Showing posts with label Hysteria. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hysteria. Show all posts
Saturday, February 25, 2017
Sunday, September 20, 2009
My Magnificent Failure Pt.I
So, I'm knee deep in my current cartooning project (see previous post) and I can't help but keep thinking about my last venture as a cartoonist. Hysteria: One Man Gang.
OMG came out of two things. The desire to build on the Hysteria series I had started my career with and to give myself a huge artistic challenge. Namely, to make a one hundred page action scene that still built upon the characters. It actually proved to be a lot easier then I had expected, and at one point I even considered bumping it up to two hundred pages. I also found I could tell readers more about a characer by showing their decisions while in action then I could have with talking heads.
OMG was originally to be published as a graphic novel by Oni Press, where it wasn't a great fit. If I'm not mistaken this was before Scott Pilgrim, and Oni wasn't known for this kind of fight comic type of material. I later jumped to Image, where it worked less. I won't go into details now, but I'm mentioning it now because I want to set the stage for some of these images I'm sharing. You'll see some of them have publishing information, and knowing the history will make it easy to follow the article.
I'm going to talk first about how we tried to promote this book. I know it's an odd place to begin an article about a creative work, but I feel it's fitting because SO much art and thought went into trying to get this book off the ground. I felt, and still feel, that this book had huge potential if I could build an audience for it. Hysteria had failed as a self published series, and the first volume at Oni had done OK, but not Good. For this to work, we needed support. To gain that, I needed to give fans something special. Something that DESERVED their support.
When we started to do some grass roots marketing for this book I had already started the book it's self. I had been working on the book when it was at Oni, and when I switched to Image I already had a good bit of the book done and was ready to switch over to doing some promo work. I went all out with this stuff. You have to understand, I loved this book and wanted to show it to the world. Doing these promo pieces was like taking kid's photos. I wanted to make comic fans fall for this book.
My partner Erik Swanson ( who lettered, and toned the book) and I tried like hell to sell this book. I designed a series of mailers that I sent to retailers, as well as free promotional posters. Erik even went from store to store in LA and dropped off promo material with store owners, as well as discussing the book with them. I did the same here in Pennsylvania and New York. We showed these folks advanced previews of the books too. Anything to get them excited about the new series.
I also made the rounds at conventions and handed out promo cards and free mini posters. I handed out a thousand posters, and a couple of thousand promo cards. Everyone that saw this thing loved it, but in the end the orders were very low. In the areas of the country we reached out to the orders were stronger then the areas we couldn't. I still believe if we could have reached farther, we could have made this work.
I was also lucky enough to have friends willing to run ads in their books for Hysteria. Here's one that ran in a few Image books.
I'm going to end Pt.I here. Stay tuned for more on my Magnificent Failure in a week.
Best,
Mike
Friday, March 27, 2009
OMG mess up
If you're one of the three and a half people reading Hysteria online, you may have noticed there were no new pages this week. I got so wrapped up in two different deadlines that I clean forgot to update the site.
Sorry bout that.
Look for new pages starting Monday.
Mike
Monday, March 09, 2009
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Monday, February 23, 2009
Hysteria for 2/23/09
Have you been reading my webcomic, Hyseria? If not, you should be!
New pages every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at www.thinktankcomics.com/
Mike
Friday, February 13, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Monday, February 09, 2009
Thursday, February 05, 2009
One Man Gang 2/6
Back when One Man Gang was coming out through Oni I made four of these small mailers which I sent to retailers. Unfortunately, I had a change of heart with the publisher, so all the effort was for nothing. So, figured I'd share them now as a reminder to GO READ THE WEBCOMIC! ;)
Best,
mike
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Hysteria trade?
I'm entertaining the idea of self publishing the collected Hysteria comics into trades. I'm also thinking of taking pre-orders, at a discounted rate, to raise money on the print run.
So, my question to you folks is would you be interested? I'd started with Vol. 0 of the webcomic, and work my way to Vol. 2.
I figure I'd take pre-orders for about a month or so, and ship the books out a month after that...depending on the printer. If I can, I'd like to keep the price of the book around 10 to 15 bucks. If you pre-order I'd offer maybe 30% off or so, give or take. Or maybe I'd offer it with a print instead. Haven't worked out the details yet.
Any takers?
Mike
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Saturday, January 03, 2009
Monday, November 24, 2008
New Hysteria chapter - Hang Gallows Love!
hey all,
There's a new chapter of Hysteria today - Hang Gallows Love. It tells of what happened to the Red Parody after the events of Vol. 0, Chapter 4.
Check it out!
Best,
Mike
Monday, November 10, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
New Hysteria chapter tomorrow!
A new chapter of my webcomics "Hysteria"starts Monday, and it's as outlandish a comic as I've ever made. Enjoy - ETERNO!! ;)
Best,
Mike
Thursday, October 09, 2008
Changes at Thinktankcomics.com
Hey everyone,
So, Jamal and I are making a few changes over at ThinktankComics.com. We'll be reconfiguring many parts of the site, including the store and archive.
The main thing that will affect readers will be that we're moving from posting new pages every weekday, to posting them three times a week - Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
I have all this stuff completely finished, so it's not that we're running out of story. In fact, I have the next several chapters already uploaded and ready to go.
We're switching the schedule for two reasons. 1. To allow me some time to come up with new material before I run out of what I have now - including finishing One Man Gang - while I still plug away at my daily work load. 2. To allow time for new readers to jump on.
That last one is the biggest reason. The readership of the webcomic has been spotty, with some weeks being great and others slow. One of the worries is that people are having a hard time keeping up with the webcomic. So, we're hoping to slow it down and allow new readers a chance to jump on. It also buys me a little time to try and promote the site.
Anyway, thanks to all of you who have been reading regularly. You can look forward to regular content for the foreseeable future, including completely new material.
Best,
Mike
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
New Hysteria chapter tomorrow!
SO, "God is My Co-pilot" wraps up today, and a new chapter starts tomorrow. This one's called "The 3 Lessons", and some of you may remember it running over at Modrentales.com's Longplay years back.
This chapter tells the story of how Josh and Toledo met.
It features some NICE colors and letters by Erik Swanson who came through and really made the art pop.
Anyway, be sure to check it out and enjoy.
Best,
Mike
PS - Yes, when I was A kid I jumped out of a window with a rope around my waist. No, I wasn't a smart kid.
PSS - Any of you http://www.stumbleupon.com/ users out there, be sure to "like" the Hysteria webcomic. Doing so will help spread the word about the comic to new readers!
Thanks in advance.
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