Payment Renderred

I keep getting a lot of spam regarding tax help. On the radio it seems that every other commercial is about tax help. “Do you owe more than $10,000 to the IRS? Tax Consolidation of America can help!”

I’ve been paying taxes since I was 16 (earlier if I had claimed all those tips I got as a coat check and bus boy). I was unaware that you had a choice in the matter. I didn’t know you could just not pay your taxes. Is this really a huge problem for Americans? Since when do I get to pick and choose which bills to pay?

It reminds me of some comic stores I’ve given Tiny Life to. I use the word “given” because that is what I did; they still – four months later – haven’t paid me a dime.

Just because a doctor perscribes it, it doesn't mean it's good for you. A few years ago, leeches kicked ass.

Maybe I’m weird, but I figure that once goods or services have been rendered, I have to pay for ‘em. When I go to dinner, I pay the bill. When I get my car fixed, I pay the bill. I even pay the doctor when he tries to treat me with tons o’ drugs and I refuse. As a community, we have agreed that a doctor’s time is worth a certain amount; I have used this certain amount and therefore the bill must be paid.

The whole thing just reminds me of when my aunt and uncle (and sometimes my cousins) used to not pay bills because they didn’t like the result. One time they wouldn’t pay their credit card bill because the Beta-Max version of Wrestlemania they bought on it doesn’t work in their VCR (true story!).

Is the whole world full of people like my family?

I certainly hope not.

SPACE Concerns

I’m trying to think of some cool things to do at SPACE in April.  Although this is my first convention, I tend to like to do things correctly form the start. 

I thought about bringing a laptop to show off the website.  But I can’t imagine too many people would look at it (more people would probably use it to check their email).

I thought about bringing a projector and showing the podcasts.  But I can’t imagine too many people sitting back and looking at slow-moving, low-resolution images of something they could hold in their hands.

I thought about bringing in all the pages.  But I can’t imagine too many people looking at these dirty pieces of paper when the finished pages are right in the book.

So what’s the plan?  I dunno. 

I asked around and the basic tenant I’ve found is “You never know.”  I think I’ll just lay out what I have on a convention-sized table and make it look good.  I have issues from each chapter of l(a, I have the trade, I have Tiny Life Demos… that doesn’t seem like it’s enough.

 

Should I trade these old things?

The Wife suggested I make a SPACE exclusive.  Feazell suggested I make a mini-comic to trade.  Both of these are excellent ideas.  Except now I don’t know how much of left I can get done before I need it printed.  I also don’t know what I would do in a mini-comic form (just another version of what I’ve already done or something new?). 

 

Damn ideas.  They make my life Hell.  

Telling You Off

I’m a bit unsure about this.

See, I haven’t really let a lot of people know about Tiny Life.  I mean, I’ve done interviews and podcasts and all that stuff, but I haven’t really told the people I work with about it.  I haven’t really told my students either.

I teach in a rural town.  Many of the people here are “God-Fearing Christians” in the sense that if anything goes against their beliefs, they automatically think that it’s bad.  “God-Fearing” is not necessarily a bad thing, nor are Christians.  It’s just that I’ve seen too many people ostracized simply because they don’t think the way that the majority of the people in this rural area tend to think. 

Here’s what I see happening:

Me: “Hey kids!  You know how Mr. Jones is the awesomest teacher ever?  Well, he also made a thought-provoking comic!”

Kids: “Hooray!  We will make you rich!”

This will be me after I suggest my students buy my book.

Parents: “The main character is flouting our beliefs!  We should get him fired!”

Me tied to a stake atop a flaming pile of Tiny Life: “That whole Second Coming thing isn’t really a huge part of the story!  Read the rest first!”

Parents and kids in unison: “Never!”

See how many exclamation points that story had?  I don’t know if I can handle that much excitement.

Matt Feazell

I got a package from THE Matt Feazell!  I sent him a copy of l(a, he sent me me stuff in return (without even asking.  What a nice guy!).

If you don’t know who Matt Feazell is, you should be stomped to death by Hans the Wonderhorse.

Feazell actually helped me get my start in comics.  I mean, he didn’t physically show me how to do anything, but he really highlighted how fun it could be.  It’s because of him that I started making stick-figures.  I didn’t remember before last night (when I read his epic The Death of AntiSocialMan mini-comic trade), but he actually gave me the name of my first publishing company: “DUH! ” (with a backwards ‘D’)

As you may have read from various places (specifically in Tiny Life Demos, on sale now!), Tiny Life is a decade-and-a-half process.  I started making covers for comics starring my favorite eight-year-old homicidal maniac, Jed Jr. (you can view them here), when I was in an earth science class.  Basically, the whole premise was to make fun of the gimmick trend that was sweeping the industry; each cover would have a brief explanation of the story inside (which I never made) while somehow linking it to a ridiculous gimmick.  From there I went on to make mini-comics and from there I went on to make actual stories and then actual continuity and then actual thought-inducing plots.  I never really mentioned it in print before, but the story of Tiny Life actually started a little before that.

They're changing the name to "Motor City dress-up-like-your-favorite-character-from-someone-else's-imagination-con

I used to go to the Motor City Comic-Con in Novi, MI every year.  It used to be pretty cool.  There were always a few artists you wanted signatures from (I got my first John Romita Jr. and Dave Sim autographs there), there were always vendors with amazing deals (one year a guy put everything 75% off, another year a different guy sold everything for $1), and there were always a few quirky people in artists’ alley.  One of these quirky people was Matt Feazell.  

I had read a few of his mini-comics and thought they were pretty good.  A friend of mine was a fanatic, so we went to talk to him.  Feazell always does convention sketches where he takes your favorite superheroes and turns them into stick figures.  Well, we thought it would be funny to ask him to draw the t-shirts we were wearing.  One friend was wearing a Captain America shirt, so Feazell drew that; another friend was wearing a Metallica shirt, so Feazell drew that.  I was wearing a plaid shirt and said “Draw this!”  He thought I said “Draw ON this,” and drew a whole CynicalMan sketch on the back of my shirt.

The ink eventually faded, but Feazell’s influence did not.  If it wasn’t for that experience, Tiny Life would probably be just another veiled crime-noir masked under a superhero façade. 

I’m excited to meet him again at this year’s SPACE in Columbus OH.

1st Convention

I am both excited and apprehensive about my first convention. 

The actual word for it is “anxious,” but no one uses that word like it’s meant to be used anymore (if you’re “anxious” about her birthday party, you’re saying that you’re “full of angst or anxiety.”  You probably mean that you’re “excited, but that’s not the right word.”  One of the many useful idiocies you learn from being an English major). 

I’m not what you’d call a “people person.”   I mean, being a teacher, I have some likeability when I want to turn it on, but it’s only available to me at certain times – usually not weekends. 

On weekends I get to relax and be a jerk just like everyone else.  When someone cuts in front of me in line on a weekday, being my likeable teacher-self, I half-heartedly point out a few flaws in the guy’s judgment so that he learns something, smiles a bit, and doesn’t feel bad about himself.  On a weekend, I would say something along the lines of, “Hey, this isn’t the line to hump your mom.  You don’t get ‘cut-sees,’ jack-ass.” 

I also have a hard time talking about myself.

I take that back.  I have a hard time bragging about myself.  I can probably tell you all sorts of stories about how I turn classrooms of children against certain noisy indicuals; I can tell you many a story about my extended family and how I wish they would one day get it together enough to not sell food stamps; I can talk endlessly about how my heart condition has affected my life philosophy.  I cannot, however, talk about how great my idea is or how “you’ll just love it!” 

Now, don’t get me wrong, I personally think Tiny Life is the best thing around.  But I can’t tell you that you’d like it.  All I can really say for sure is that I’ve done my best with it.

That and I have better art now than I did when I started:

Early drawing of Jed		Recent drawing of Jed

Who Wants to be a Publisher?

I received word today (although I’ve heard rumblings about it from other publishers) that Diamond won’t distribute anything if they don’t feel they can make $2500 on it.  This pretty much takes me out of the running for left unless I can create some sort serious word-of-mouth buzz from l(a.  I think Diamond only made about $1000 (maybe $1500) from the initial run of the last book.

This is the problem with having a series of comic novels rather than a monthly series of comic books.  I have no advertisement when the next one comes out; I have no fan base.  The only people that will buy my next book are the people who happen to walk into a comic store that happens to be carrying and they happen to have a little extra money in their pocket and they happen to be feeling adventurous with it. 

So what’s a girl to do?

Do you think this would look good on the cover?

I think I might have to start shopping around for publishers.  People (and Diamond) are much more likely to buy Tiny Life: left from Image or Top Shelf or Dark Horse than they are to buy it from Sliver ltd.

That is, unless somehow I can sell dozens of awesome comic titles between now and then!

So send your ideas to me at nickjones@sliverltd.com and we’ll beat em!

It’ll be like Alan Moore’s America’s Best Comics line but without the geuius!

Sliver and the Power of Zero

It’s getting to the point where I actually have to start keeping some files.

See, I’m of the mind that one should never worry about money.  I don’t balance a checkbook, I don’t have massive debt, and I don’t buy things that I don’t need.  Basically, I spend what I believe I can cover.  I do the approximate math in my head, and if my debt is even close to my take-home pay, I don’t spend any money.  It’s a good way to live because every once in a while, you forget that you’re “going without” a little bit each month and after a season goes by, suddenly you have a bit of money you never intended to save.

I planned on doing something like that with Sliver ltd. as well.  I planned on simply having a ballpark figure of Sliver assets in my head and hopefully, after some time went by, I would suddenly be sitting on a pile of cash.  That’s not how it works, though (especially when there’s a limit on how much is actually brought into the business).

I always told myself that I would spend $5000 on this endeavor.  If I ever ran out of cash, I would stop doing the book. 

So, when cash starts to get close to where the business induces a self-imposed bankruptcy, it’s important to start looking at the numbers.  After crunching the numbers, I’ve come to realize that I don’t believe Diamond has paid me for the books yet (although, to be perfectly fair, it has been less than a month, so they still have time.  I was just thinking that they already paid me, which gave me a lot more money in my head).

Since I sold a couple hundred through them, it puts a bit of a dent in the comic’s pocketbook.  If it had pockets and a book where it keeps its money (although, having a pocketbook would either make it a girl-comic or a possibly-gay-comic). 

I should probably call them.  Sliver ltd. might be much closer to zero than I thought.

More than One (or, “Shoot to Thrill”)

I’ve been thinking about this:

Why is it that so many creators start something and don’t finish?  Or, I guess put more specifically, why do so many people make one thing and then disappear forever?  I think it’s a very complicated question, but I think it has a simple answer.

A lot of people get into comics for one of two reasons: 1) they want to play with superheroes.  They want to write or draw Spiderman or Superman and they want to boast to everyone “look what I get paid to do!” or 2) they want to make money the easy way; for some reason, people think that because it takes less time to read a comic book (as opposed to a text book), it must take less time to make.  Or, as Dave Sim once told me, people often get into comics because they want “money for nothing and their chicks for free.”  So when they make something and it doesn’t sell, when it doesn’t get them laid or doesn’t get them rich or doesn’t allow them to give a new suit to Superman, they give up.  I have a solution.

I fucking hate this band.

I listen to rock and/or roll.  Lately, I noticed that there’s been a lot more of my archenemy AC/DC on the radio.  They released an album earlier this year.  Nothing on the radio is from that album; I still hear “Hell’s Bells” and “Shoot to Thrill” until my balls shrivel (seriously, AC/DC is physically painful for me to listen to).  I also noticed that I’m hearing a LOT of Guns N Roses because they (he) just released Chinese Democracy.  As I do with most things, I started to wonder how this relates to comics.

I don't really care about this band.

I thought back to my first days of reading independent black-and-whites.  Most of what I picked up – Cerebus, Hepcats, Milk & Cheese – generally had higher issue numbers.  I was amazed that there was a comic out there that had made it to issue 50 and I never heard about it.  I think that’s how a lot of people view this stuff.

Once you get past the idea that comics are collectibles (no need to keep them in plastic bags if all you’re going to do is read them over and over.  As a matter of fact, if you buy one and don’t like it, you should – gasp – throw it away!  Or donate it to a library or Goodwill), you start to really appreciate them.  You don’t collect every number one just because it’s a number one.  You also start to look at them like they are literature.  Since comics are only 20 pages long, I start to look at the longer ones.  I look for the ones that are telling a story.

 

My first ever b+w.

So, the solution to those people who make one thing and leave the field forever?  Make something else.  And then something else.  Once you have a few books out, people start to notice that first one.  If they like it, maybe they’ll buy the second and third.  I know I didn’t buy Goodbye, Chunky Rice until I read Blankets.  I also didn’t listen to Kill ‘Em All until I heard …And Justice for All.

 

I’m thinking that’s the way Tiny Life is going to go.  I’ll sell 500 copies of the first book.  And then a few more once the next book comes out.  And then a few more once the 3^rd books comes out. 

Maybe by the time I’m done with book ten, I’ll actually break even on l(a.   

Bad Reviews

As anyone who knows me understands, I am a HUGE The Simpsons fan.  I have all eleven seasons currently available on DVD, I watched the movie the day it came out, I went all the way to Florida just to ride the used-to-be-Back-to-the-Future (also a big fan) but-is-now-The-Simpsons-Ride.  I even watch all the commentary.

As a side-note, would producers of ALL television shows that are now on DVD insist that each episode have some sort of commentary?  Please?  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve watch Newsradio or 30 Rock or – God please spare me when I say this – even Full House and wanted to know what certain people were thinking when this or that joke aired or when this or that episode was not well-received. 

Anyway, on the commentary of the newest season, the first episode features Mel Gibson watching a screening of his remake of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.  Everyone says it was good except Homer.  Gibson listens to Homer and hilarity ensues.  However, when I was watching the commentary, one of the writers (I think it was Al Jean, but I’m probably wrong), said something like, “That’s how it is at screenings.  You want everyone to like it so you take all suggestions.  I remember a dozen times during the making of The Simpsons Movie where we argued for hours about changing something because one guy in Utah didn’t like it.”

I’m the same way.

I’ve gotten about a dozen reviews so far and all but one have been very positive.  All I can do is concentrate on that one.  “What can I do to please that one guy!”

Please, no gay jokes.

Honestly, I shouldn’t care.  The one and only reason for me to publish Tiny Life is to get it out of my head (finally).  Some dude some place isn’t going to change that.

Of course, a lot of his comments are unfounded.  He doesn’t see the whole story yet so his comments of it being “too verbose” or of “nothing happening” don’t really hold up.  A lot of things actually happen in this book, but you won’t understand that for another three volumes (or so).  There are also some comments on Colacitti’s art; frankly, I think Nicolas Colacitti is going to kick a lot of ass in the comic world if I ever let him up for air.  Also, I’ve heard that I’m too cocky with Tiny Life.  That’s because I’m sick of hearing creators say, “Thanks for supporting my little book here.  It’s not the greatest, but tell your friends!”  Dammit, mine is the greatest because it is the best that I can do and it is the most original that I could think of.

See, I feel better already.

Amazing how much my self-esteem rises after I practice some delusional justification.

Released into the Wild

Tiny Life: l(a is officially released today!

Of course, if you’re reading this post as I write it, you probably already have a copy.  This post is really just for people looking at previous posts sometime in the future.

For instance, you might be saying, “I wonder what Nick Jones had to say the day his first book came out?”  Then you’ll find this post and be utterly disappointed. 

That’s what you get for prying into my past.