Colorist found!

Right after our last post, we found our perfect colorist: Dustin Evans. He did an amazing job on the sample pages we gave him, following our directions while adding an individual twist. It feels wonderful to have a certain amount of the graphic novel inked and colored; the finish line is slightly nearer.

The next step will be securing funding in order to complete the book. As well, I have another story to plot and draw, to fill out the page number we've decided to go with. 

Not enough hours in a day!

Colorist search results

Our recent attempt at finding a colorist for Ninja Baby has been an eye-opening experience. It's very cool to see all of the talented folk around the world interested in working for us. Some digital painters showed absolutely incredible samples; that being said, despite carefully scrutinizing all emails/portfolios, the perfect 'fit' for our project just wasn't there.

It's difficult to quantify exactly what we were hoping to see; we just know that the right candidate would've jumped out at us.Ninja Baby (and all STP properties) are our 'babies' of sorts, and handing them off to someone new is a daunting challenge that requires much deliberation.

We've decided to take a temporary step back; our goal remains to have a certain number pf pages colored so that the images might spruce up an IndieGoGo pitch. Once that step is accomplished and funding is in hand, we're tremendously excited to move our concepts forward toward publication.

Please check back often for news about Sore Thumb Press!

Revising the format of the older artwork has allowed me to tweak the storytelling. I didn't notice as much when inking the first time how much information was crammed into a given page. By allowing panels to 'breathe', the story actually flows better. Having reformatted the very first Ninja Baby story, we arrive at 16 pages. I'll be reformatting the second story as time permits.

Looking forward to this book being completed! We've plotted the third story that will be in the book, I'm excited by what's in store....
 

Incremental forward progress

My wife's input has been invaluable; her comments have allowed us to steer our publishing venture in exciting directions, and I'm grateful for that.

We've discussed the format for our first book, based on printing cost; she also brought up the point that a certain book size is popular, and it got us rethinking the pages I'd already inked. With rescanning and reformatting, we can package Ninja Baby as a 'manga digest', which will allow the artwork to breathe better, and appeal to our target demographic.

I'm thrilled by this direction, and will start tweaking the finished artwork. As a bonus, it'll be easier to achieve a certain number of pages, without necessarily creating much new artwork. 

I'm looking forward to having our first book ready to sell!

A New Year, ripe with promise

It depresses me a bit how I haven't spent much time on our small press endeavor over the last few months. Focusing on paying work remains a priority, and I look forward to the day when I can place all my attention on our 'baby'.

Discussing things with my partner in crime, it seems that a decent sized 'graphic novel' is the way to go. That would be easier to sell than a comic book, especially considering that the market for kid's comics seems so dead (which is itself depressing considering how comic books were a powerful entertainment phenomenon in the past). Deciding to target young readers hungry for graphic novels just makes sense.

The trick is figuring out the size of the book. 100 pages seems daunting; even 80 pages (a size which appeals to me on account of the Silver Age 80 page giants I love to collect) is a lot of pages to fill. I think 64 pages might be the answer, a decent amount of material for the print format we're looking at.

Currently I have 24 inked pages of Ninja Baby; expanding the book as described above will involve some work, but the end result should be exciting and inspiring. Just gotta get cracking on it, which fits in with my resolution to sharpen my focus in 2013. 

Funding options

When I first considered self-publishing, funding sources became a priority. I assumed (naively) that launching this blog with my online 'hand' held out hoping for a donation would generate some money. This didn't transpire. I realize that folk are bombarded daily with requests for charity or demands on their disposable income (as well as the fact that promotion of STP has been so far limited). I was never completely comfortable asking for money to fund my publishing dreams anyways, and when nothing trickled in, I prepared to do things out of my own pocket.

Last week, I noted that IndieGoGo is available for Canadian projects. I've eyed Kickstarter ever since it began, but they restrict projects to US citizens (as of this writing). I like the concept of rewarding folk willing to contribute to my dream with nifty 'gifts'; I have some neat ideas bouncing around my noggin if I ever had the opportunity to try either site.

I've discussed the matter with my co-publisher, and we have some mulling to do. Funding is a powerful tool; it could either help complete material that is at a fledgling stage, or allow us to print stuff that's almost finished. We'll have to go over out list of concepts, and decide A) if funding is worth pursuing, and B) which 'baby' should be our focus.

I'm confident that if people were properly introduced to my ideas, they'd become as passionate about them as I am. Once we've decided if/when to take that step, this blog will share the details.

Moving forwards

Thanks to the assistance of my lovely wife, Sore Thumb Press is on the move! I've completed inking 24 pages of Ninja Baby and have found an excellent colorist ready to tackle the pages; it feels absolutely wonderful that one of my 'babies' is that much closer to being ready to print.

We're considering print options; I'd suggested a black and white book for traditional paper. Color does look a lot more vibrant, perhaps pdf versions would sell just as easily. Once the book is colored, lettered, and finalized, we'll make the decisions necessary to have the book ready to share with the world.

While my colorist works on this project, I'll focus on a second concept. That will involve a bit of mulling, since I have many that I'm attached to; whichever it is, the news will be broken next week!