Before there was RuneStone there was...SLYTHE Part 2

Here is more art of SLYTHE, a character I created in my junior high days before Elders of the RuneStone. The artwork is not quite as good as Robert's, but I sense his anxiety anyway. Enjoy! (Click on any image for a larger version)An unfinished cover. Still one of my favorites.

Page 1 of my original attempt at the comic, in all its ballpoint pen-inked, crayon-colored glory! Taking place in the distant future (at the time) of 1995! I originally taped a bunch of sketchbook pages together to make the "book."
Page 2. In hindsight: They didn't have enough money for food? On a farm? But they had enough money to move to New York? And don't you love little Slythe's cute cartoon eyes? :)

Page 3. Pay no attention to the "4" at the bottom of the page. I'm trying to remember why I was so insistent on Slythe only knowing karate and kickboxing; I think it's from the influence of Van Damme movies. Darn those "troublesome punks"!
Page 4. Still a pretty cool fight scene in my opinion. Love those punks' hair! When you have Slythe reflections in your eyes, kiss your butt good-bye.

Page 5. Some time must have passed before doing this page; notice the abrupt change in art style. This is when I was discovering the Ninja Turtles comics by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird and tried to emulate the toning / inking style. Can you say overkill?

Page 6. The introduction of Mavery, who would go on to be Slythe's wife. Originally I gave the female Reptillians lizard faces too, but made the (weird) decision to give them human-like faces instead. I mean, lizard-faces just can't be hot.

Page 7. Another sweet fight scene.

Page 8. You can tell where I messed with Mavery's face a lot. You can also tell where I ran out of steam. Regarding the last panel, don't be alarmed, they were just going to be having lunch.

A homemade advertisement for my own "Masters Comics", featuring Mutant, a character from another series I had ideas for. They were the "Ultimate Force of Fun"!

The cover for my 2nd attempt at the Slythe comic, a major revamping of the original version. Love that over-inking with the ballpoint pen! I liked the palm-strike effect though.

Page 1. The kidnapper at the bottom would be the Dark Hood's main henchman. Don't worry, Slythe would save all the kidnapped children.

Page 2. Good thing there were "military soldiers" there, as opposed to the regular kind.

Page 3. Notice where I ran out of steam again (hint: there's only half a page).

A drawing of Slythe as a hero in a video game I had in mind called "Fear City." It was one of my first of him, and the only time I had him breathe fire.

The Dark Hood, formerly the Reaper. This fellow was the template for the Monolith in RuneStone.

In the Slythe comic, it would be revealed that the Dark Hood was not human! The effect was lessened when a kid in my class asked why he was wearing a diaper.

A later drawing of the big, beefy Dark Hood (diaper still intact).

Slythe's sensei Wu Shu, who later became Adder's sensei Koji Nakashi in Elders of the RuneStone.

A dream match inspired by the days of the Batman Vs. Predator comic: Slythe Vs. Predator!!

An idea I had for a team of superhero Reptillians led by Slythe in his alternate future. The lone female, Eynstine, was Slythe's wife Mavery.

Inspired by the Marvel Comics Infinity War where everybody fought their evil clone: Slythe Vs. Un-Slythe!

And how that fight would have ended, when Slythe unleashes the mystic powers granted him by the spirit of his sensei Wu Shu. It's payback time. FOOM!!

For great justice. I realize now that back then I liked conceptualizing more than hunkering down to make an actual comic.

Slythe montage. Complete with Final Fight street fighting moves!

As the story got more complex and I envisioned a "Sega CD" video game, I had ideas for a team of operatives as Slythe's back-up.

Concepts for Slythe's "spirit powers" for the video game.

One of my first attempts at using a crowquill pen. And a rare shot of Slythe in kung fu pants. That cloaked fellow is another vague character idea.

And last but not least, a shot of Slythe plus two other characters I never did anything with.

Before there was RuneStone there was...SLYTHE

Hey everyone, hope you've all had a great holiday season and that 2008 is an awesome era for you. If all goes according to plan it will certainly be so for us! As production continues, we appreciate everyone's ongoing support! We promise it will be well worth the wait as Elders of the RuneStone makes its first issue-length appearance!

But wait! Let's turn back time...

Back before there was RuneStone, another character was formulated in my mind and took all my attention: a lizard-man named Slythe. He was significant in that I put a lot of effort into his story and that his arch-nemesis eventually became Monolith, the enemy of the heroes in RuneStone. So here's a little bit of fun info on him!

Slythe, Reptillian Master of the Martial Arts

The basis of Slythe was that in the near future (September, 1995; I worked on the character through sixth grade and junior high, circa. 1991-1994) an alien race known as the Reptillians (notice the extra "L", so it's not the same as our HUMAN spelling) came to Earth after their own planet was destroyed by cosmic rays. It was pretty much a rip-off of the Alien Nation concept, but hey, I was like 12 at the time. These aliens were gradually accepted into Earth culture and treated like normal citizens of the planet. As time went on, a married Reptillian couple had a child named Slythe, who as a child met a martial arts master (at the time, master of Karate and Kickboxing!) named Wu Shu. (I found out later that Wu Shu is the name of an actual martial arts style. Weird.) When Slythe's parents are killed by an evil cult, he vows vengeance and uses his martial arts expertise to become a vigilante.

Several fights later, Slythe would come up against the leader of the cult, who is kidnapping children for some sort of sacrificial ritual. The leader is a mysterious cloaked fiend known as the Reaper. Then the Dark Hood. Then the Dark Specter. The point of the matter was, he was really evil. Slythe was forced to use his karate and kickboxing prowess against a villain who had magical power-blasting abilities. After tearing the cloak from the fiend, it was revealed that the Reaper was an inhuman creature from some foul realm. Eventually Slythe was the victor, and the Reaper was knocked into a vat of toxic chemicals. Was he dead? The iconic hand rising from the depths was clearly not of that opinion! And so future battles would reveal the Reaper had been mutated by the chemicals into a massive hulking creature with super-strength. (Don't you hate that?)

So that was the basis for the character. In hindsight, the storyline borrowed liberally from many other comic books, but to me it was "totally rad." The story evolved over time (I never got very far at actually drawing the story); eventually Slythe obtained sophisticated gadgets and a sweet super-car (a la "Batman"), a back-up team of operatives, and mystical abilities granted him by the spirit of his deceased master Wu Shu. And why all the alien backstory for a hero who is essentially just a good martial artist? Simply because lizard-men are cool. So without further ado, for your viewing pleasure, check out the various images below that went into this ultimately discontinued but still fun and exciting creation from my younger years. Note that the art is all from my younger days, so please, no mockery of the terrible disregard for realistic anatomy or man-faced females.

Covers for my first attempt at the Slythe comic. Notice the Van Damme outfit. And it's the "first in an unlimited series"! (Still not sure what that means.)

Here is some super-foreshortening. Foot in your FACE!
Notice that this comic will be at a comics station near you!

Slythe fighting the evil Reaper. A nice kick to the face. A nice pile-drive to the face.

And Slythe fighting the huge, post-toxic chemical dunked Reaper. He uses the Thigh Master.

And the "big reveal" with the unmasked Reaper. This was in the days before I started editing the comic for language.
























And one more. This was after Slythe had a wardrobe change with a leather jacket and gloves. I drew him here with cool shoes that had blades that flipped out.

So there you have it. Next time I'll reveal more pics of Slythe as he evolved...and you'll see more of the influence that found its way into RuneStone. Ciao!

Quinn

Up and Running part 3

Okay, At this point of the process there seems to be an incredibly large and invisible barrier. I have worked on 4 seperate projects where work had been completed by a creative team. These, all being independant, smaller press books, have each failed or atleast never progressed for various reasons. Some reasons for the lack of progress were due to issues I have already addressed. But each endeavor had been at a different stage of the publishing process.

The first project had actually been pretty far along when I came on board. The writer/creator had paid to have a creative team produce the book and then got the financial backing to self-publish the series. I drew issue #3 and part of #4, they have been published, but the print runs were so small and lack of finances prevented proper advertising for anyone to really know about the project. So this book, while published, is still only at issue 5 literally 4 years after I finished issue 3. They have plans to move forward, but such a ridiculous gap in solicitation prevents any continous readership.

Self publishing can be successful. There just needs to be alot of capitol to fund your project, and a determination to see it through. There are alot of examples of the successful self publisher, Mirage studios with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jeff Smith with Bone, Mike Allred with Madman, and really Image comics started out that way aswell. But you need those key ingredients for it all to fall into place.

My second project took alittle longer to get off the ground. I completed the work for a preview to send as a sample to publishers. It had been rejected by image, but later in the year was accepted by Moonstone publishing. It was one of those deals where this guy knows that guy and there was an agreement. I dont know how solid the deal was, or the exact specifications of the deal. The most I really knew about it was Moonstone had a similar deal with the writer that Image usually offers. Basically back end percentages of profits. Unfortunantly for this project I was mostly through the first issue when I received work with a movie property and later my first GI JOE work and had to set the project aside. I had worked on it on and off for the next year but was unable to see it through.

This experience taught me that even if one publisher isn't interested in the property to begin with, another might be totally behind it. Also, if the creative team doesnt feel invested in the project, it is hard to keep them on task when higher profile and paying work comes along. I didnt feel like I was a part of the creative process, therefore without any real emotional ties to the work, it wasnt hard for me to leave for something that could pay me.

My third project had a publisher in place before I came on. Again the writer knew the publisher well, and he was an established and very well known writer in the industry. His name recognition carried the property to be picked up before I was on board. He was offering a page rate, but it was back end pay. This never set well with me, even though I signed the contracts to it. A mistake I definantly learned from. There are two ways to be paid for your work in comics. Either the writer or publisher owns the rights and pays you an "upfront" page rate. Meaning you get paid a set amount within a reasonable time after you complete the work. OR you are part creator and have part ownership of the creative rights to the property and are paid on the "back end". Meaning you get paid along with the writer after the book is published and has sold, after which you receive a percentage of the profits.

On this project the writer wanted the best of both worlds. He demanded 100% ownership, but didnt have to pay me until the book came out. Meaning he places all of the risk on the artist. I felt I was working a full-time job, hoping, maybe to get paid 6-9 months later. And if the book became incredibly successful, he would reap the benefits of that success. I left the project pretty soon into it. 6 months later the publisher folded and went bankrupt leaving all the books unpaid.

I learned from this, to be very careful reading your contracts. Understand what you are getting into, and only sign if you feel completely comfortable with the deal. Also before you sign with a publisher do your homework. What is their past history and sales like? Are they reliable? talk to other creators and professionals to get their opinion. Conventions are a wonderful place to interact with these people. Make sure as best you can, that the publisher is reliable and wont leave you out to dry. It will never be a guarantee, but you can atleast be informed.

My fourth project was again a backend deal. It had a publisher set, again the writer had his contacts and set the deal prior to me starting. I had to leave the project again to pursue more financially viable opportunities, but the writer found an artist willing to work on the backend, and the book was published this last year as a graphic novel. So the project was still very successful, though I was not a part of its end result.

I think I will revisit the publisher topic in my next installment and talk about the various publishers I know. The pros and cons of working for each, and how to present your property to them.

Catch ya later!

Up and Running part 2

Well, so now you have worked out the basics of what's called a "creative team". Any comic can start with a writer and a penciler committed and on board. It is this relationship that has to be a strong working relationship for the project to stay intact through production. IF either of the two aren't communicating or feel they aren't being treated professionally then the project is done, and you are back at square one. So I cannot stress enough choosing the right artist, and creating that productive working relationship.

Once that partnership is in place, you have a solid foundation to build on. From there as work is being completed you need to find a reliable and capable inker and colorist for the book. (assuming it will be in color) Now I add that as an assumption, because a full color comic book is nearly 3 times more expensive to print than a black and white book. That will be addressed more completely when I talk about the finances of producing comics later.

So you need an inker. I have worked on a project, my first in fact, where I had penciled 22 consecutive pages and couldn't have been more proud. It was a work for hire gig, and I was getting paid per page, without any say on the production of the book. So an inker was hired without me having any say in the matter. An inker was hired, and it was his first work as well. Now let me say right off that the work I did on that project makes me cringe to this day, I was at the beginning of my career and still in school. That said, I was incredibly disappointed when I saw the inks come in.
It wasn't a matter of being nit picky either. Entire backgrounds were left out, faces were redrawn when they were smaller figures, and there was no sense of depth through the line weights. An inkers job is to embellish the art, define the art. This is accomplished through many techniques, including adjusting line weights from thick to thin to define depth, and texture to define mood, variation, and perspective. This is no easy task and is most certainly an art all it's own. A professional inker can literally save a book, but the inexperienced inker can do just the opposite. As a creative team you need to find an inker that best compliments the style and mood you are looking for in your book.

After your inker is on board and working on pages, finding a colorist is the next step. Again there are a few message boards that you can go to and put up ads that you are looking for a colorist. Typically, you need to have funds to pay the colorist upfront for their work. As with the inker, a colorist can really make or break the look of your project. In colors, you can very much expect to get what you pay for. By paying a colorist a page rate upfront you will have a much better chance at landing a capable colorist who will treat your work professionally.

A colorist will take the black and white line art and apply the last step of art to the finished page. They add separation and definition to the page that black and white art can only suggest at . Especially when it comes to "effect" heavy books with superpowers and explosions. But there are many other subtle benefits to the coloring step when it comes to the mood and setting. Whether it is morning or night, in the city or country side, indoors or outdoors, these places and times can be clearly suggested with the line art. But all of these settings can be instantly recognizable through an effective color palette. A colorist will use the theory of color to help clarify or embellish the story you have drawn. When you treat the colorist with respect and professionalism they will most likely be willing to work with you on creating the color palette and style that best supports your story. It can be a tedious process that often isn't found at once. In the beginning of any project there are many revisions that require a lot of time. If you communicate well, this can be relatively stress-free.

So you have the writer, penciler, inker and colorist all on board and working on various steps of the process. If you are already at this point you are way ahead of the game! Seriously, I have only been a part of two out of nearly a dozen projects that have gotten this far. And this is all before even landing a publishing deal. After you have the art finished, and I use that term "finished" loosely as to not offend any letterers, then you either have the book lettered by a freelancer or the art goes to your publisher for pre-production.

Pre-production encompasses many things and shouldn't be taken lightly. At Marvel, DC and other larger publishers they have on-hand staff that incorporate the art into a format they use for printing. If you compare a standard Marvel book, to DC, Dark Horse, or Devil's Due product, they all have a different "look" or feel to the book. This can be attributed to their "house" style of pre-production. This can include lettering the books (dialogue and sound effects), title pages, page size, page numbers, ads, letters pages and many other elements that come together to get the book ready to go the printer. You need a masthead or Title Logo for your book, usually a company logo, Issue # and date, Artist credits and sometimes a UPC all on the cover. Who does all that?.... Pre-production staff at your publisher. This also means that if you decide to self-publish, all that work falls on your lonely shoulders.

Like I said though, some of that work (like the letterer) is often farmed out to freelancers. I have worked on a couple projects where the pre-press was freelanced out before sending it to the printer on self published books.

So those many steps of the process all come together to get your project to the printer. If you are working on a "monthly" book, that means there is a very tight deadline to accomplish all this work in. Often the death sentence of many books is their untimely schedule and blown deadlines. If there is a major hold up or delay in any one of these steps, there is a very real chance that you miss your publishing deadline.

It usually takes a penciler working full-time 8-12 hours to pencil one comic book page. So with an average 22-24 page comic, you need to plan on at least a full month for the penciler to finish one issue. The inker should be given at least 3 weeks for a comfortable deadline, even more if it can be spared. In a perfect world you could even give the colorist that much time, before the book goes to pre-production. On that time-line it would take nearly 3 full months to create one monthly book. Obviously that math doesn't add up and you would get behind pretty quickly.

That is why most publishers expect at least 3 full issues completed before they even consider soliciting (making the book available to order for retailers) the first issue. On that schedule with 3 issues done by the time your book is coming out you should be working 3 issues in advance of the book on the shelf. Again...that's in a perfect world.

Sometimes artists have lives, and life gets in the way of deadlines. When the writer is slow getting a script approved, or to the penciler, expect that to ripple through the production schedule. More times than not, that delay comes from the penciler for various reasons. It becomes a very rigorous schedule for a penciler to consistently pencil a whole page every day, month after month. This is often why you find "fill-in" issues through most books. Either the penciler is so far behind that it has accumulated to over a months worth of lag time, or they just need a break. It is easy to get burned out creatively on that kind of schedule.

This applies to each step of the process when there are delays. But usually the burden of blown deadlines gets laid on the backs of the inkers and colorists to pick up the lost time. Inkers are forced to crunch 3 weeks of work into 2 or even 1 week. I've seen this and been a part of these expectations far too many times. I've seen colorists forced to crank out 20+ pages in 3 days, due to blown deadlines just to keep on schedule.

It ain't pretty when that happens, you end up with a disgruntled and burned out creative team that can't possibly create their best work.

There is no clear cut solution to the deadline problem. If there were, you would have a lot more comic book artists out there. It is a difficult and stressful job when working on deadline. The best thing you can do is plan ahead. Start working on your project WELL in advance of your first solicitation. The more lead time you have before a project, the bigger window you allow yourself for the guaranteed mishaps that cut away at your production schedule. So plan ahead, and have a back up plan of what to do if you are late in any one step of the process.

Well that's enough for now. In the next installment I will address proposals to publishers, and the many options you have for publishing.