Tonight’s installment… “Making money on something you love makes the day go by faster.”
Two years ago, I was looking for a way to do our own team comic book. The industry was hot with movies galore and from a pop culture standpoint I thought it was the time to tie the two together. At this point, despite considering myself a fan, I only knew of the big two; Marvel and DC. So I emailed and called both companies to find out what the process would take.
After a while I received a call from Mitch Dane at Marvel. That led to a conference call with Bob Sabouni and Mitch. After the first call I realized that this project was going to be price prohibitive for one team so I started the process to bring Triple-A Baseball into the mix. International League President Randy Mobley was a tremendous help in crafting the message and getting me in front of all Triple-A general manager’s for a final conference call. The event was approved and we began to design a comic book that was to be distributed throughout all 30 Triple-A parks.
Real proud of that piece, especially the cover.
From the very beginning I wanted to do something similar to the Norman Rockwell baseball pieces. I originally wanted Karee Andrews to do the cover. I had seen his work in the second Hulk series and loved his covers. Unfortunately, or fortunately as it would work out he was not available. Marvel recommended a British painter named John Watson. I had already liked his Uncanny X-Men covers so it was an easy yes for me.
The great thing about that first project was learning the process. You can be a fan and read hundreds of comics and never really understand all of the parts that have to happen for you to read a comic book. It is a very involved process. Marvel was there every step of the way.
The first book came out to some nice press.
2007 Marvel Press Release
Nothing earth shattering but it did spark some conversation. Teams made enough money that year two was on the docket. This year we had the knowledge and experience that we lacked the year previous. Through discussions with the Marvel editors and artists I began to understand the process better and began to really enjoy it. Sure, it is a lot of time consuming reports and emails but I really enjoyed the way everything worked especially working with the artists and editors.
The first book was centered about our business. The book touched on the 16 million fans that go to Triple-A games and the business of our baseball environment. We didn’t need to do the same book twice so we put the book to get sponsored. Whoever would purchase title sponsorship, they would dictate the editorial. However, we got close to deadline and the H-Vac company that was heavily interested could not pull the trigger this year. So we had no story.
Since we also had no sponsorship or baseball dictates for editorial I decided that I wanted to write the story. However, I wanted to make sure the story would be approved on its own merits and not due to any perceived or real influence I may wield. I submitted a treatment anonymously to the Comic Book Committee and the league presidents. They liked it. Marvel did not. We’ll they didn’t mind it but wanted someone to work with me on the project. Knowing what I know now, I can see why. I was a little wordy back then. Mark Sumerak took my story and modified it. The end result was a solidly traditional superhero story. Bad guy wants to do bad things and the good guys stop them. It was my first Marvel credit.
2008 Marvel Press Release
So what to do next? No question, I had the bug. I have always enjoyed writing but now I was able to write something in a medium that I loved. Now what? I did what I always do when I am fascinated with a subject I don’t know enough about, I read a lot of material. From comic centric articles to more obscure details I wanted to make sure I was as educated as possible. After familiarizing myself with the process I had the good fortune to sit down and spend a day with two guys that really propelled me on this process, Mark Sumerak (Mark's Website) and this years sequentialist Mario Gully (Mario's Website).
Each year during our giveaway, we fly in the artist to sign autographs for our fans. This year we were lucky enough to have Mark who lived in Cleveland. He wanted to drive in. So I was able to sit down and speak at length with Mario and Mark.
Mario produced his own book called “Ant.” It was published by Arcana and then Image and now I think he is at Big City Comics. His advice on the business was invaluable. He has had good experiences and poor experiences. He was able to write, pencil and ink his book. We talked about working with publishers, colorists etc. It was a great discussion that got me very interested in creating my own book.
I gave a piece to Mark to read. It was an obscure Marvel universe story I had written the week previous. He was nice and gave some constructive criticism. My talk with Mark was more about my specific skill-sets and where I needed to focus. As a former Marvel editor that information was invaluable. At some point I will re-write the piece. I still like the story but I would approach it differently today. I was over reaching style wise and of course I was a little too wordy.
So now I was torn. Based on the first work I was not ready but I wanted to get more involved with the business. The goal has always been to write for Marvel. I’m a Marvel guy. When I flew it to meet with the Marvel team last year my favorite part was meeting the editors and the editorial teams. I was kinda like a kid in the candy shoppe. One of their editors was a big baseball fan so we hit it off. He has helped a lot in nicely directing me on a preferred path. You don’t just walk in with no in medium experience and start writing Spider-man. He emphasized the ability to hit deadlines consistently and he recommended that I make a name for myself in this industry elsewhere. Once I could demonstrate an ability to hit deadlines and produce quality work then bring it back and we would go from there - great advice and just the right dose of realism.
So now I knew what I needed to do…produce a creator controlled comic book!
Next Time…Going it (almost) alone
Labels: christopher, Comic Book Publishing, hill, john, lai, primordium, tim, watson
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