Profit and Loss

First, let me say that Profit and Loss would be a righteous name for a super hero duo. A sort of corporate-themed vigilante team. "We're here to help investors and creditors determine the past performance of their enterprise, predict future performance, assess the capability of generating future cash flows, and clean up the streets!" It would have sort of a Watchmen/Dark Knight feel to it.

Anyway, I believe I've mentioned costing as it relates to comics before in this blog, and I thought I might go into it in some more detail. This may only be of interest to those looking to get into comics. And maybe not even them. This will be a "how the sausage is made" type entry.

At any publisher, your project is going to go through the costing process before it is given the go ahead for publication. Or more likely, your project is going to go through the costing process and there it will die an unceremonious death mourned only by you and, if you're lucky, your editor. It's not a kind process and, given the current state of publishing and the economy, I can only imagine that it's become even uglier than I remember it. For the sake of example I am going to talking about my memories of the costing process at Dark Horse Comics. 1) Because I worked there in the editorial department for a time and 2) because I've had a book go through the process there myself.

Once you have convinced your editor that your idea for a comic is a good one (no mean feat and perhaps worthy of an entry of its own), your editor will take the idea to the Costing Committee. The Costing Committee is made up of a mix of senior editors, financial people, marketing and advertising. The editor will give to the Costing Committee any relevant material that you have given him: your pitch document, art, etc. And the first thing the Costing Committee does is have a Profit and Loss sheet (P&L) made up for your project.

This part of the process is sort of like magic to me, but the individual making up the P&L plugs lots of bits of data into a spread sheet. The creative cost, the parameters of which were discussed between you and your editor; the cost of producing a book of a given page count; whether the book is color or black and white; and etc. And all of these things are broken down into print runs of various size. This tells the costing committee, for example, that a color book that is 120-pages long with a print run of 5,000 copies will likely sell X number of copies in a year and so will ear Y number of dollars. If X and Y are high enough numbers, then your book will be published. In today's publishing climate, I'm guessing that X and Y being high enough is becoming increasingly rare.

I should mention some more about the creative costs and the the discussions that go on between you and your editor. Your editor is by no means an accountant, but he has a fairly good idea (or should) of what kinds of budgets he can get approved. And that budget figure is going to be different depending on if you are just starting out (a low figure) or are an established creator who's name on a project means a guaranteed level of profit (potentially quite high. And this discussion between the two of you should be a back and forth and you have to understand that when your editor will not give in to your every request, he is doing so not because it pleases him to disappoint you (at least that's not the only reason), but because he knows what sorts of budgets are being approved by the costing committee and how much chance of success your project has of going through at a given dollar amount.

You may wonder why I'm thinking so much about the costing process. I will be honest: it's not just for your education and edification, but because I have a book currently going through the process. Writing this entry is helping to remind myself that the process takes time and that there is, ultimately, nothing I can do to speed it along. I just have to hope that the numbers my editor and I (and my co-creators) agreed upon are ones the committee will find agreeable.

I'll keep you posted as the situation develops.

I feel like I don't have much to say lately. A lot of things in process. At stages that aren't that exciting to talk about (because I know that my readers have come to expect pure excitement from this blog).

One thing I should mention is that I got a part-time job. I'm now working as a projectionist at Salem Cinema, Salem's only independent theater. It specializes in indy and art-house movies. So far, except for the time it takes me away from Melissa and Oscar, it's a lot of fun. But it's helping to make ends meet, so it's hard to complain.

I've never worked a projector before, so it's been interesting learning the skill. I like machinery and the chance to get my hands inside of the projectors is great. And I think I take more satisfaction in having threaded the film properly than I likely should. Learning a new skill makes my head feel clear, which is nice. It's been a while since I learned anything new.

On the writing front, like I said, things are in process. Dalton is being considered for publication, which always turns into a hurry-up-and-wait situation (and I'm reminded that I need to write an email to the editor looking at it with my and Todd's ideas about publication--an email that will likely kill any chances the project has of moving forward). Todd is drawing an eight-page short story, but, because he has a day job, it's going to be a while before that's done. I need to start designing an actual web site for my self, but I am lazy and will probably put that off until... who knows when. I sent a query letter off last week to a literary agent, but that's another situation where I just have to wait for a response. Finally, I should be looking for artists for a couple of new projects, but with so many things up in the air, I'm reluctant to start anything new.

Maybe I'll just sit back and try and finish a book. Something I haven't been able to do in more than a week.

Stay tuned for more thrilling posts once things develop.

Back in the real world

I spent the last few days in La Grande, Oregon, which is my wife's hometown and probably the loveliest bit of Earth I've ever laid eyes on. I offer the photograph at right as evidence of it's aesthetic attributes. The only thing about being there is that neither Melissa's mom nor dad has wifi, which leaves me completely cut off from my beloved internets. In small doses, this is a good thing.

The nice thing about this trip's enforced Internet abstinence was that when I returned to check my email, there was a slew of good news and interesting bits. Two stand-outs are that Todd sent me thumbnails for our new eight-page story. Is it shameful for an author to laugh out loud at something they've written. Is it egotistical? Because, really, I thought it was hilarious. The second thing was an invitation from one of my favorite people to participate in a project they're putting together. This knocked me out. And, of course, I can't talk about it in any more detail until it becomes a bit more real. Just know that if this all works out, I am going to be freaking out. For reals.

All of this goodness has left me inspired and productive and, dare I say it, optimistic. Please keep it coming, Universe, I can use all the goodness you've got to offer.

Don't worry; I'm sure that in future posts I shall return to me normal, morose self.

Things I'm thinking about that are most likely unrelated to one another.

Item 1: I have what I suspect is an annoying habit. Well, more than one certainly but just one that relevant to the discussion here. I don't like to talk about projects in any detail until they have actually come to fruition. On the other hand, I like to mention when I have finished my end of a project. This coyness on my part may very well be infuriating for the reader. For that I apologize.

However! I just finished writing an eight-page script for an unspecified project and I sent it of to Todd Demong. When he's done drawing it we are going to see about entering it into an on-line comics competition. This is something that Todd and I have talked about doing together for going on five ears now. It's nice to finally start writing it; to start seeing it come alive. If this project moves forward from this point, I will definitely write about it in more detail in this space.

I should mention that collectors of the original 100 Girls comics series may find a clue to what project I'm talking about in the letters columns contained therein. There.

Item 2: I can become obsessive about things. Those who know e well may not be surprised by this. Authors and film makers, books, movies, television shows. I can watch certain films again and again. I can listen to certain songs endlessly on repeat. A couple of years ago, I found some videos by the band Ok Go and, for a few months, I had to watch those videos at least once every day.

And now these. A pair of videos by the band The Decemberists. A band I've paid very little attention to before now. I even have one of their albums, but it never grabbed my attention. But a week or so ago, I was on youtube and stumbled across the video for "O Valencia", and quickly followed it up with the video for "Sixteen Military Wives". And I've been watching them compulsively ever since. I don't even feel the need to watch any other of The Decemberists videos. I just need to watch these two over and over again. Soon the spell will be broken and I'll leave them behind and move on to some new obsession. And I won't even remember what it was that appealed to me so strongly about these little gems. But for now, here they are. Let's watch together, shall we?

And a bit of useless trivia. In the video for "Sixteen Military Wives", Ezra Holbrook, songwriter and lead singer of one of my favorite local bands, Dr. Theopolis, shows up at the 4:10 mark. He's sitting behind the drum and wearing a light blue sweater vest. Perhaps that fact will enhance your enjoyment of this video as it did mine.

EDIT: It was pointed out to me by two faithful readers that the video of "O Valencia" I chose wouldn't play. That has now been fixed.

The not-so-Sacred Moleskine

The image at Left is from my notebook. The Sacred Moleskine, as Jim Woodring calls his. Though mine is not nearly as sacred as Mr Woodring's.

I have the artistic ability of a woodland creature -- most likely some sort of rodent; a squirrel, perhaps -- but for the last couple of years I've found it a great help to sketch out pages after they've been plotted but before I script them. I find and fix a lot of problems that way. For instance, as in the example shown, there is way too much dialog. There is always too much dialog in my initial outlines and scripts. My characters cannot shut up and I find I must cut their speeches with a ruthlessness that would make Gordon Lish proud.

Also, even at the size I draw them, I can figure out when I'm asking for something that is impossible to draw. This often means that something I want to be one panel needs to become two. And I get a good sense of the rhythm of a page with these thumbnails.

All in all, I think that scripts have become easier to write, and the scripts themselves are better, since I've started sketching. And some day, when I'm a big star, those sketches are gonna be worth something! Right?

In which a terrible discovery is made!

I was so impressed with myself today. And then, not.

I got away for a little writing time this afternoon/evening and I had one goal: to write a first draft outline for a short story that Todd and I want to do together. Normally if I have one goal I work on everything else under the sun (including the all-important task of checking facebook and twitter every five damned seconds to make sure they haven't updated). But today I remained focused and got the work done. After a few false starts.

I was starting from scratch. This is a brand new set of characters and a new story. I wrote a draft of something for these characters months ago, but when I showed Todd he didn't like it and thought it should go in a new direction. I didn't know how to do that so I set it aside for a bit. I've been feeling for the last few days that it was time to bring it out and work on it again. My brain had done one of those things where it was apparently thinking about the story without seeming to and I had some new ideas.

But being altogether new, it took a few attempts to get comfortable with the characters and the situation. And the tone. The tone is mostly what Todd was concerned with, so I concentrated on that. After a while, however, the words started coming pretty easily and then it stopped feeling like work and just felt fun. Always a good sign. And I did it. An outline with a beginning middle and end, something that would be easy to turn into a script should Todd say he liked. Yea, me.

Except. Later as I thought about, it started to dawn on me that I hadn't really written chapter one of something; I had written chapter negative one. The chapter that happens right before the action should start; lots of exposition and characterization and talking, talking, talking. My characters love the sounds of their own voices. Which is totally different than me, by the way.

Anyway, now I have to scrap what I wrote today, or at least set it aside and use it later down the line. Now I have to write an entirely new first chapter. Or, I suppose, I could lower my standards. I could do that, right?

No? Okay, I'll be over here bitterly writing a new piece...