Could I be making the "switch" soon?

I've been talking with several people over the last couple of months about doing freelance work for them. Obviously some have come to fruition as demonstrated by Cary's post over at RedHandedStudios.com, but others have been floating around waiting to get nailed down. One particular person, who shall remain nameless for now, is doing something really great in the tech world and needs a solid comic writer to help him tap into the market. That is where I fit in... Over the last several days, we have pinged back and forth, amassing a lengthy email string discussing possible stories ~ not just one, but a bunch of them. If things come through on that both as a freelance position for me and as a business in general, it could stand to be very lucrative for both of us, which is great! I'll update more as I'm allowed, of course, but for now I'm staying relatively quiet about the details so not to accidentally give away something that's not mine to give away.

Back on the Faction front, KT is finished with the sketches save one, which I should have in my hands this morning at some point. All of the final touches on formatting, bio's, etc, are being finished up today as well, to make sure everything is "purdy" before sending them over to Ian at DimeStoreProductions.com. I'm excited to see what happens with the voting tomorrow!

On other projects, things have been very quiet the last little bit... Denman is working behind the scenes on the horror mini as he has time. Sachin is working on the detective story, finishing up the submission package over the next few days. God, he's fast! There's also potentially another artist in the mix, but I won't name drop at this time... If we work out some details, I'll throw his name out there, because I'm very excited. We're talking about him potentially being the artist for my fantasy book. He is a known artist, having worked for several larger independeng publishers, but he hasn't done fantasy before, so it's a new challenge for him. Anyway, more to come on that front.

That's it from Erik-land for now... Once Ian posts our round 2 stuff on the dimestore site, I'll be sure to share things here, the Faction group on FaceBook, and anywhere else I can get away with it so everyone can check it out.

Just two more days until voting begins for SPI Round 2

The sand is running out to turn in submission for Round 2 over at Small Press Idol 2009 (http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/). I find that as things wind down, I'm double checking everything I've written (again and again), looking at the images for clarity and little errors, wondering if I'm writing too much or too little in the bios, etc... At some point you just have to resign yourself to the fact that no matter what you try to do nothing is perfect. The trick is to do your best, put your best foot forward and at some point stop tweaking it. While reworking the pitch for Faction after it was called out as too long by the judges and other forum members, I tooled and re-tooled it. At one point I turned in a concise pitch, but then I lost pertinent information from it, which made some details which were critical to the plot disappear. Point to that is that the more you re-work something, the higher the chance that something that makes it special is going to be unintentionally cut out in the guise of efficiency.

If you're reading this and haven't already done so, please go sign up at the dimestore site... Instructions are in previous posts on my blog, so get over there, sign up, and vote for Faction starting on April 1st. If you're registered, you get one vote per day, so go back daily to vote, it just takes a sec. Thanks!

Comic book life, universe, and evertything in it - another rant

I’ve found myself thinking a lot recently about comics, writing, how they fit into the grand scheme of things within myself and society. I have been emailing back and forth with someone about another potential freelance gig and part of the discussion is what you can really get out of comics, how they can change people (or not), etc… I just wanted to elaborate on some of my thoughts.

Comic books are an interesting medium. For the most part, comic books published over the last number of decades are disposable mass-market entertainment. Is that a bad thing? Well, no, of course not. Millions of kids were raised on a healthy diet of the medium, learned things about people indirectly through the exploits of their favorite characters from Clark Kent to Reed Richards, from Peter Parker to Hal Jordan, from Ororo Munroe to Diana Prince, etc etc etc… Intentionally or subconsciously, the writers taught children the meaning of right and wrong, standing up for what you believe in, why prejudice was wrong, and other great things. Somewhere along the way, though, it became more about bigger and bigger battles, what threat is there to the universe this time, and which heroes can we get away with killing, bringing back, changing reality, going to the future, changing the past… Well, you get the idea.

Now, what has changed? Nothing for the most part, but there is a larger group of writers these days who challenge what it means to be a comic book, throw in more reality to the medium, often hidden within the pages but there. Now the question is, just how much reality do you want in the comic books? Non-fiction comic books are around, drama comic books are around, but do we need a comic book about literal modern struggles or should there be a separation between the two? Do we need to turn on the news to hear about all of the world’s problems and then open a comic book to hear the same thing? I would argue not… Any life lessons picked up from a comic book should be subtle. Any commentary on the world should be done the same way. Writers through characters, villains and heroes, inspired by the real world but not of it. Again, biographical and non-fiction books are different. Personally, I would be depressed reading about the real world in comic books. Now unlike the latest issues of South Park, which are often created in a very short span of time, comic books are often months in development. A hot topic now might be moot in two months (supporting NOT making comics too real).

My point to all of this? Make comics real to themselves, not to our reality. Create your own, even if inspired by real events, rather than forcing “reality” down people’s throats through yet another medium, as if the constant barrage of tv, internet, newspaper, radio, and water-cooler sources didn’t take care of it on their own. Life and death can be contained in comics and still have as much impact as reality would, but events can be driven to a point with a little more concrete black and white resolutions over the real world. In the new show “Castle” on ABC, the main character, Castle, often looks within the “plot” of murders, thinking that the truth isn’t telling a good enough “story”, so there must be more to it. Unfortunately, in the real world the story isn’t always there. Sometimes violence is done for violence’s sake and nothing more. Though I don’t want to see another fifty years of disposable comic books, I would rather see drama in the books between the characters and the events in their world, not ours.
Probably enough ranting for now… I’m not positive what point I was trying to make for this except that comic books, while not disposable all the time, should try NOT to be TOO real.

Wow how things have snowballed!!

This is pretty cool... I checked this morning and 111 people are watching the FaceBook group I created for Faction. That's some attention if I've ever seen it! I'm excited to see what everyone brings to Round 2 of Small Press Idol 2009, but I'm more interested to see what the fans think of what we're bringing to the table. Fans will help us get from Rounds 2 to 3 and 3 to 4 as much as the judges will, so if you haven't already done so, please go and sign up... If you're on FaceBook, sign up for the Faction Forum! http://www.facebook.com/groups.php?ref=sb#/group.php?gid=55926073990

Below is a note I sent out to all of the members this morning...

I appreciate the eyes and ears watching the project and look forward to the grand unveil in just a few days. Once again I wanted to throw out a few links to everyone so you know A) How to sign up, B) Where to sign up, and C) Where to go to vote starting on Wednesday, April 1st.

a. How to sign up - The process itself is very easy, but I created a little process on my personal web site to show you how. You can download it at ~ http://www.geocities.com/thelastbard/Faction/SPI-JoinForums.doc

b. Where to sign up - You can go to the DimeStore Productions web site and click on the link at the top left of the screen that shows sign in or sign up... no big deal there or to link directly to the sign in area, you can go to ~ http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/signup.php .. Please keep in mind that they ask for address information and stuff, but that's just because it ties to their store, too, so if you end up ordering anything, it's in their system. They will not bill, spam, or harrass you for anything unless YOU decide you want to buy something.

c. Where to go to vote starting on Wednesday April 1st ~ If you go to the DimeStore productions web site, there's a button for Idol on the left hand side. When you're in there, just scroll down to the "Round 2" area. Your other option is just to go to ~ http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/content287.html#Round2 ... Once you are there, you will see a list of projects in alphabetical order... Just scroll down to "Faction" and on the right side (column 4). there is a link to vote for the project. Note: The link will not be active until April 1st. You have to be signed up on the site to be able to vote so they know you're a real person.

Once again, I appreciate the help and look forward to seeing you all on the DimeStore site showing your support!

Thank you,
Erik Hendrix
http://thelastbardsblog.blogspot.com/
http://lastbard.deviantart.com/
http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/content294.html <-- Faction project site on DimeStore site.

Rambling as only I can… history, comics, getting published, SPI, and what it all means…

I’ve talked with several friends over the last few months about this mysterious comic book world I’m trying to crack into, so I thought I’d share some insight as to what’s going on in my head…

Back when I a little kid, around six years old, I was introduced to books like the Chronicles of Narnia, the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings series, Lloyd Alexander’s books, etc… Thought I did read the typical books of kids that age as well, the fantasy stories my mother purchased for me really struck a chord in me. I can remember back in elementary school, probably 3rd or 4th grade, having some school project that I ended up making a book out of, drawing pictures of dragons and heroes fighting them. I’m not sure of the details because I don’t have that kind of memory, but I know I won some sort of competition and the school asked to put my “book” in their library. I really wish I had that now so I could see what I did back then.

Anyway, fast-forward a few years… When I was a child, I did everything from read voracious amounts of science fiction and fantasy (hundreds and hundreds of novels) to comic books to watch anything my parents would let me get away with (and often things they wouldn’t). Add to that my mother and her ever-evolving list of new age, occult, spiritual, etc studies she picked up along the way and showed me and also a healthy dose of the life only a military brat can bring and I was quickly developing into, well, an odd kid. At an early age I was also exposed to D&D, which along with those other experiences, definitely helped to pave the way for the prolific creativity which I’m plagued by now (don’t mean to make it sound like a bad thing, because it’s not).

In high school, my creativity hit a new stride. My best friend at the time and I were really into music, wrote tons of songs, and had aspirations to start a band. Unfortunately, neither of us could play guitar and I was terrified to sing around anyone but him when we were goofing around. Now there was a dream easily side-tracked. Also in high school, I hooked up with a group of friends who were already playing Star Frontiers (old TSR game) and after discussing, we ended up delving into the realm of D&D together. We bounced around various campaign settings but seemed to like Spelljammer the most because you could go literally anywhere and we did. Dan, THE ultimate DM ~ by far the best I’ve ever known, created vast worlds, unique creatures, and let us run through and mess it all up. During that time I started to really get a good grasp on character development. The trick is to find something within yourself, no matter how small, to put into the character and run with it. We all have light and dark sides, normal and strange, extremely intelligent and downright stupid, etc, so you find the grain, flush it out, and everyone, when it comes down to it, is an aspect of you ~ even the whackos! Same applies now when I create characters… I have a couple of villains that I think “Where did that come from?” but I’m sure it’s somewhere in my psyche.

Along the way I delved into DM’ing campaigns myself, filling notebooks with details of the worlds, characters, spells, classes, etc, striving to make the “perfect” world for the characters to run around in, planning for every scenario. In the end, I was annoyed because the PC’s, instead of doing something logical, decided that it would be more fun to kill everything. I can imagine video game developers must be annoyed when they roll such a nice plot into a game like Fallout 3 and people decide that rather than talking to people and, even if it goes poorly, go through the dialogue, they skip the dialogue and put a bullet in their head. That was more or less what happened. Worlds of intrigue were reduced to bloodbaths and my notebooks filled with notes ended up collecting dust in a box somewhere. The skill I picked up during this time, however, is world building. Despite the fact that PC’s tend to do the unexpected, when you create a world and characters meant for that world, they tend to go along a path or one of the paths you created for them (where else are they going to go?). It was quite a while before I assimilated that knowledge into my writing, but it was in there.

During the years that I played D&D, but after high school, I was working at a book store, reading tons and tons of books (I rode the bus so I had time). I decided it was time to create my own. Using my own methodology, I created the world, created the characters, came up with situations, and dropped the characters in. My early attempts to write said book, I can look back on now and laugh at, but the foundation is still there in the fantasy novel I’m writing now. I filled notebooks with ideas, characters, bits of plot, etc… When I switched to a corporate job, my time to write shrank ~ I had a car, so no bus time to write, I had responsibilities, so no time to daydream, etc… Eventually, I stopped writing on my book and another set of notebooks ended up collecting dust in a box someplace. I switched over to guitar and writing songs since I had some work friends in bands. After a while of fumbling with that, everything stopped except writing poetry and songs. Relationships from the time provided perfect fodder for both the bad (previous relationships) and good (meeting my wife, falling in love, and getting married) writing.

Career changed, priorities changed, and suddenly I found time to write again, though it take me a while to take advantage of it. I commute on the train a couple of hours per day, leaving me dedicated time in my own little world. First thing I started doing was re-writing the novel I had started and stopped years prior. I couldn’t find my old notebooks at the time, so all I had to go on were a handful of old computer files with character information and some gods. Lucky for me! I started writing like mad, quickly tallying up over 200 pages of straight text ~ hand written, of course, because that’s how I was the most comfortable at the time. As the pages were cranking out, however, other ideas started popping in my head that wouldn’t go away, so I started jotting down notes on them, setting them aside, and eventually putting them in files on a pen drive. I didn’t know what I was going to do with them, but there they were. Inspiration struck when one particular idea really seemed like a good idea for a comic book. I had been reading comics for almost 25 years seriously, so it just kind of made sense. As soon as I started to dabble in script writing, I realized my style translated very well to script writing. This was confirmed as soon as the first artist I worked with got ahold of my scripts and was able to create about exactly what I had in my head on paper. I was onto something, I realized!

Soon, my novel was set aside for a time and I started pouring all of my spare moments into writing my opus, a detective story based on a character I had created as a joke at work years before, cranking out a TON of script pages before I even stopped to catch my breath. I was passionate about it, and decided this is what I HAD to be doing, even if only freelance ~ I wanted to be published, I wanted to be able to say, “I’m a writer” without it being a hobby. My creative mind and my professional mind talked, came to an agreement, and I started to push forward, unscathed, undeterred by the horror stories of people trying to get published. Soon, I had around 16 ideas on my pen drive, hundreds of pages of scripts, multiple artists working on various projects and then I landed in Small Press Idol. Feedback from my peers in the small press world confirmed that I’m not just “trying” to write, I’m actually doing it and doing it well.

Milestones – not in order of importance…
- Finishing my first mini-series… The project I’m working with Denman Rooke on I finished writing about two months ago and can’t wait to get it out there. It was an amazing feeling, though, going from original concept to getting it completed in the four issues (my target number).
- Writing over 180 pages (as of today) of my detective story and being close to having a submission package ready to ship out. Sachin Nagar, the artist I’m working with on the project has amazed me with his ability to take what’s in my head and on paper and translate it perfectly.
- Making it through Small Press Idol Round 1… We may win, we may not win. I’ll tell you this, though, we DO have a good shot. Obviously I can’t share details, but my story is amazing, my characters breathe, and KT’s art is organic and beautiful. Round 2 will show that, but take my word for it, this series can literally go on forever without becoming a cliché.
- Red Handed Studios… The fact that Cary has a good idea of what I can do based on what he’s seen and a few conversations leading him to offer me a spot on his team for Dynagirl is awesome. He’s a great writer and has created a world with some solid heroes and plenty of room to go to town, so I look forward to digging in.
- Small Press Community… From Doc to Ian to the judges at Small Press Idol to the countless others who frequent the DimeStoreProductions site, I have come to value their input, their banter, and their insight into a world I didn’t understand or really know about before starting this comic book journey.

Whether the comics I write will lead me to the “big leagues” or not is anyone’s guess and it doesn’t bother me. Success, as I’ve defined it in previous posts, is what you determine. As far as I’m concerned, I’ve almost achieved it, so anything above that is just icing on the cake. “Big League” publishers ~ I’m here, prolific, and have a billion ideas. I’m not going to forget, though, who has helped me over the last few months no matter where I end up.

Anyway, that’s it for now… I just thought I might try to organize some of the chaos in my brain to share with people… By the way, I DID eventually find those old dusty notebooks taped in boxes… My writing when I first started my book? Not so good. Ha ha ha…

P.S. – Dan, my old DM and best friend… we still need to co-write something together. I’m not letting you off the hook yet.

Faction "in print" - available at DimeStore

So, we (round 2 SPI contestants) received a mail today letting us know that there's an SPA (Small Press Association) book being published which also includes a little blurb about each project heading into Round 2. You can download it for free at the link below and it's worth checking out. Ian (Mr. DimeStore) has put together a preview of Pinnacle (another DimeStore book), reviews, and all of the Round 1 submission details for each project as well as links to get to the project sites. Click below to download, but you'll have to sign up to get it even though it's free. Just the name of the game (free to sign up and no spam).

http://www.dimestoredistro.com/sneakpeek2-p-1157.html

I know I've mentioned this various places like a billion times, but if you haven't already done so, please sign up at http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/ so you can vote for Round 2. Faction needs your votes if we are to get to Rounds 3 and 4. No money, just sign up and go on daily starting on April 1st. You get ONE VOTE PER DAY! Thanks!

It's not live yet, but if you are already signed up, starting on April 1st, go to the below link once per day to vote for Faction to win Small Press Idol 2009!

http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/content287.html#Round2

TwelveFingers.com promotes Faction

Another web site has joined in the fun of Small Press Idol. TwelveFingers.com, a blog run by Shawn Swanson, which covers everything under the sun related to comics posted an article about Faction. Check it out at the link below.

Looks like the buzz is spreading! Round 2 starts in a week, so sign up on dimestoreproductions.com so you can vote!

http://twelvefingers.com/2009/faction-makes-2nd-round-of-small-press-idol-2009/

Red Handed Studios, Inter-Fan, and SPI

When it rains, it pours, I suppose... Since starting my trek towards getting my comic books published, I have established relationships with several people in the publishing world. Some of those relationships are now "hatching" in a very positive way. Over the last few things a couple of things were "released".

Red Handed Studios ~ Cary Kelly, owner of Red Handed Studios, publisher of the exploits of Justice Theta in Final Justice and soon the misadventures of Dynagirl in her spin-off series, has asked me to join the team as a writer to assist in the Dynagirl ongoing series. I'm extremely excited to jump on board since the team from Cary to the art team are all great both professionally and personally. It is amazing that Cary has recognized my talent just from the few samples I've posted online and I'm excited with the opportunity.

Inter-Fan ~ "Doc", an SPA alum, has officially asked me to be the correspondant and photographer at the San Diego Comic Con this year. We met after I joined Small Press Idol this year and both my knowledge of comics and love for photography make this a natural fit. I look forward to looking at the Con from a small press perspective, taking pictures and meeting people from the SPA, etc... Look for me there!

Small Press Idol 2009 and the SPA (Small Press Association) ~ Round 2 of Small Press Idol starts on April 1st. KT and I are hard at work preparing everything for the "unveil" and significant updates on the DimeStoreProductions web site show us that they are gearing up.

Other Projects ~ Along with Faction at Small Press Idol, my upcoming stint on Dynagirl, and my various "mystery" projects which I always hesitate talk about, I have other projects in the works and some "maybe's" for others. I took on a co-writing gig with someone in FL a while back and we're just getting started on a submission package. That has been an interesting experience since every writer does things a little differently. At the end of the day I feel there is a healthy share of "Erik" in the script despite the fact that it's not my creation. The coming months will bring more information on that. As I mentioned before, a few other companies and people have contacted me about freelance work, so we'll see how those pan out as well.

Small Press Idol 2009 - New Rough Cover from KT

Check this one out! KT sent me an updated rough cover at around 1am today (after he got off of work) and I'm blown away! I've seen it a little further along than this, but we can't post too much detail this early in the competition. You have to use your imagination a little bit and throw in some lighting effects and also the shadow of one of the big baddies above the figures below. The names of the characters save Acker (center - mentioned in the pitch) and their bios will appear in Round 2, which starts on April 1st.

In other exciting news, feedback so far on this updated rough cover is that it's a HUGE improvement over the original we posted. I liked the old one, but I do agree this one is a lot better. The details KT put into it are amazing and it tells things about the story that will make more sense after you read issue 0 - when THAT will be released all depends on how far along we get in the competition based on the judges and Votes from YOU! If you haven't done it already, please join the forums at http://www.dimestoreproductions.com/ so you can vote. It's the only way the mods can make sure the people voting are real... otherwise us sneaky creators could just vote all we wanted. ;)

In other news, some great things are getting ready to be revealed, but I can't spill the beans yet. It does, however, move me towards a point - below...

HOW DO YOU MEASURE SUCCESS?

I've posted on a few forums about my view of success. Back in the day I had this dream of starting up a band as the lead singer and guitar player (not lead). I always said I would consider the band a success once we put out our first 45 record. Seems kind of funny, right? Why would a single be a measure of success? Well, I think about it as what I spent the most money on at the time in regards to music. It wasn't major record labels, it was the indies, music I picked up from shows, etc... I just wanted something tangible to sell at shows. Now, I never ended up getting anywhere with music, band ventures fell apart, but that's no big deal, I'm cool with it.

Now, what's my measure of comic book success? If people interested in the book are able to buy a tangible copy, I'm happy. Is there a dream somewhere inside of working for Marvel or DC Comics? ABSOLUTELY!!! It is not, however, what point I would consider myself a success, just the icing on the cake. I want to publish my books... I want publishers to believe in what I believe in to the point that they are willing to help me publish my ideas for mass consumption. If hundreds of people want the book, I'm a success. If thousands or tens of thousands want to read them, that's just gravy.

A while back I posted on the DimeStore forums asking what people's dreams are with comics. I want to tell stories. I'm working on a book - someday I want it printed and to be able to walk into a Borders, B&N or look on Amazon and see it for sale. With the comics, if someone on the East coast wants the book, I want them to be able to find it.

Anyway, that's enough of a rant from me for now... If you're a writer, artist, or whatever, don't think about your pipedream, think of realistic goals and how you're going to get there. That way if you meet those goals, you can push beyond them and you've succeeded. If you end up getting picked up by one of the larger publishers, can make a living, become famouse, sell movie rights, etc, that's just icing on the cake.

With Faction, the dream is to have an ongoing series published with a steady readership. With some of the others, the dreams might vary. :)

Updates again!

Well, I'm not going to spill the beans myself, but there's potentially some good news heading my way which will be posted on another web site in the next couple of days. Of course once there is an official announcement I'll be sure to post about it. I'm pretty darned excited, actually, but I'm shutting up on that.

Sachin sent another page to me last night, rough layouts for the project we're working on. The guy's got style, I tell you! It's stuff like this that makes me love being a writer ~ seeing what a talented artist can do with your words!

For some reason I can't get the page to show up, so I'll have to post it later.... shoot.

AHA! Got it! Isn't it awesome!

Freelance writing

Apparently there's something to freelance writing! I call myself one, but I didn't really think that people would come to me asking for me to write specific things for video games, other comic books, etc... Suddenly in the last week I've received five mails from various people asking to work with me on projects. Typically it's their idea and they want me to help them by scripting, providing ideas, etc... No complaints here! I've always said I didn't want to be a "hired monkey", but if I find the projects interesting, it definitely seems like the way to go and it's great practice for eventually working in the big leagues as a writer. Very nice!

Progress on things? Working to get updates on various projects, find the "right" project for some artists, etc... Small Press Idol is still a blast and the people involved have been awesome every step of the way. No complaints about the judges as long as none of them throw a "meh" my direction.... ha ha ha...

Anywho, I think that's it from me for now. Just waiting for the wife to get ready so we can go out for a bit, do some grocery shopping, and come back to catch up on some tv. Writing today? Guessing I won't have the time, but that's okay, there's always tomorrow!

Tied to Facebook

So I tied my Blog to Facebook to see how that goes... Posting a widget says it would take technical skills... Click a button and paste, not overly technical. ;)

A Character Evolution Evolving Into?

Ok, as usual I don't talk about the names or plot of stories that aren't out there, but I was pretty darned excited about some of the progress made on my detective story, I thought I would at least share some artwork. Sachin Nagar found me not too long ago and was interested in working together. At the first crack at the characters, he downright NAILED them! Check out the results below.

Welcome to Facebook, Faction!

Well, I joined Facebook last week and now I've gone and made a page especially for my Small Press Idol 2009 project, Faction. Go check it out and join up to receive updates on the project.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=55926073990

How many will it be?

Damn I wish I could list titles on here... It's kind of hard talking about things without talking about them, you know?

1. Faction - Going going going... KT and I email back and forth regularly and I'm a constant presence on the DimeStoreProductions forums just so I can check out the competition and keep in touch with the people there (who are really cool by the way). I'm enjoying the "trip" of the book overall ~ writing, developing, preparing for the next stages, etc... I hope we win, I know the book has the potential, but the experience is priceless.
2. Horror-mini - Deman and I email back and forth fairly regularly with statuses on the art and such. I went through and did another pass on issues 3 and 4 (the script) so I can get some more eyes on it without them getting distracted by my early AM writing.... I make stupid mistakes sometimes at the crack of dawn.
3. Crime, Detective, Noir, whatever you want to call it - Actually I had an artist out of the blue contact me a few weeks ago who NAILED the art style I was looking for on the book... This is the project I have over 130 pages scripted, so I'm excited to find somone who can do what I'm looking for on the book. I had an artist at one point, but we had to part ways. No had feelings, though, there...
4. Fantasy Series - As mentioned before, I may have found an artist for this one. Michael does some absolutely amazing stuff on his site and he's working on my concepts to get the right "feel" for the book. Hopefully we can pull it off because it's one of those stories I HAVE to tell.
5. More... I seem to get regular emails from artists who find old postings on various sites... I have a ton of projects in the pipeline, but only so much time in the day! We'll see if any of the others pan out and we can get something going.

The big question is, I guess, how many submission packages can I get together to send out around SDCC this year? I'm hoping to have a lot of stuff to walk around with at the con, set up appointments with some editors, etc etc etc... wish me luck!