In my limited experience, I’ve found that when I do local store signings, I’m just an unknown and no one excitedly rushes out to meet me. Maybe a few friends pop in to say hello, and that’s about it. So I’ve stopped asking shops if it would be all right if I come out special and do a signing. But on the other hand, if a shop invites me, then I’m happy to oblige. I think it’s important to support businesses that are so supportive of me, and it builds good relations. Plus, I have a good time. I got a couple of these recently.
June 24th, 2006 A-1 Comics Small Press Day Signing
Every year, A-1 Comics invites local artists to spend a few hours in their shop for “small press day,” which has been on “Free Comic Book Day” the last few years. I assumed it would be the same this year, and I would miss it, because I had scheduled a trip out of town, but they picked a different day, partially to celebrate the opening of their new location. When I found out, I wound up contacting a number of my local self-publishing friends (local being Northern California) to see if they might like to join in the fun. I wrote to some slightly bigger names in the industry as well, but none of them ended up coming. Of all the people I wrote, three people said they were coming, another seriously considered it, and only Matt Silady, who shared our table at San Diego, came up.
Brian, the owner, however, convinced Ron Lim and Thomas Yeates to hang out for awhile.
Also appearing were “The Nice Guy” creators Michael O’Connell and Tim Watts, Leigh Dragoon (“Spidric”), Dan Cooney (“Valentine”), Mike Hampton (Captain A*hole), and Zac Henderson (“Project i.O”).
I got to the shop, and I was sitting by Ron, who is just about the friendliest guy around. I see him at all the local cons, either at a table, or just wandering around. He’s always smiling and friendly, and real positive about my work. We got him talking about his art style, and how he’s made a conscious decision to simplify his backgrounds, because he was tired of seeing all his detail flattened out by a one-color-wash from his colorist. So he’s started having to think in color as he’s drawing.
I found this interesting. It reminded me of some of my monster pages Dick Ayers inked. When I studied them, I realized that some color could easily add some depth to the linework, but in black and white they felt a little flatter. It made me aware that I was beginning to visualize my work in black and white. If my work began getting colored, I would have to re-imagine my line quality. You don’t think of this stuff…until you have to think about it.
Ron was only there maybe an hour, and I was sad to see him go, but soon after, Thomas Yeates appeared, so he just took Ron’s seat right by me.
We were talking a little about my comics, and I mentioned how I’m a big fan of film noir and EC-style horror, and Thomas said, “Really. I would have thought your stuff comes more from the pages of Mad Magazine.” Somehow, the thought that people would have this kind of view of my work surprised me. I don’t know why. I should take it as a compliment, because I try to be funny with my work, and I do a fair amount of parodies, so maybe Mad Magazine is where I belong. I just never really realized that’s what I was doing, I guess. It can be sobering when people tell you their perceptions of you, if it doesn’t match with your perceptions of yourself.
I had brought some copies of the Ojo trade paperback to sell, and that caught Thomas’s eye, and I began showing him, page by page, what I had done, and what Sam had done. I’d turn to one page, and he’d say, “Oh, wow, Did you draw that? Look at how well you’ve drawn water there. You can really feel the fluidity! That’s amazing!” and I’d have to say, “No, Sam drew that one. You’re right; it is a great page.” And then he’d say, “What a great image that is!” and I’d say, “Uh. Yeah. That’s Sam’s page too.” I know I’m no Sam Kieth, but here I was hoping my pages held up okay, and Thomas, with his artist’s eye, could really nail it. I felt just as transparent as can be.
He was really impressed with Sam as an artist, and was asking what Sam used to get his thin white lines. I told him it was Pentel “Presto!” correction markers, but Thomas said he’d tried using them, and couldn’t get such a thin line. I later emailed Sam on Thomas’s behalf. Sam confirmed that he was using Prestos with medium tips, but then he recommended something new he’d found that he liked even better, called Gelly Roll fine and medium point pens. Sam said they’re the he’s found, although they dry up and clog with india ink. On the other hand, they’re cheap, so I passed the info back to Thomas.
Thomas said he’d recently been drawing on HUGE paper. I think it must be like 22”x28” or something crazy. This is, of course, how the old, OLD pros used to do their work. Flash Gordons and Prince Valiants and such. Thomas found he really enjoyed the look of the work, once it got shrinked down to comic-sized pages. The drawback was that no comics company has scanners that can scan these images at this size, and it’s an absolute pain-in-the-ass to scan each half and then try to splice them together. It more than doubles your work. Probably quadruples it, I’m guessing, and I know, because I tried scanning pages on a smaller scanner, before I bought an ultra-expensive 12”X17” scanner. He said what he has to do is take his pages to Kinkos, and have them make a reduced-size copy, which I think he said costs two bucks (maybe one) a page. He finds this extra cost and work worth it, for the product he’s able to produce as a result. Interesting process. I was really fascinated.
I knew he was interested in things like Zorro and Tarzan, and so I told him I had recently been reading a lot of these books. I don’t think I told him, but I’ve never been particularly interested in the adventure genre, and I realized how little I’d read when I was trying to figure out who all the characters were in Alan Moore’s Extraordinary Gentlemen. So that led me to read 20,000 Leagues, Dracula, King Solomon’s Mines, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the Invisible Man (or at least listen to them on audio book). From there, I just continued reading stacks of other books by H.Rider Haggard, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Jules Verne. I enjoyed it enough to continue onto the adventure/sci-fi line with stacks of H.G. Welles, Tarzan and “Princess of Mars” and “Land Before Time,” Robinson Crusoe and Swiss Family Robinson, Moby Dick, Three Muskateers and Count of Monte Cristo, and anything else I could think of. So we spent some time talking about good adventure books, and he mentioned that he was surprised how much he had enjoyed “The Adventures of Robin Hood” recently. It was one I had enjoyed too.
At this signing, I think one guy bought one of my comics, and maybe two other guys came over and talked to me for a while, and that was as much as I expected. But I still had a really nice time, got some professional tips, and visited with everybody and hung out.