Creative Team Assemble!

[Danger_Slater]

So I just joined the Penciljack community at the behest of several websites offering advice at breaking into the comic book game.

Here's who I am, in case anyone wants to know some background: http://www.dangerslater.blogspot.com.

The short version is I'm a professional writer/novelist, looking to expand into writing comics. Now, I've already written the entire 6-issue story arc based off an original idea I had (the first story arc of an ongoing series). I was in talks with a certain comapny [name withheld] to get this story published. But that deal fell through. Now I'm shopping it around elsewhere. I'm noticing a trend, though. It seems to me that most comic publishing companies want an entire 'creative team' attached to their books and not just some dude with a bunch of scripts going, "find me an artist, goddamnit!"

My question is, how do I find this "creative team"?
How do I find people of similar vision and humor to work on this with me?
And if there are publishers out there who would help me assemble this team, how do I find them?

Any help or advice, etc. would be greatly appreciated.

[My name is Tommy]

Hey, I know the struggles my man. The fact is though, most companies don't just want a full team attached, they want complete comics. The average company won't look at your work unless you're handing them some complete and professional quality comics(from what I've seen, most companies want at least 8 pages, but some want a full first issue).

Two good places to look for people to work with are, well, right here on this site. Just click forum, scroll down to the last section of threads "DIVERGENT DISCUSSIONS" and click on "BULLETIN BOARD". That's the place for looking for work/partner type posts. I've personally never looked for help that way, as I have lucked out by just running into people interested, but it's something I plan on doing in the near future. If there's anyone on this site looking for new projects, it will be in that section they go a-searching.

There's also Digital Webbing: http://www.digitalwebbing.com/talent/
If you go there you can more or less copy whatever you post on the bulliten board here and paste it into their talent search. Honestly, I don't know which one gets better results, as I have not done it myself, and I have heard more people talk about meeting partners on PencilJack than on D.W. But, honestly, why not double your chances.


And, lastly, I know I saw it on here somewhere, but I can't remember which thread(maybe someone reading this can help out with that) but there's a list as per the requirements for all kinds of publishing companies. If you can't find it here, I'm sure you could unearth it with a simple google search.

Anyway, best of luck!

[Danger_Slater]

Thanks, dude.

I'm gonna put out some feelers now.

D

[My name is Tommy]

Not a problem. Good luck, man.

[Chris2.0]

Good points by MNiT!

I am going the PJ "BULLETIN BOARD" way, but have previously done the DigiWebbing route as well - in both cases got some VERY good art done!

I can perhaps add that depending on your budget and if you don't want to personally supervise each step in the process - then you can approach a comic book studio to do all the heavy lifting, and they they supply you with the completed comic book? One group I've recently come to know about is http://www.spacegoatproductions.com - perhaps contact them and see which way works better for you? And I'm sure there are others around as well...

[My name is Tommy]

Sorry to hijack the thread for my own benefit, but Chris, have you gone the studio route before? Or do you know how much cash we're talking? Because I am quite the starving artist(writer), so a budget is hard to come by, but it might be worth saving up and going that route to make sure the product gets finished. As long as the studio has a good enough reputation, it certainly seems a little safer to go that route if paying upfront is involved(not to say that regular artist folks on the site aren't to be trusted or anything.

Either way though, I'm about to browse their site.

[Chris2.0]

Pretty sure Danger_Slater won't mind (too much)!

Nope, I only heard about them last week, but their list of work is pretty impressive...!

I'm just guessing here, but DC will either give out the work to a studio if its either less risk/hassle and/or cheaper than to do it themselves? So yeah, it should be more or less what DC pays everybody involved in making a comic, except the in-house writer? So if you take Mark Waid's calculations, you can perhaps guestimate what they should charge?

But easiest might be to just mail them and ask...

Although I'm pretty sorted with artists - most of the scripts I would want drawn is in the pipeline to get done, and looks like my "This is what I remember..." story will be the 1st to be finished... And my 92 page sci-fi First Contact story to be started in Aug...

Now just to get my WordPress hat on and start to get a website together again...

[Danger_Slater]

First off, I refuse to pay anybody money out of my pocket without getting paid myself first. It's like buying a gym membership. Yeah, you just spent 100 bucks to use their treadmill, but just because you're broke now it doesn't mean you're skinny. At the end of the day, you still got to run, and to me the sidewalk costs nothing and gets you the same result as the spin class...

...that was a dumb analogy...

What I mean to say is that what I want more than my comic to be "drawn" is to find a partner. An artists who's ideas and sense of humor are simpatico with mine. A teammate to help me develop my ideas, and likewise, whose idea I can help develop too. To make us both better at what we do. I know there are so many talented artists out there, many of them unproven. Many of them who would probably be interested in the sort of story I'm trying to tell.

I'm just trying to figure out where they are hiding?

[My name is Tommy]

@Chris: Yeah, their credits are remarkable. I actually did send an email, since it's not going to cost anything to ask. They claim to try and work with any budget, so we'll see what they can do with my 42 cents. Honestly though, they claim to be affordable so we'll see. Based on the talent and credits alone I doubt they're cheap, but maybe if I can get one thing going well enough another way I can keep going to that well.
And I wish all of my stories were so close to being done! One is, but that's about it. I think the problem(if you want to call it one) is that when I don't get things sorted out with one story, I just move on and write the next one. I have less than 2 years experience writing comments and easily over a dozen and a half stories either finished or underway.

@D.S: I cannot even tell you how up my alley that way of thinking is. I've been in tons of bands, and while asking someone "Hey, do you want to play guitar?", I never once heard "What can you pay me upfront?" In the perfect scenario, all art-based endeavors would be treated as labors of love, and all involved would be equally at risk of failure and, ergo, equally motivated to make the project happen outside of just doing their part artistically.
That said, finding a free artist seems much more similar to finding a free actor for a film rather than a free guitarist for a band. Oh they're out there, but the general consensus is writers need them more than the other way around. It's a hard point to argue, as much as I want to. As far as talented and unproven artists, the truth is that they definitely exist, but are only unproven on some levels. What I mean is, though they may be completely unsuccessful, it's easy to prove talent. All they have to do is show a picture. And the truth is, if they're THAT talented, they can find people willing to pay them to work. The trick is finding them when the time is right and getting a commitment before someone snatches them up. Also, you have to figure drawing is a LOT more work. I can finish a comic script in 2 days, the longest one has ever taken me was 10 days. For an artist, it's going to take at least twice as long. And that's being opimistic. A 6 part series is typically going to be 6 months of full-time work for the average artist. That's not to say I disagree with you, just that I can see where the wanting to be for sure paid comes into play.

Also, just to answer your question in regards to where are they are hiding. I don't quite know where, but man it's a good spot! In nearly 2 years I have found 5 artists interested in working without being paid upfront. 3 of them were totally unreliable, 1 was just way too busy to commit(still trying to make it happen, just very slow going), and of the bunch only one has the skills, dedication and time to make things happen. It's possible, but it's very hard to find.

[amadarwin]

I'm just trying to figure out where they are hiding?

The quick answer: Everyone wants to get paid.

The only way to get what you're seeking (a partnership), you're going to have to find a way to get chummy with an artist and build a relationship of mutual trust and respect. Even then, you have to remember partners tend to share rights and ownership. Unfortunately, this route takes time.

On the flip side, the quicker route hits your pocket book first.

It's hard to swallow, I know, but that's how it usually is in this arena.

here's an analogy for you:

You want to build a house to sell. In fact, you have this great idea how you want it built. You have the designs, blueprints and can't wait to build it. Unfortunately, you have no idea how to build a house. For that, you'll need a crew. Even worse, they expect to be PAID for their work! What do you do?

How do you think they'll respond if you tell them you'll pay them after you get your cut of the sale?