JOE GORDON has written a very positive review of Tim Skinner: Total Scumbag on his Forbidden Planet Blog Log. You'll find it here.
It's "sick, perverted, twisted filth full of violence and sex," according to Joe which is just about spot on I think...
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
True Brit
HERE'S Glenn Fabry's gorgeous cover to BritForce #1 - now with added lettering!
The 64-page perfect-bound one-shot is launching at the Bristol Expo in around a month's time. This is the first comic Moonface Press is publishing that isn't written by me - the book is both written and illustrated by Andrew Radbourne, who is also the artist on Brothers.
Moonface actually has a double presence at Bristol this year - I have a table in the main exhibitors' area for the whole weekend and Andy R has booked a pitch for the Saturday at the small press event that's happening over at the Mercure.
Here's the BritForce back cover blurb...
Britannia! Bulldog! Lionheart! Stonehenge! Moonwitch!
Hellspawn! In the ’90s they were BritForce – the UK’s
very own team of super-powered heroes. But driven
apart by catastrophe, BritForce disbanded and haven’t
seen each other in over a decade... until now.
Waiting in the wings is a threat so huge it might just
be enough to throw the team back together. The Grail
and his army of meta-human zealots have attacked
Downing Street and are intent on making Britain the
power base for their brutal religious crusade.
Will BritForce reunite to combat the threat? Or does
Britain face a future crushed beneath the heel of religious
oppression, presided over by a man convinced he’s the
resurrection of the Messiah himself?
* I'VE finished lettering the Brothers one-shot but it's now that the hard work really begins - I have to print out all 52 pages and proofread them. It isn't unknown for me to change bits of the script at this late stage either - punching up dialogue and making sure exposition is kept as short as possible.
I'm really pleased with Brothers - it's the big, crazy, 1000mph story I set out to write in the first place with splashes of triumph, tragedy, romance and loads of completely over-the-top violence. Andy R has done some terrific work - there are several sequences from the script that he's just picked up and run with, transforming good, solid scenes into genuinely excellent ones.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Brotherly love
HERE is the cover for the BROTHERS one-shot written by me and illustrated by Andrew Radbourne. The 56-page book is being launched at this year's Bristol Expo (May 9-10).
I had pretty much decided to publish it in the same "graphic novella" format as Septic Isle - i.e. perfect-bound on thick gloss paper for four to five quid. However, because of the bleak economic situation, I've been thinking of doing something that's a bit more cheap and cheerful instead - maybe do Brothers as a straightforward comic on slightly less lovely paper for around £3-£3.50.
It isn't a done deal yet but if I can find a printer that can deliver what I'm looking for I shall give it a go. When flimsy pamphlet-style US comics full of ads are being flogged in stores for £3+, it strikes me that now might be a good time for indie publishers to do a bit of outreach to mainstream readers fed up with seeing their hard-earned cash buy fewer and fewer comics every week.
I'm also considering doing a 16-page comic at some point and selling it for a £1-£1.50. The idea would be to cram as much material in there as possible - maybe a couple of one-pagers along with some slightly longer stuff. The price would massively undercut pretty much everything else that's out there - including a lot of mini-comics - but would have the same top-notch production values as any of the stuff I've done before. This whole "value for money" subject is something I shall return to I suspect...
Monday, March 16, 2009
Skinner for sale
THE Tim Skinner: Total Scumbag one-shot is now on sale in the moonfacepress.com shop. It's £3, plus £1.50 p&p, for 36 full-colour pages (just one page of ads). It's the first time artist Declan Shalvey and I have worked together since the Eagle Award-winning Hero Killers and we're both delighted with the results.
Other people rather like Skinner, too. Jonathan Hickman (writer of Secret Warriors and The Nightly News) called it "Fucking Hilarious" and Rich Johnston (writer of CBR's Lying In The Gutters column) said it was: "A very self-referential, up-its-own-arse comic that I was destined to love."
The book contains scabrous parodies of a host of much-loved comic stories, characters and creators, including Lost Girls, The Boys, Power Girl, Blankets, Judge Dredd, zombie books and Jack Kirby. It's guaranteed to make you laugh... or your money back.*
* This statement isn't legally binding, I've checked.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Future imperfect
CAN'T believe it's been over a month since my last post here. Not that there's been much to report anyway - nothing good at least.
Diamond won't be soliciting mine and Dec's Tim Skinner: Total Scumbag one-shot, which is a bit of a blow really; especially as it's easily the best thing I've yet written and published. And Dec's full-colour artwork is terrific.
I shall probably be contacting Haven Distribution in the very near future to see if they might be interested in picking the book up but, to be honest, I can't see us getting nearly as many orders going that route as we would have through Diamond.
The worrying thing is that if Diamond don't want something as blatantly commercial as Skinner, I really can't see them going for anything else currently sitting on my release schedule (although Brit Force's Glenn Fabry cover might give that book more than a fighting chance).
That means I'm back to square one in many ways - publishing comics to sell online and at conventions. This is something of a backwards step so I'm going to have a serious think about making some changes. I'm currently in the middle of lettering the Brothers one-shot for release at the Bristol Expo in May but, after that, I'm going to take a long hard look at what I do and decide what my next step will be.
It could be that I stop publishing altogether and concentrate 100 per cent on writing and pitching to professional companies, but that would take a lot of the fun out of it for me. I enjoy the entire process of putting a comic together - not just the writing side. And, of course, the problem with pitching is that there's no guarantee any of my ideas would ever be picked up - I could spend years toiling away for absolutely no return.
As you can probably tell, I'm a bit confused about where things are headed at the moment - hopefully I'll feel a bit more positive after Bristol...
Diamond won't be soliciting mine and Dec's Tim Skinner: Total Scumbag one-shot, which is a bit of a blow really; especially as it's easily the best thing I've yet written and published. And Dec's full-colour artwork is terrific.
I shall probably be contacting Haven Distribution in the very near future to see if they might be interested in picking the book up but, to be honest, I can't see us getting nearly as many orders going that route as we would have through Diamond.
The worrying thing is that if Diamond don't want something as blatantly commercial as Skinner, I really can't see them going for anything else currently sitting on my release schedule (although Brit Force's Glenn Fabry cover might give that book more than a fighting chance).
That means I'm back to square one in many ways - publishing comics to sell online and at conventions. This is something of a backwards step so I'm going to have a serious think about making some changes. I'm currently in the middle of lettering the Brothers one-shot for release at the Bristol Expo in May but, after that, I'm going to take a long hard look at what I do and decide what my next step will be.
It could be that I stop publishing altogether and concentrate 100 per cent on writing and pitching to professional companies, but that would take a lot of the fun out of it for me. I enjoy the entire process of putting a comic together - not just the writing side. And, of course, the problem with pitching is that there's no guarantee any of my ideas would ever be picked up - I could spend years toiling away for absolutely no return.
As you can probably tell, I'm a bit confused about where things are headed at the moment - hopefully I'll feel a bit more positive after Bristol...
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Diamond aren't forever
A QUICK browse across the net has already thrown up a couple of early casualties of Diamond's new minimum order policy.
Steve Tanner, of Time Bomb Comics, reports that his Dick Turpin & The Restless Dead book has been ditched by the distributor because retailer orders failed to hit the new threshold. Read about it on Steve's blog.
And over at CBR, Rich Johnston discusses Classical Comics' adaptation of The Tempest which has been dropped "due to a lack of sales expectations". Read about it in this week's Lying In The Gutters.
The Dick Turpin book's rejection is a shame but, under the new rules, understandable because a) it's from a tiny UK indie publisher and b) it's black and white. But I'm astounded at the news concerning The Tempest - it's full colour and the art (by Jon Haward and Gary Erskine) is gorgeous. Check out the cover at the Classical Comics website.
More than that, though, Classical Comics are a proper, bonafide company - they pay their pro writers and artists good rates and have budgets for the marketing and promotion of their books. As far as I know sales are good too - Dec Shalvey's excellent Frankenstein adaptation outstripped sales estimates and went to a second printing after just three months. The company and its books also get acres of positive coverage in the comics press and elsewhere.
In his piece, Rich suggests Diamond might take a "second look" at The Tempest and I very much hope he's right because, if stuff as good as that can't make it into Previews any more, then the likes of Steve Tanner and I have no chance at all.
Steve Tanner, of Time Bomb Comics, reports that his Dick Turpin & The Restless Dead book has been ditched by the distributor because retailer orders failed to hit the new threshold. Read about it on Steve's blog.
And over at CBR, Rich Johnston discusses Classical Comics' adaptation of The Tempest which has been dropped "due to a lack of sales expectations". Read about it in this week's Lying In The Gutters.
The Dick Turpin book's rejection is a shame but, under the new rules, understandable because a) it's from a tiny UK indie publisher and b) it's black and white. But I'm astounded at the news concerning The Tempest - it's full colour and the art (by Jon Haward and Gary Erskine) is gorgeous. Check out the cover at the Classical Comics website.
More than that, though, Classical Comics are a proper, bonafide company - they pay their pro writers and artists good rates and have budgets for the marketing and promotion of their books. As far as I know sales are good too - Dec Shalvey's excellent Frankenstein adaptation outstripped sales estimates and went to a second printing after just three months. The company and its books also get acres of positive coverage in the comics press and elsewhere.
In his piece, Rich suggests Diamond might take a "second look" at The Tempest and I very much hope he's right because, if stuff as good as that can't make it into Previews any more, then the likes of Steve Tanner and I have no chance at all.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Very long post about Blood Psi and Diamond
I'VE just had a week away from the day job to get cracking on the Blood Psi stuff and have made pretty good progress. I finished the first draft of the story's second part yesterday and will now spend the next week tweaking and chopping it around.
I don't know how other writers do it but, for me, a first draft is never more than about 60 per cent of the way to the finished script. It's all about giving what you're writing a structure and hitting the plot points you need to in the allotted number of pages (in this case 24-25). It's in the second and third drafts that stuff like dialogue and panel descriptions take proper shape. You also become aware of plot elements that aren't really explained properly in the first draft and have to work out ways of weaving them into the story without having to rely on obvious exposition. After fight scenes, this is the thing I find trickiest.
*WHEN artist Keith Burns and I first discussed doing more Blood Psi, we thought it would take the form of a three- or four-issue mini-series. It's more likely to appear now as a graphic novel though. The main reason for that is the recent changes Diamond (the comic distributors) have made to their minimum order benchmarks. In the good old days, titles submitted to Diamond had to generate a minimum of $1500 in revenue for the company. That figure has now been raised to $2500 - a massive increase.
The implications for small publishers like myself are obvious - if low sales mean we can't get our books listed in Previews, we're pretty much screwed. I think I'm right in saying that all my books to date have exceeded the $1500 minimum but, in the new climate, expecting a four dollar mini-series by a couple of obscure UK creators to do $2500 four times on the bounce is unrealistic to say the least. Therefore doing Blood Psi as a 100-page graphic novel makes a lot more sense. If we solicited it for $10, on a 60-40 split in Diamond's favour, we'd only need 600 orders to hit the minimum benchmark; $12 and it's just 500.
Where all this leaves the raft of one-shots I'm submitting to Diamond this year I don't know. Tim Skinner is the most commercial thing I've published and boasts full-colour art from Dec so I'm hopeful that'll be picked up. Brothers is black and white but it's about superheroes and the art's gorgeous so that could go either way. Scoregasm is about football so that has about as much chance of being picked up by Diamond as I have of being picked up by Halle Berry.
So while I'm still determined to submit my stuff to Diamond and get it into Previews, I'm probably going to have to look at other ways of getting my books out there. One thing I'm going to do is check out Haven Distribution (www.havendistro.com) who, from what I can gather, carry quite a lot of indie comics stuff. I'm also going to look seriously at making my stuff available for download - either from the main Moonface site or through Eagle One Media (www.eagleonemedia.com), a company that already have many smaller comics publishers supplying them with digital content for download.
It's all a bit scary - worst case scenario is that I could end up with no US distribution for my comics. And on that glum note...
I don't know how other writers do it but, for me, a first draft is never more than about 60 per cent of the way to the finished script. It's all about giving what you're writing a structure and hitting the plot points you need to in the allotted number of pages (in this case 24-25). It's in the second and third drafts that stuff like dialogue and panel descriptions take proper shape. You also become aware of plot elements that aren't really explained properly in the first draft and have to work out ways of weaving them into the story without having to rely on obvious exposition. After fight scenes, this is the thing I find trickiest.
*WHEN artist Keith Burns and I first discussed doing more Blood Psi, we thought it would take the form of a three- or four-issue mini-series. It's more likely to appear now as a graphic novel though. The main reason for that is the recent changes Diamond (the comic distributors) have made to their minimum order benchmarks. In the good old days, titles submitted to Diamond had to generate a minimum of $1500 in revenue for the company. That figure has now been raised to $2500 - a massive increase.
The implications for small publishers like myself are obvious - if low sales mean we can't get our books listed in Previews, we're pretty much screwed. I think I'm right in saying that all my books to date have exceeded the $1500 minimum but, in the new climate, expecting a four dollar mini-series by a couple of obscure UK creators to do $2500 four times on the bounce is unrealistic to say the least. Therefore doing Blood Psi as a 100-page graphic novel makes a lot more sense. If we solicited it for $10, on a 60-40 split in Diamond's favour, we'd only need 600 orders to hit the minimum benchmark; $12 and it's just 500.
Where all this leaves the raft of one-shots I'm submitting to Diamond this year I don't know. Tim Skinner is the most commercial thing I've published and boasts full-colour art from Dec so I'm hopeful that'll be picked up. Brothers is black and white but it's about superheroes and the art's gorgeous so that could go either way. Scoregasm is about football so that has about as much chance of being picked up by Diamond as I have of being picked up by Halle Berry.
So while I'm still determined to submit my stuff to Diamond and get it into Previews, I'm probably going to have to look at other ways of getting my books out there. One thing I'm going to do is check out Haven Distribution (www.havendistro.com) who, from what I can gather, carry quite a lot of indie comics stuff. I'm also going to look seriously at making my stuff available for download - either from the main Moonface site or through Eagle One Media (www.eagleonemedia.com), a company that already have many smaller comics publishers supplying them with digital content for download.
It's all a bit scary - worst case scenario is that I could end up with no US distribution for my comics. And on that glum note...
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