Speaking of California, Scott Kurtz has been on a pretty impressive march through the state, with gigs at the Cartoon Art Musuem and the Schulz Museum, and he’s about to address Macworld. There’s a nice interview with him in the pages of The Washington Post about how he’s not really trying to destroy newspapers.
• Some of you may be acquainted with The IT Crowd, a British televised humor programme which deals with technologist in particular and their nerdery in general; they have a history of using webcomickry as set-dressing. And as a new block of shows is in production, there is a call for appropriately nerdy artifacts to appear in the background, which perhaps one or more of you might be able to help with?
• Speaking of The IT Crowd, it bears some resemblance to the venerable Bastard Operator From Hell (past ten years or so worth of installments here — warning: high risk to free time and higher risk of being inspired to inappropriate behavior if you’ve ever worked in IT).

  A long, long time ago, the BOFH’s early adventures were collected in book form, and volume 4 (now long since out of print) was my introduction to the work of one Bradley J. Guigar (side note: all great cartoon characters, have “J” as a middle initial, like Bullwinkle J. Moose and Rocket J. Squirrel, not to mention Homer J. and Bartholomew J. Simpson; I’m not saying that Brad is fictional, I’m just saying that’s a mighty big coincidence).

  Anyway, that was where I first took notice of youngling Brad; as it turned out, he’d been engaged in daily cartooning for a couple of years at that point:

  On Valentine’s Day, as many people celebrated romance, Brad Guigar raised a toast to a passion that has been a driving force in his life for ten years — daily comics.

  That’s from the press release, where Brad talks about himself in the third person a lot; a more personal take is at Evil, Inc. today: Brad’s adventures in cartooning at college, his syndicate rejections, launching Greystone Inn, Courting Disaster, Phables, and E,I. There there was this:

  It’s been an incredible journey. And I’m thankful that you’ve been around to help make it happen. To that end, I’m going to be celebrating this anniversary all year long.

  … which is just one heck of a warm-fuzzy moment. But for my money, the big summation of his career comes at the end of the press release:

  Surprisingly enough, his wife of 12 years hasn’t divorced him.

  … which by my math means that the lovely Mrs Guigar had Brad to herself for two years before she had to share him with his inky, bristolly, pun-laden mistress, which makes her the Best Cartoonist Wife Ever. In all seriousness, nobody who does what Brad’s done can make any realistic claim that cartooning doesn’t involve the support of their entire family, so it’s as much her achievement as his. Since it was Valentine’s Day that stole away her husband, I suggest that if you feel inclined to drop Brad a note of congrats, maybe you should pass them along to her instead. Or is “condolences” the right word?

How big?

• How about 10? Real Life hit the ten year mark yesterday, and celebrated with a rare Sunday posting. Creator Greg Dean promises that the week will be following the Inside the Comic Studio with James Lipton theme in celebration.
• Okay, okay, how does 500 sound? A Softer World rolled over its 500th update over the weekend, with a particularly wacked-out triptych of existential horror (starring Meredith Gran).
• Okay, if those don’t do it for you, let’s try … 5. Blind Ferret Supremo (or humble shopkeep? only his mother knows for sure) Ryan Sohmer had a damn interesting announcement on Friday afternoon:
  

  I have always been vocal about my beliefs regarding a career in webcomics. It takes a great deal of work and dedication, a greater deal of luck and a myriad of other ingredients to make it work, but it CAN work. A career in this field is a viable option. Like anything else however, an education would provide a huge leg up.

  Because of that, and our desire to help others break through, we have decided to create The Rayne Summers Webcomic Scholarship, at The Center for Cartoon Studies in Vermont.

  Beginning in the fall of ’10, we will be covering the full tuition for the selected applicant. The applicant who, I might add, is working towards a career in webcomics. Over the course of the next 5 years, we plan on adding 1 student per year, thus by 2015, the Scholarship will be putting 5 students through the program per year.

  Let’s put that in concrete terms: for the current academic year (2009 – ’10), tuition at CCS is $16,000; given the economics of higher education, the absolute best case is that next year (when the scholarship starts) it will be only slightly more. In five years, with five students? Very little chance that will come to less than $100,000 per annum that BFE are ponying up to help create the next generation of webcomickers.

  And here’s the thing: every time I talk to Sohmer — every. damn. time. — I come away with two impressions:

  1. He’s funny, personable, and I like him
  2. He is completely, but cheerfully, mercenary in his outlook to a degree that would make any self-respecting Ferengi blush

  By that second point, I mean that all all times he has a monomaniacal focus on what will continue to maintain and grow his business; he approaches that end of the creative game like nobody else this side of Robert Khoo. He has his eyes on his audience, their disposable incomes, and potential competitors for that pool of money, and doesn’t waver in giving them his full attention because he knows that Daddy’s supply of Red Bull isn’t going to pay for itself (actually, given the amount that fans bring him at conventions, it just might … but work with me here).

  And by this scholarship, what Sohmer’s doing is creating potential competitors for himself, “because he can”. Ladies and gentlemen, that is either the act of a clueless, hubristic fool, or a careful, calculating (potentially evil?) genius. My money’s on the latter.

• One last BRN for the day: 1. Doesn’t sound very big, or very round. It’s the number of strips so far in a brand-new webcomic called Max vs. Max, and normally a new-out-of-the-gate effort wouldn’t get press here. But this one is from Wes Molebash, of the now-folded You’ll Have That, so I’m pretty confident that this one will do okay. Get in on the ground floor.

First, a little visual Wow. For everybody that’s ever asked, “Why webcomics? What can they do that’s so special?”, Rich Stevens has your answer hangin’, boy.¹

• Next, a little financial Wow[io], with news that WOWIO payments for Q2 of 2008 are going out. Chris Crosby informs me that a sizeable sum has been presented via check (edit to correct: actually, it was a wire transfer; Fleen regrets the error) to settle back payments owed in full, plus a little extra for interest. The optimist in me is thrilled for creators finally getting paid what they’re due. The realist in me hopes the next Great Thing doesn’t leave them hanging for more than a year. The cynic in me is astonished that previous securities filings hinting that payments would never come were overly pessimistic. And none of them would never dream of suggesting that checks be deposited quickly.
• Charitable Wow up next: Nick Nitro emailed to tell me about his cousin, Amie Morgan, founder of Amie’s Angels:
  

  Relay for Life team. Created by Amie Morgan when she found out she had been diagnosed with cancer, Amie’s Angels has helped raised more than $75k for the American Cancel Society’s Madison County [Ohio] Relay for Life, upon many other activities such as volunteering at the Arthur James Cancer Hospital assisting other head and neck cancer patients.

  Ms Morgan died after five years of fighting bone cancer this summer; at Mid-Ohio Con few weeks ago, Mr Nitro got a buncha creators to do up a piece of jam art to benefit Amie’s Angels as they continue to raise funds to kick cancer’s ass. No reserve, and three days left to go. Let’s bid this one up, shall we?

• Ubiquitous Wow: Jenny Everywhere caption contest coming down to the home stretch. Did we mention this before? If we didn’t we should have, since the very idea of an open source cartoon character is just so neat. I first encountered Ms Everywhere in the pages of a now-discontinued offering of Graphic Smash variously known as Flick, Kokonino, The Chaos Prince, The Crossover Thingie, etc; elements of it can still be found here. She’s literally everywhere, though, and you may use her in your own webcomic if you so wish, as long as you include the following text:
  

  The character of Jenny Everywhere is available for use by anyone, with only one condition. This paragraph must be included in any publication involving Jenny Everywhere, in order that others may use this property as they wish. All rights reversed.

  Go to it.

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¹ ‘Long wit a two-week supply of IGNINT McNUGGET, de breakfast o’ champiums!

‘Cause — you know, sometimes things happen all at once, and sometimes I’m scrambling for stories.

• SPX roundups are available from the usual suspects, with notes from exhibitors ranging (paraphrasing slightly here) from It rocked to It really rocked and I sold all the stuff I brought. Sorry to have missed it — will do my best to attend next year (although apparently, I was there in spirit).
• A’ course, one of the highlights of SPX would be the Ignatz Awards, and Fleen congratulates all of the winners, but particularly Cat Garza for his Outstanding Online Comic, Year of the Rat. Video here if you like, but it appears that there was no gorilla — I’m not sure that I can ever love the Ignatz Awards again without a guy in a gorilla suit !
• Along with the Ignatzen, the Shuster Awards (for outstanding work by Canadian creators — anybody calling them “The Eisners, eh?” will be beaten) happened over the weekend as well; congratulations to the very talented Cameron Stewart for taking the presitigious Webcomics/Bandes Dessinées Web award for Sin Titulo (which you should be reading if you’re not, but if you’re not, don’t start with the latest installment, which will melt your face off), and the very talented Kean Soo for taking the just as prestigious Comics for Kids/Bandes Dessinées pour Enfants award for Jellaby (leaving open the possibility of a followup win next year for the second volume of Jellaby’s adventures).
• Lastly, this weekend saw a confab in Las Vagrus, Nevadruh (organized by Chad Carpenter of Tundra and Bill Kellogg, a marketer) on the topic of success in cartooning. Alan Gardner posted summaries of the presentations, of which one stands out for readers of this blog:
  

  Howard Tayler, the creator of The [viz.] Schlock Mercenary was the last speaker and the lone representative of the webcomic free model. [emphasis original]

  By my count, there were nine speakers, which means that webcomics achieved a record high representation at this gathering, but still — one? Of all the people that have started strips and found success in the past decade, how many have quit their day jobs and gone full-time in print as opposed to web?

  I’m not saying, Print sucks, web is the only model to success! — I am decidedly not saying that — but I think that if you’re going to talk about how to find/keep success in a world where print is rapidly receding, it would be helpful to find more than one person from the (let’s be kind and call it) non-traditional world, for surely many of them have followed different paths and would have different lessons to impart. Particularly because the first sentence in the announcement of said seminar read-and-I-quote:

  Have you ever wanted to know how to succeed in the world of newspaper and/or web comics?

  Just sayin’.

Here we roll into the end stages of SDCC. Didn’t get to see all the stuff I wanted to, unexpected stories presented themselves, and much happened. Let’s start at the top, shall we?

• The syndicated strip cartoonists held a Q&A yesterday; Stephan Pastis (Pearls Before Swine), Richard Thompson (Cul De Sac) and Keith Knight (Knight Life) engaged in what amounted to a running discussion on the the topic of As newspapers go, we go, unless we figure out something fast. We want your questions because we need to figure out some answers. Today.

  After that brief introduction by Pastis, the very first question was on webcomics (and didn’t come from me). Paraphrasing (since it came a little too fast to transcribe): Where do you stand on webcomics, with a model where you give the comic away and sell goods to make money? Knight replied with a variation on an answer he’s given a couple of times this week: You need to get your work out to as many people, by as many channels as possible, and it only makes sense for anybody in print syndication to look at this approach. But he doesn’t believe in being exclusively self-published on the web, and he doesn’t believe in being exclusively syndicated (and has different projects that follow different models). Money quote (and this one is exact): I learn as much from webcartoonists as I do from [gesturing to fellow panelists] these guys.

  Good answer, but the question didn’t directly address an issue I’d like to have seen brought up, viz., what benefit does a syndicate actually provide these days? One may not believe that papers will entirely go away (as does Pastis), and that the physicality of the actual object is something people will want (Pastis again), even while negotiating rights to new channels like the Kindle (Pastis once more) while pondering the question, “Does this add to my audience or take away?”

  Mostly though, they saw the problem as one of scarcity of space — asked about legacy strips (repeating the question for the room, Pastis phrased it as How do you feel about all the dead wood on the comics page?), the panel figured they could live with them if there were sufficient room for new strips as well. But below that is a sense of almost visceral dislike of strips that continue long past their original creators. Pastis wondered if there’s another creative form that’s perceived as so transferrable that the creator could die and the kid could continue it and it’s considered just the same.

  But at least that problem might not exist in the future — as Pastis and Knight pointed out, for about ten years now, most syndicate contracts and left the copyright with the creator (although the monetary terms are such that while the creator own the strip, the syndicate gets a significant cut). Case in point: books. Why don’t many syndicated strippers have books out? Pastis noted that there’s essentially one publisher of such (Andrews & McMeel), but not every strip cartoonist tries to get books made.

  With the avenues of self-publishing, there’s no reason not to have them, although if, say, Thompson were to decide to publish books because the syndicate didn’t want to, they’d still get about 50% of the revenue per their contracts. But Knight did point out that when a particular publisher produced books for him, he got $1 per book sold, and now that he self-publishes, he gets $11 per (this is on rights that were recovered by Knight, so he doesn’t have to share, but still — it might be almost worthwhile as a revenue stream, seeing as how the number of papers carrying strips is dropping).

• I bumped into two of the most generous people in all of comicdom — Jennifer Babcock and Matt Murray had previously been associated with the running of the Museum of Comics and Cartoon Art and the annual MoCCA Art Fest, but they and others struck out last Fall to form a new nonprofit devoted to comics scholarship. Turns out what’s normally a tricky undertaking is even trickier in the midst of a worldwide economic contraction, but they’re still plugging away at it, and were very sympathetic towards the current MoCCA folks about the logistical … let’s call them challenges … at this year’s show. There’s a steep learning curve and Murray and Babcock sincerely hoped the current showrunners are able to negotiate it. Like I said, generous; if you don’t do so already, check out their undertakings with the Sequential Art Collective.
• What would happen if the guys behind Halfpixel, Webcomics Weekly, and webcomics.com held a panel and didn’t give any soundbites? Unlike some of their previous appearances which were explicitly pitched as Webcomics Weekly live performances, this session (entitled Webcomics Bootcamp) was a fairly organic conversation, with answers not neatly encapsulated down into short, pithy, ten words answers. Find a recording somewhere (we’ll link to any we come across) and listen to the whole thing — you’ll only miss out on the visuals where Scott Kurtz spilled water on the table and what looked like a large dog laughed at him from the back of the room.
  Sidenote: dissatisfied that only four people got to ask questions before time was up, Kurtz, Brad Guigar, and Robert Khoo held an impromptu Q&A session on webcomics business at the Marriott at 11:00pm; anybody that made it there, please send us a summary.

It’s time to wrap this — I still have to write up the SMBC/Cyanide & Happiness/nerdcore show, the story of how I spoke with the publisher/editor-in-chief of IDW about the Bay Boy comics (pretty good outcome on that one I think) and some changes at Keenspot, not to mention news on new webcomics statues, and photos. If I don’t get to all that before tomorrow, deal. In the meantime, the Keenspot panel’s at 11:00 (32AB) and the Zuda version of how-to-do-webcomics panel at 3:00 (4). Hope to make both of those, but I’ve got some other appointments.

Oh yeah — this is why. On those occasions that I meet somebody that reads this blog, it never fails to give me a little thrill to know that I’m not just sending electrons into the aether. Your kind words buoy me in times like now, when my liver and consciousness have reached their limits in service to webcomics, and I have to take an early night or both will be irretrievably shredded. On the up side, it means that somebody will be alive at the Dumbrella booth (which will please the new boss — details below), and there’s plenty to talk about even with me having missed the evening’s social niceties.

I didn’t manage to make it to the Miyazaki panel or the Kibuishi panel, but I did get to have lunch with The Rockin’ Teenage Combo, aka Becky ‘n’ Frank. We had some disturbingly good breakfast, spoke about how hard it is to make comics or pursue an animation career from New Zealand (beautiful place and absolute tops on my gotta-visit list, but so remote from the rest of your industry), and saw the most clever bit of experiential marketing at the Con so far — the people behind a forthcoming movie called LEGION (don’t know anything about it, but now I kind of want to) appropriated an ice-cream truck, dressed the driver & attendant as zombies, and drove around the Gaslamp hanging out the windows looking suitably dead and chucking t-shirts at unsuspecting passers-by.

On the way back in to the scrum, I had the pleasure of seeing Becky & Frank interact with the likes of Jeff Smith, Steve Hamaker, Scott Campbell, Kibuishi, and others — I never get tired of seeing artists who admire each others work interact. I snagged quick copies of Flight 6 and Owly 5 (and watched the Owly cartoon clip loop on the TV — purely adorable), and was back to the grind.

The rushes came and went, the booth crew were troupers, and organizational changes made. What began as an over-booze discussion about number trending has become an expansion of Dumbrella. Andy Bell’s wife, Jackie MacLeod, works for humanitarian non-profits in a logistical capacity, work which has taken her as far as Congo, trying to get food and medical aid to those in war zones (braving rebels, corrupt governmental officials, malaria, and baboons to do so). Jackie is a tiny person, so to deal with crap of the magnitude she must regularly deal with, you know that she has an enormous capacity to Get Shit Done. By popular acclaim (and fear of reprisals — a woman who can stare down armed insurgent baboons while dealing with a case of malaria is not somebody you want annoyed with you), she will now be known as Madame El Presidente For Life of Dumbrella. ¡Viva!

Getting serious for a moment, there’s a valuable lesson here, one that echoes a conversation I had with Robert Khoo a couple of San Diegos ago: the difference between Penny Arcade and various webcomics collectives is that at PA, there’s one person that makes a decision, and things happen. When there’s multiple people sharing the decisions inherent in prepping months for a shared week-long marketing experience — or in some collectives, having a tighter organization, complete with shared revenues — things will inevitably bog down.

Want an exercise in frustration? Try to get three or more people to agree what to put on a pizza. Now try to get five or more to agree what to put on a pizza that will determine a nontrivial portion of their year’s income. If there can be a level of trust in the skills and fairness of one person to make a decision and just go with it, things can happen, and with less potential for hurt feelings. Thus, Jackie, whose experience in war zones should just about prepare her for the job of dealing with the level of poo-flinging that is found in webcomickers. And there will be a bit more poo flung, as Dumbrella has expanded by two — de facto Dumbrellites Meredith Gran and Chris Yates are now de juris members in (good?) standing.

In other news:

• Webcomics guest star Wil Wheaton and I discussed the most effective techniques of being a grumpy old guy telling kids to stay the hell of our respective lawns — he favors the cane to gesture with, I’m going with chucking the pears that fall of my pear tree at the little whippersnappers. We agree that releasing the hounds is something you have to hold in reserve, but I’ve just thought of another issue … when do we get the garden hose?
• Fleen offers condolences to David Malki ! on not taking the Eisner award for humor, particularly after hearing him do a run-through on semi-prepared remarks in the event of a win.
• IDW will be visited today in an attempt to find out what the hell is up with the announcement that they will be doing a 4 issue comic miniseries on the topic of Bat Boy. A 4 issues comic miniseries that apparently does not involve Danielle Corsetto, who did the Adventures of Bat Boy comics for the Weekly World News after Peter Bagge originated it. What the hell, IDW?
• Andrew Farago at the Cartoon Art Musuem tells me there’s still slots open for the virtual gallery portion of Monsters of Webcomics. Short form: three strips at 72dpi, to fit on a 1680 x 1050 monitor. It’ll be a slideshow, so no scrolling. Include your name, webcomic title, URL, and keep in mind there’ll be kids so stick to PG-13 (and tamer) material. Submit by 31 July to andrewfarago who may be found at the Google-run e-mail service (dot-com). Also, they need a logo, so if you want to design something that’s truly metal, have at it.
• If you’re in San Diego, drop by the 1200 aisle and see Randy Milholland. Ask him about the sketch he did that’s Berry, Berry Disturbing. I’d tell you, but it’s both a) extraordinarily rude and b) not my joke to tell. I’m in awe of what comes out of his head.

No photos. Up today: the aforementioned IDW visit, the panel on syndication (morbid curiousity really — noon in room 7AB), the Halfpixel panel (2:00 in room 8) and hopefully the Hope Larson panel (4:00 in room 3). Speaking of Hope Larson, Bryan Lee O’ Malley was grateful when I spoke to him that he and Scott McCloud did their panel and the questions were actually about Scott Pilgrim the comics, and not Scott Pilgrim the it-won’t-be-out-for-another-year movie. Well done, masses.

Lots of people, lots of crowd on the floor at the San Diego Convention Center yesterday, although it was a weird sort of “lots of crowd”. The announcements that the doors were open lacked the usual Voice From Above panache, and the floor remained eerily quiet for a good 15 minutes afterwards — surely related to the massive crowd outside jockeying for position in the panel rooms.

Unlike Preview Night, when the hardcore fans come to spend, the crowd seemed slightly frugal, circling endlessly, deciding where over the four days of the show they were going to drop cash now, and where to do so later. There’s a feeling of anticipation in the massive hall, as if the attendees haven’t entirely made up their minds about their budget and how much it’s going to stretch.

In the meantime, there was a panel featuring a collection of reprobates and some guest ne’er-do-wells, which was moderated by some hack webcomics pseudojournalist.

Big news from the panel: Meredith Gran has signed a contract with a major publisher (the name will have to wait another week or so — the legalities of such deals can be rather random) and is expected to produce an omnibus edition of Octopus Pie (featuring some new art to make the styles more consistent and some extensions to the story) around this time next year. It’s welcome news, although those who both already have OP 1-3 (Hi!) and are obsessive completists (Hi, again!) may be slightly grumbling about having to make room on the shelf for another version. Dang, our lives just suck.

In other happenings:

• Robert Khoo is hinting at really interesting stuff from the forthcoming Penny Arcade anniversary book (which will be a history of the strip and the creators, rather than a collection of material). Due next year, a certain subset of webomics fans (I said hi, dammit!) are likely to find it terribly interesting.
• His panel duties done, Scott McCloud is wandering the halls and deciding what to attend and who to hang and talk with. Both of us fear the immensity of the room and the madding of the crowd that fills Hall H, but the talk today that features Hayao Miyazaki, John Lasseter, others from Disney/Pixar, footage from Ponyo, and moderated by Patton Oswalt may pull us in.
• The Indy Cartoonist Survival Guide panel was a mixed bag — with seven people on the panel (moderator Keith Knight, Lark Pien, Jim Mahfood, Paul Friedrich, and Miriam Libicki, Stephen Notley, and our own Dave Kellett) there were a lot of experiences and perspectives to be shared, but also a tendency for the conversation to slow — while Knight did a great job of always turning the questions to somebody new and keeping the flow going, so many voices on a serious topic that requires long answers can turn into a series of unwieldy moderator + one person talk, everybody else looks thoughtful moments.

  But the ideas were pretty good — the key thoughts can probably be summed up as Variety, Ownership, and Support. Let’s hit them one at a time:

  Variety: There was pretty much consensus that to be any kind of cartoonist, you have to do a variety of things. Whether it’s in the sense of finding income from multiple sources (prints, originals, books, shows, teaching/lecturing) or in the sense that you have run your business (hustle your jobs, manage all aspects of your career), the chances of you being able to merely sit in a room and draw, pass your finished work to other people to take care of the details, and then cash the check? Doesn’t happen anymore. Kellett talked about long-time syndicated cartoonists that have taken that approach to the extent that — decades later — they aren’t able to adapt and don’t even know their way around Photoshop.

  Knight, Mahfood and others took up the idea that cartoonists can do lots of thing; as Mahfood put it, Living in LA you can bullshit your way into a lot of situations. He spoke about pitching ideas for cartoons, getting option deals, how a graphic novel can be your calling card in the movie/TV world, and how he wound up painting a mural next to Banksy — because when asked Do you want to do X in exchange for money? he said, Yeah, I can do that instead of No, I’ve never done that. Also? Europe. They’re really into indy/comics artists over there and love Americans whose work is novel and not well-known. Somebody invites you to a show or a gallery, take it.

  Ownership: This was maybe Kellett’s key point: Own everything you produce. It’s no surprise that every year the con circuit brings news of another Golden or Silver age artist that needs funds raised to take care of a serious medical condition; years of work-for-hire got them a paycheck, and that it. No insurance, no originals to sell, no royalties, because they didn’t own what they worked on. Riffing on the theme, Knight shared how he had to buy back the rights to his own early strips when he realized that he was doing the work to make the sales, and somebody else was keeping the money.

  Lark Pien also hit this theme on the topic of pricing: too many artists don’t price their work appropriately (or as Knight put it, Nobody’s going to value your work unless you value it first). Sure, she sells prints in the $5 range, but also original art that’s gonig for more than $500 — going soft on the price points doesn’t make sense, but having a wide range of costs means that the fan can buy (i.e.: give you money) at a point that they find appropriate.

  Notley chimed in that finding those appropriate price points can be a little tricky, but that market forces can be made to work for you. Several times, he put a blank piece of paper up on eBay, with the auction winner getting the right to specify what would be drawn on it. After a couple auctions went in the $150 – $200 range, he had an idea what his fans would pay for originals and priced accordingly.

  Support: You have to manage your career, but you absolutely can’t do it alone. From the importance of the spouse/partner that’s bought into your artistic career to utilizing the fanboys and fangirls with skills, time, and dedication, this is a key driver for success. Kellett spoke about the challenges of living in a home with two artistic people, and how the solution was that one of them would work on the arts stuff for a few years while the other covered the bills, then swap and repeat as necessary — in each case, the artistic partner got the career to the stage where it could be the bill-paying career while the other developed the arts to the next stage.

  Libnicki talked about her husband being “a numbers guy”, and how he’s jumped into the organizational end of her career — keeping track of show sales, inventories, opportunities, and the like. Freidrich made a point about how being a cartoonist can let you choose how much support your career requires by the simple choice of where you live: I moved from LA back to North Carolina where I could make half the money and live four times as well. If you’re working as a webcomicker especially, as Knight said, you can live anywhere that’s got got high-speed data and regular FedEx pickups.

  Finally, there are people out there that you can find to help where you lack skills (although as Kellett put it, always try the task yourself first, to find out how much it’s worth to you to pay somebody else to do it). Whether it’s finding a fangirl to run his newletter (as Mahfood did), or snagging an intern, or (if you hit the right combination of successes and lack of successes) finding a Robert Khoo-like person to be the business guru, there are people out there.

  Maybe the best point was Knight’s final thought — there’s a lot of niches that your work can fit into, there’s lots of small sources of income that a company won’t find worth pursuing, but an individual can find lucrative in the aggregate. In other word, Indy cartoonists are too small to fail.

Today, the aforementioned Miyazaki panel (12:45, hall H), and hopefully the Kazu Kibuishi panel (5:30 in room 3; rumor is that Amulet‘s been extended from two books to five, with an option for up to ten!).

Photos:

Phil Foglio appears to have annoyed somebody in the Victorian era, who has sent their bounty hunters to correct his ways. Meanwhile, the Cardboard Tube Saumurai figure has apparently got on the human growth hormone. Those at the Dumbrella panel appear to be slightly unfocused and prone to photographic artifacts (maybe — that blur in the second photo is right where Scott McCloud and family would suddenly be sitting a moment later, and nobody saw them walk in — magic!).