Viva le double!!

As much as I embrace our digital future, Rich Johnston touches on one of the biggest pitfalls to the new format (especially on smaller handheld devices)... the limited canvas that all but wipes away any chance to dramatically increase scale during the story with double page splashes (and to an extent, single page splashes).

He even includes a nice gallery of double page splashes that are a visual feast HERE

I know a lot of people are detractors of the splash page, but for me comics are an art form, and are art first and foremost, so limiting it's potential canvas is worrisome, so as much as I'd love to see comics expand their reach digitally, I hate that it comes at a cost.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Diamond raises independent pubisher sales thresholds PART 2: beneath the surface

First be sure and read part 1, my reaction yesterday to the news of the changes to Diamond's indpendent publisher policy. Now, here are some more in depth thoughts on the topic...

Comics are a business.
True.
However, comics, and by that we mean the US comics industry/direct market, have become increasingly a business about the large publishers.
There was a time when small press was a viable percentage of what the direct market was about, ushering in new creators, ideas, characters, companies, and franchises, offering a diversity beyond the spandex and cape comics that had conquered the newsstands, and growing the medium to it's current more mature existence.
Let's not forget, there once was a time that comics were truly for kids, and while Stan Lee and the modern Marvel universe may have played a large role in changing that, we certainly wouldn't have gotten to where we are today without the small press and creator-owned comic books of the 1980's and beyond.

It's easy to point to Diamond, and their handling of this material, being vastly the sole distributor to comic books shops, as the guilty party, but lets not forget, it's accross the board. Somewhere along the line, there was tipping point - most likely when the big two publishers realized they had a captive, and importantly, static market, and catered their publishing around that, increasing output and gimmicks to take more and more of their fanbase's comic spending dollars, leaving less money for everyone, accross the board, to spend on independent offerings. In turn, driving interest further in their direction, and therefore affecting every aspect of the industry, including print and web coverage. You see, it's not just tough to sell a book via Diamond, it's also become increasingly difficult to get any press whatsoever for the small press, as comic news sites become more and more corporate, and hit/traffic based revenue driven. They simply no longer afford much coverage at all to anything outside the larger publishers, as they need to drive their traffic based revenue, with the advertising rates rising, along with their hit counts, and the industries largest and main print publication, Wizard, fancying itself a media magazine, with coverage and expensive ad rates to coincide with it's bloated distribution numbers. There's increasingly no where for the smaller voices to turn, or even be heard, and increasingly more product from the large publishers, with high level, high volume exposure, competing against them.

The entire industry has become self serving to these larger publishers, and there's no one with any power, championing indpendent comics and the small press. Sure, the web is infinite, but small press centric sites come and go, and no real voice has emerged. (This has been a point I often muse about, and would love to address, putting together and pitching some sort of small press column to the big sites, but something I unfortunately haven't found the time for.)

In recent years, one can sight the emergence of the "indy" scene, and/or market, that's largely driven by those like-minded creators, and a growing convention circuit, arguably, mostly buoyed by, themselves. But yes, the indy market does exist, and is also linked to the growing alt/lit style book market. Both this convention circuit, and bookstore market, are unique, and mostly seperate from the comic book store direct market though, and therefore still leave a void in presence there. Most any independent publisher that traffics in this material will openly point out that Diamond and the direct market are just a fraction or subset of their business.

There is a real void of support for small press comic books across the board in the direct market, and no one to champion them. Readers can't be the ones to drive this effort, and Diamond is a business, simply reacting to the reality of their market (and, not deciding to invest in, or cultivate their back catalog). That leaves the retailers, and the publishers with the most interest, and power in this situation. If either doesn't band together and make an effort, to bring more focus to small press product, the ability for the market to offer it may slip away completely.

Or, perhaps it's all just a cycle, and it takes the fall of small press completely, and a clean slate, for some new publisher to enter the mix post collapse (like PC comics, or Eclipse in the 1980's), and get the attention small press used to draw, from lack of competition and renewed need for that material, for the whole small press boom to start again.

It's our choice, a proactive effort to bring visibility to this portion of the medium, to fight the control the large publishers are exerting on the market, or sit idiley by, do nothing, and see if fate, and the market, deem another rise from the ashes.

Of course, changing paradigms like digital distribution, and the switch in format to trade/graphic novel length material are large factors in where things go from here too, but that still doesn't change the current climate of the direct market and it's complete focus on the upper tier Diamond clients, which means any efforts in it's direction will face similar disadvantages seen in the current model.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Diamond raises independent pubisher sales thresholds PART 1: the surface

So the big news in the world of comics is of course the announced (or rather, exposed) changes to the Diamond Distribution independent publisher sales thresholds, and as an independent publisher that’s listed by Diamond, well, that’s me.

Basically it means that things will be drastically changed in what product you see in comic shops. Either a more seismic shift to trade or larger price point style format, and/or a dearth of variety outside the larger publishers, or a continued move to digital for those in the back end of the catalog. But most likely all of the above.

I know many of you kids out there have no real interest in what goes on in comic shops, or selling your comics via those outlets, and are already making good online, but for us old timers like me, it’s something we still cling to, perhaps pointlessly. Look, I’ve long said digital is the future, and nothing can change that, the economics are indisputable, and sure there will always be some print comics, however, instead of a the perfect app coming along to cause the shift, looks like it will be the direct market’s inability to support anything outside the big two publishers, who completely drive the industry (selling 70-85% of it’s product). Anyone who argues independently published quality can find it’s way, regardless, is deluded in thinking so, I'd argue that the playing field is simply too unbalanced at this point.

So, I’ll continue to look for solutions outside the norm, like the change in format I did last year to larger, original graphic novellas, and addressing digital solutions. This may be the end of an era, but it’s certainly the dawn of a new one.

Links to the story:

The Beat
Lying in the Gutters
The Comics Reporter

For the time being, you'll continue to see Super Real Graphics print product via comic book shops. For how long, remains to be seen.

INDUSTRY RANT: Passion of the Comics

Well, haven't done one of these in a while, and it's kind of topical now, what with Kirkman's plea to save comics...

I dunno, that just seemed, odd, to me.
But, hell yes, can't argue more creator-owned comics wouldn't be a darn cool thing!

Anyway, my buddy Rashad (one kick ass comics head) had a journal up on DeviantArt about comic fans needing to "chill", in relation to making some changes in the US industry, for the better. Be that more creator-owned comics, or some actual, you know, change and growth, to their beloved superhero (registered trademark/copyright Marvel/DC) comics!

And yeah, while I agree with that, I don't think the ownus of change is on the fans, or at least, the "readers", I think it's more on the powers-that-be, or the "powers-that-will-be"!

So here's my response, or passionate rant, that mostly sums up my observations to what's needed to truly move the US comics industry forward:

The US comics industry is incestuous, and is only concerned with milking money from it's existing, dwindling fanbase. And because of that, it's core fanbase are only concerned with getting more of what they're spoon fed by the big two.
Look, it's business, and through other media, they aren't forced to innovate and bring in a new audience. They can keep wrangling dollars out of the aging fanbase, and not really giving too much effort to new readers.
It's not really on the fan base though, there gonna want what they want, for the most part.
It's gonna take something new changing the game; digital, manga, etc, or a corporate focus to get new readers at the cost of existing ones.
There's a lot of things that are great about the current market, but most of it is built on old outdated standards, from production, to story, to quality, to distribution. Soup to nuts, the US market is still built around the disposable entertainment newsstand model it left behind decades ago.
To have a better quality product, one only need look East or West, manga as many point out, tell natural story arcs, more than never ending serializations (only concerned about maintaining the status quo for licensing), and European comics have much higher production quality from their slower production schedule emphasizing art over all, instead of a new book every 30 fucking days!! To say nothing of either’s wider focus in genre, tone, and style.
To put it bluntly, it’s a mess.
But if it’s clear to a layman like me what’s lacking, than surely something can be done.
As I said, it’ll just take some kind of paradigm shift. Because the fans don’t want it (by in large), and the corporations that run/own/are the big two (that do what, 70/80% of US comics?) don’t either. The publishing divisions are just farm systems for other media and licensing, that's what Marvel/DC comics are.
But, with a new generation embracing manga, and webcomics, as much or more than the stale US market (hey, don’t get me wrong, there’s a ton of good shit in it too, despite itself, but it’s approach is completely ass backwards and not looking forward), who knows what may come.
Digital will undeniably play a part, or most likely change the game, no outcry for tangible reading can stop the economics of it, it’s just a matter of a better reader most likely (and yes, there’ll always be print… or at least for the foreseeable future, to some extent, but not as the norm), and/or time.

And yeah, it’s funny, the US market had the tools, and the model in place, with things like Ultimate Marvel, and All Star DC. You could roll out new contemporary retellings of your core characters/stories, which you’ll HAVE to do eventually (as you point out, not many concepts are built like the X-Men where by it’s very nature, a school for mutants, it’s built to have legacy and change... but hey, just cause they keep adding (or subtracting) mutants from their roster, don't confuse that for actual change), while still telling the current continuity, and bringing those stories growth and an actual end. All while being massively epic, on a scale beyond any other medium. You’ve got your existing stories for your aging fanbase, and new contemporary stories for new fans (and those that enjoy that as well). Then you can just repeat that model. :)
The problem is, then they'd have to actually invest in finding that new market...

Otherwise, as things are, there’s never any real change, and only the die hardest of the die hards, won’t get burnt out, or just plain burnt, by that! (which is pretty much what you have now, perhaps the movies etc bring back some lapsed readers/fans, but do they really bring in new fans in any large number?)
Every death, undone.
Every change, swept away.
It’s frustrating, dumb, and just lame.
And none of it serves story, which is what ideally, we’d all like to see.

Or ya know, outside serialization, creator-owned or story driven material, if it’s good enough, will live on. Case in point, Watchmen.
So hopefully that will sink into someones brain, “Hey, this Watchmen thing doesn’t go on to infinity, maybe telling a really great story can continue to sell as good, or better than recycling the same shit forever?!?”
But more likely, they’ll just start an ongoing comic for it! ;)

And the one last caveat to all this, that's kind of forgotten today, is licensed comics. And no, I don’t mean Dynamite Entertainment and nostalgic licenses like that (Lone Ranger, Buck Rogers, etc), those sell comics for independent/smaller publishers because they’re recognized brands marketed to the existing aging fanbase. I mean licenses for current other media. The big two used to trade in this heavily, and now that they’re essentially their own license companies, do not. And that my friends, is/was a huge factor to snagging new readers!
Star Wars, GI Joe, Transformers, etc
Hit movies, TV, and toy franchises bring in new readers.
They buy a comic of their favorite toy, then if they like comics, start trying other stuff.
Hmmm.
Where’s Harry Potter, where’s Lord of the Rings, where’s more video games of the moment?
That puts new butts in the seats!
Sure, there’s Battlestar Galactica, Halo etc, but those skew more older, which is a tougher sell for those who aren’t already fans of the medium, to say nothing of the lacking mainstream availability.
Oh, and FYI, bookstores are not the answer.
You need outlets that reach everyone, and bookstores are far from that.
Outside the internet, the easy answer a few years ago was video stores, but not anymore… but something more along those lines, where people already traffic in similar media on a large scale.

As you can tell man, this is one of my biggest peeves, let’s not call it fixing comics, but improving them. If you’re a true fan of the medium, you only want to share it with more people, and I just don’t see that happening enough with where things are, or where they’re headed, but there’s always hope!

What do you think?

Come on, lets IMPROVE comics!!!

INDUSTRY RANT: The game has changed!

Oh, wait, comics aren't music... damn!

A couple weeks ago though, the music industry changed, with another huge move towards all digital, when Radiohead announced they're new album, In Rainbows, would be released online, and by them, direct. Regardless of what you think of their decision to make the album available at whatever cost, including free, they'll still take in likely bushels more than what a record company would give them. No middleman, no media, just 0's and 1's for pennies on the dollar. Artist makes more, fan pays less, that's what digital can, and I think should, mean.

That's the future of entertainment (at least the near one), and hopefully comics.
I know in the past I've ranted here about the pending switch to direct digital distribution, and the Radiohead model (one adopted suddenly by a slew of other big name artists including NIN, and Madonna) is a perfect illustration, providing the content, directly from the creator, to the public model, with no distribution or manufacturing required.
Holy shit that's nice!
Look, I don't want to bemoan Diamond, or any other cogs in the wheel of the comic book industry, but if an artist can release their work directly to the market, without inflating prices and sharing profits, that's the ideal state. Don't cry for the retailers or any other party who loses out here, they only exist because the artist needs them to reach an audience, and well through the magic of technology, we don't any longer.
Sure, for music, it's much more streamlined, there's no loss (perceived or otherwise) in quality, the product is the same, whereas comics, are still waiting for a better application to replace, or at least make it not so radically different, from paper.
With PSP's, and now Iphones, and other ereader/digital tech on the horizon, it's getting closer at hand.

In Rainbows is just the latest step in that direction, and possibly a big one.

I for one can't wait for the next!

And yes, I know the great majority of comic buyers are old school paper purists, but you can't argue spending $3 for a read vs .25 cents, or even a dollar, you just can't, not once you can nearly replicate the experience via some portable device.
And if you want to further argue that print will always exist, to some extent, fine, no doubt, just like Radiohead plan to release a deluxe disc edition down the road, there will of course still be a potential market for tangible edition items.

Also, before anyone gets too critical of me for wanting a bigger cut of my profits, consider that I'm a self publisher selling in the bottom range of market, a market that's increasingly hostile and unreceptive to my efforts. So to me, digital is an even brighter opportunity to make my art, and passion, viable.