Webcomicker Talking Smack ‘Bout Distant Soil, YO!
on May 11th, 2010OK.
Jamie Coville informs me some webcomicker at the Toronto Festival told a room full of people that I had restarted A Distant Soil five times and apparently this is due to some massive insecurity on my part.
For the record:
ADS First Publisher:
The original publishing contract clearly stated that I was to own my own work, but with every couple of issues, the indicia went through a morph, and in the end, the publisher claimed copyright as well as trademark. For themselves. When the lawyer hit the fan, the original publisher also claimed I was just hired to do the art and A Distant Soil was created by the publisher.
Naturally, I was not pleased with this development, and so left the publisher, spent years wrangling for the rights, and got them.
Since the original art was shot (mostly) from pencils, and since I wanted a clean break with the old company, I decided to redo the book from scratch. This would also preclude further claims by this old company to authorship.
ADS Second Publisher:
This is the only time I rewrote and redrew my book from scratch.
I would have been happy and content with this situation, but THIS HAPPENED.
I repeat: this is the only time I redid my book. From the beginning. From scratch. Period.
Three years after I signed on, the publisher closed its trade line, and sold all our contracts. Illegally. Lawsuit ensued. Authors got their rights and a financial settlement.
However, the graphic novel editions were in color and there was no way to recover those color negatives. (EDIT) Original plan was to publish black and white comics and to have these dudes publish color GN reprints. Instead we got a perfect storm of bummer.
What to do? Do I walk away, or do I try to give it another go – which could not possibly have anything to do with two publishers who violated the contracts of a dozen authors! When you take your book to another publisher, you’re showing signs of emotional insecurity, OMG, the horror?
This has nothing to do with wanting to finish your project, economic concerns, or legal rights issues!
I decided to give self publishing a go. I touched up the art to make it more attractive in black and white, added some pages to flesh out a couple of scenes and make chapter breaks, and soldiered on.
That was in 1991.
I went to Image Comics in 1996, and did not restart my book. I picked up the series at Image with issue #15.
I have published a trade paperback edition (which is not restarting the book,) and online (which is not restarting the book. A new edition is not a restart. It’s a reprint.)
There have been more editions of Sandman than there have been of A Distant Soil. More editions of Bone. More editions of Finder.
TWO comic book editions. TWO graphic novel editions. Since 1980. This is excessive?
I am very sorry some people feel vast amounts of inconvenience that I have not finished my book.
I’d love to just sit around and draw whatever I want, but I can’t do that. I have to make a living.
The income on the last issue of A Distant Soil was about $200. Which means I worked on it for two months for $200.
Which means that the money I had to live on for two entire months and to finance any book overhead took about $8,000 out of my savings.
Let me repeat that.
Last issue cost me $8,000. The issue before that cost about $7,000.
I don’t have spare time to work on comics. This is what I do for a living. If a book is not bringing in profit, that money has to come from somewhere else.
While I receive royalty checks on ADS graphic novels, this modest income I chose to use to bring the book online for everyone to read in hopes of creating another income stream to finance further work. It took almost two year’s of ADS GN royalties to pay for a web tech to design and build my sites, deal with the hack back in January, cover online access and registrations, advertising, etc. It took one royalty check to pay for my booth at San Diego. I get two checks a year.
And I am sure this webcomicker person didn’t mean any harm, so I am happy to have the opportunity to clear this up.
I wonder if they will put a tip in my donation box. They haven’t so far.
Seriously, if I had enough money to do nothing but sit down and draw A Distant Soil, I would very happily do nothing else. Not to say my other work isn’t fulfilling and wonderful, but it’s dead annoying to have other people act like they have somehow been harmed by my failure to perform on cue for free. To add injury to injury, a failure to perform while incurring HUGE FREAKING DEBT.
I’m sorry if this is cranky.
Well, not really.
Wow, that was totally whiney.
I don’t think it was too whiney, and I can understand your frustration! It sounds like that guy was just talking out of his ass, probably because he’s intimidated by your obvious talent and intelligence. I can’t understand what the big deal is either, because it’s so easy to just buy the collected graphic novels if you want to read ADS, or read it for FREE here! -sigh- What a jerk.
I did once think the number of A Distant Soil issues was more than what you have actually done but that’s just because I had heard about the book for years before I actually read an issue of it. By the way I didn’t read any of ADS until discovering your site about a year ago and now I’m cataching up on your site.
Oh, and a little off topic was talking to an English prof. today with some of his studants and he asked me, “You love writing and if you could you would give your books away wouldn’t you? You just can’t afford to?” Then he got a little upset when I said, “No I wouldn’t. I’ve done a few free things and plan to do more for promotion reasons but I don’t want to give away my work.” What’s so wrong with an artist of any sort wanting to make money off their work. He acted like I’m was attacking “Art” by saying that.
He probably wanted a scapegoat to show that HIS lazy ass schedule fail and constant reworkings aren’t so bad in comparison. “I mean look at HER, she did MUCH worse! Stop picking on MEEEE”
Wrong example, Mr. Rectal Haberdasher.
I would love to believe EVERYONE who talks out of their ass is just intimidated by my talent and intelligence, but I suspect they’re just talking out of their ass.
Like I said, I am sure they didn’t mean any harm. I wonder if there is some website out there with bogus info about my publishing history or something, because I’ve had multiple people talk about the five restarts on ADS that didn’t happen.
I think you could argue three – 1st pub, 2nd and self publishing – but going to Image was no restart. I just kept on from where I stopped.
My self publishing was a reprint, with added material.
I don’t expect people to know the details of my publishing life, but that said, I don’t know why my publishing history seems like some kind of betrayal of artistic principles. Or something. I don’t really get what the deal is.
I can’t be more clear. I don’t make money on this book. The most money I have made in years where this project was concerned was on the donation incentive I had back in February. And that was basically me selling off stuff from my collection.
I’ve been (repeatedly) advised not to be so candid about the finances on this project, but I can’t bring myself to lie about this. It’s too important. And there are too many young creators out there who pin their hopes on someday making it big in comics. I don’t want to give them a false picture.
In the past, A Distant Soil made decent money, but the comics industry went to pot, and that’s that. My sales percentage drop was no worse than everybody else’s. I can’t take it personally.
As for actual readers, at least 50,000 people came here to read the comic for free, but that simply doesn’t translate to big dollars.
Here is an interesting post on the reality of digital income.
http://altreport.hipsterrunoff.com/2010/04/how-many-mp3s-albums-streams-must-an-artist-sell-to-make-minimum-wage.html
Compare how many sales and how much traffic an artist has to generate just to make minimum wage.
Just wondering. Do you see having the comic on your site as being a success so far?
@ Brian: Yes and no.
Got lots of new readers, but I don’t know if that translates into book sales.
My readership did not start going up until late December. About 10 months after I started posting. It’s too early to know if people are picking up trades. I may not know for an entire year.
I have seen an increase in the value of my original art. I am getting substantially better prices for ADS originals.
I also made more money on ads starting in December, but our ad network was badly infected with viruses and I had to cut it in February. I was never able to get the problem addressed by the client. Unfortunately, that cost me about $2,000 in potential annual ad income, assuming steady traffic.
Unfortunately, in terms of time-investment it’s a big loss. I don’t mind posting once in awhile, or answering notes here, but I do need to watch my time management. My Leechblock stats tell me I have not as prudent as I should be.
I truly appreciate your candidness about your finances on this project. I try to apply your good advice to my own business, and I like the constant reminder that making art for personal reasons is a lot different than making art to make money. Sometimes paid projects can be interesting and enjoyable (and sometimes not), but they always require a different mind-set than personal ones.
I didn’t read it as whiny at all; you were just setting the record straight.
There are several people I could name who would do well to read — and UNDERSTAND — what’s written here. There’s a reason why some of these personal projects don’t come out as often or as regularly as some might like, and it sure as heck isn’t due to laziness or insecurity.
I know it must sound ridiculous, “WAH WAH I don’t make more money on my comic!”
Hitting me a fiver via my donation button will not bring about the cure of cancer.
But I am not going to feel excesses of guilt for not being more productive. I don’t know how I can afford to sink more money into this thing.
I couldn’t afford it as of about 6 years ago.
Every once in awhile, someone will tell me that they bought my comics in 1985, and will not give me any more money until I finish!
And I wish they would read VERY BAD PUBLISHERS so they could see I didn’t get any of that money from the sale of many of those comics.
http://adistantsoil.com/tag/very-bad-publishers/
And some simple math an alarming number of people simply don’t seem to get:
The creator does not pocket the cover cost of the book. If you paid $2 for a comic, I did not get $2.
And back in the day, I probably got nothing at all.
If I had the same number of readers I had in the early 1990′s, I’d be sitting pretty. But NO ONE has the same number of readers they had in the 1990′s.
I am doing everything I can to figure out how to finance this thing. I just sold off a huge load of stuff from my library and collection in the February donation drive. That’s enough money to finance a month of work. But I have to meet the deadlines that pay right now.
And that is the way it is.
This both exonerates you (not that you’re incapable of exonerating yourself or need exoneration, far from it on both counts) and gives me a chance to air a pet peeve.
It’s not whining to express a legitimate complaint. It’s a right.
Ahem.
As we were, then.
LOL! Thanks!
And something else I thought I would point out.
The other day on other websites I read comments about why pirates were not bad for art economics, and that freeloading (which is the preferred term for illegal downloading) is not bad for art economics either. One of the comments that floored me most was some guy who posted that artists only need money to “get by”.
He postulated this scenario for ideal art creation economics in which the scads of freeloaders are able to enjoy the fruits of the artist’s labor financed by the donations of the few patrons who can be depended on to fork over dough. The artist should be able to get enough patrons to GET BY. If they are any good, that is. If not, then they must not be any good.
And don’t you love it when people who protest that artists shouldn’t be in it for the money then use a financial measuring stick for valuing the art of others. Yeah, that thrills me.
Now, no one who comes to this site is a freeloader. You guys pay for this site with your page hits.
Thank you.
But the point is, the guy said the artist just needs enough to “get by”.
No, you don’t. You need enough to PUT BY.
A perfect example of this is…well…me.
Through most of the 1990′s, A Distant Soil made enough to get by.
For a time there, I was making pretty good money on ADS, especially considering much of it was reprint material. In fact, my entire economic model for the project was based on GET BY.
I was clearing $20,000 or so, which in today’s dollars is around $30,000. So, not bad. But only GET BY.
(EDIT) Wanted to add that I was doing scads of mainstream art at the same time, so money was very good for awhile. I went full time on ADS at one point, and that was my mistake. Can’t recall all the details, but I had lousy timing.
In 1995, the comic industry collapsed. Big time. My income on ADS collapsed with it. I can’t remember exactly, but I don’t think I had any taxable income for more than a year. I cleared less than $10,000, so no tax after standard deductions. Back to less than minimum wage days on my own work, only this time I was my own Very Bad Publisher.
But I kept soldering forward. I could GET BY. A Distant Soil dutifully popped up at Image comics five issues a year.
After years of GET BY, I was broke and deeply in debt. I was unable to scare up enough side work to make up the deficits. Going to Image helped a lot, but I was clearing less than $20,000 even there, and now had big debts to pay from a nearly 2 year period with almost no income, so my financial situation was dire.
By 1999, I was sinking in loads of debt and interest, and was ready to chuck art entirely. All because I thought if I just plowed forward on ADS, my ship would come in, and because I just knew I could GET BY.
Hell, no.
GET BY won’t get you through a rough patch. GET BY means no savings. GET BY means no way to finance your work when money simply isn’t coming in from other sources, no way to handle even the smallest financial emergency.
GET BY is not GOOD ENOUGH.
NO artist can afford to GET BY. If your GET BY doesn’t include a huge chunk to PUT BY, you are going to end up like me.
Years of GET BY, and now I’m going nowhere.
GET BY is a pretty stinky economic model, in my humble opinion. It’s a shame some people think they should impose it on others.
And BTW, if anyone knows my pub history it’s Allan Harvey. He is more than welcome to pipe in and shout if I am misrepresenting anything here.
The one person in the world who would have every single copy of those legendary five ADS restarts, he’d be the guy.
But they don’t exist, so whatever.
I had to go back to the top and snort.
Colleen and “massive insecurity”?? Really?
I can’t see how anyone who has ever read her blog would accuse her of “massive insecurity”. Nevermind anyone who has met her in person. It just boggles my mind.
But so what if she has restarted her magnum opus? It’s hers to create, hers to say is in it’s “best state”. She’s not the only creator to ever redo a work in order to make it better.
But that said, right, she’s not rebooting it now. She’s just gearing up to continue onward.
What can you do.
BTW, this post was not based on hearsay. The incident Jamie reported to me was recorded.
My spies are everywhere.
Just kidding!
I admit that I have found myself on both sides of the downloading debate, but you’ve given me even more to chew on, Colleen. As a rule I am very choosy about what I choose to “freeload.” If something is out of print or unavailable in my country, I don’t see anything wrong with pirating that. And I’d never pirate an independent movie, or an Alan Moore comic, knowing how he turned away studio checks with tears in his eyes. But now I’m forced to reconsider my justifications when I reflect upon the fact that I’ve pirated issues of The Umbrella Academy, thinking to myself that its rock star author was already rich. I didn’t even give a moment’s thought to the phenomenal independent artist who worked on it! Shame on me. As an aspiring artist myself, I can’t believe I was so thoughtless.
I agree that it isn’t right to devalue the work of an artist’s hands. Most people can only dream of doing what we do, and yet they treat it as if it were no accomplishment – as if making art were as easy as hot-gluing plastic jewels to a pair of blue jeans. It’s not. It’s WORK. It’s labor like any other kind, *skilled* labor. And that’s worth something, especially in this day and age.
It is sad that someone feels the need to disparage your comic before getting all (or perhaps any!) of the facts which are readily available on this blog.
I hope you get an apology but I won’t bet on it. Unfortunately there are a few fans around who form half baked opinions and refuse to let the facts get in their way.
I recall one artist injuring their drawing hand and having to withdraw from a series and getting flak for not being able to stick with a series. I recall another being criticized for being slow while they waited weeks and weeks for a script!
Hey Zoe, that’s great of you to think of the artist.
Back in the day, the common wisdom was that US and Japanese copyright laws were so different that it was OK to buy unauthorized videos, translation fanzines, and so forth. I had plenty! A guy I used to know was a well-known SMOF who trafficked bootleg anime. The only way to get most anime was via bootleg.
It wasn’t until I started doing business with Japanese clients that I found out everything I believed about Japanese copyright law was completely wrong, all those vids I had were bogus, and one of my favorite manga artists had a day job working in her mother’s shop.
Stranger still: you know how everyone thinks manga artists are rich? When I first went to Japan, all the manga artists thought the US artists were rich. I thought that was really funny.
I don’t think anyone is going to resent you for having a few items in your collection that are, perhaps, not all the snuff, but there are people out there who never give the creators or companies who produce this stuff a thought. If anything, they dismiss every argument against piracy as “corporate shill” lies. I think it’s great that you are considerate of others.
Today I found out that VIZ just laid off 40% of its work force.
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/book-news/comics/article/43145-viz-media-lays-off-60.html
Now, it can be argued that none of the people who pirated all that manga were going to buy it anyway. But one thing’s for sure, enough of it wasn’t selling for those people to keep their jobs.
I’ve read that three manga companies went down recently.
Bottom line is, no publisher can compete with FREE.
I wouldn’t be surprised if I still had a few old anime bootlegs around here someplace. But I believe I replaced all I bought with commercial copies at some point. It looks like most of the anime bootlegs I had were sold at shows. So, pirates got the money, not the studios or the artists.
@ Miki:
Wow, I can think of a few incidents like that. Didn’t Brett Breeding have a very bad accident and destroy his drawing hand? I briefly knew that fellow. The accident ended his career.
I did not know about Brett Breeding, it was another artist, but it appears that Brett must be doing OK now as he is taking commissions
http://www.catskillcomics.com/breeding.htm
I am guessing that the 5 ‘restarts’ is coming from someone who is just skimming your publishing history:
1. ADS mag – Warp
2. ADS comic- Warp – continues numbering from mag – not a restart- Mile High Comics lists the comic separate from the mag while the Grand Comics Database lists them as one series.
3. Starblaze GNs
4. Aria press comic
5. Image comic – continues numbering from Aria – not a restart but is listed separately by both MHC and GCD.
Maybe that’s it.
I would never occur to me that someone would mistake that for “restarts”.
Did BONE restart when it went to Image?
Did it restart when it went to Scholastic?
No.
You must be right. Someone who really doesn’t know my work would easily make that mistake.
And these young whippersnappers must be having fits trying to figure out what the ADS magazine must have been like.
Why, we had cooking columns, romance advice, and fashion tips.
The only “restart” in there was at Starblaze. Aria was primarily reprints, and a continuation. I didn’t redo the series for kicks, or anything like that.
God knows where these people get their ideas.
I giggle thinking people could go crazy trying to find issue #1′s of these editions that don’t exist.
As for Breeding, I know that he was unable to keep to the rigors of a schedule for some years.
He couldn’t maintain fine motor control for more than short periods.
I do hope he’s gotten better.
I made a mistake earlier.
I checked my stats this morning, and my traffic shows a significant increase in November of last year.
After I first put the comic online in late January ’09, I saw an uptick in traffic after a couple of months, then that flattened out.
In November, the page views increased by five times over normal. Our traffic this year is already higher than it was for last year’s total.
Last year the blog seemed to get the most regular traffic, but now the comic does.
So there won’t be a chibi “Distant Soil” comic?
Wait… WaRP claimed copyright on ADS?
And just for schnitzel giggles… what was the circulation of the magazine?
I never found out total circulation because I never got final accountings. I know the first issue had two printings, and the first print was 27,500, second print unknown. I have a letter on file via a third party that claims total circulation was 40,000.
This was a story in TCJ many years ago, so this is all a matter of public record.
Some historical context:
http://srbissette.com/?p=8348
To be honest, when it all started, I wasn’t even really sure what my indicia meant. I had no idea what a trademark was. I was 16 when they first approached me, and the first installment came out when I was 19. And no internet, so info about comics publishing was scarce.
Ah, well, bygones are bygones.
“Why, we had cooking columns, romance advice, and fashion tips”
Nah, that was the old ADS message board circa 2001.
I don’t know quite how one could make five “restarts” out of ADS publishing history: that would make SIX separate versions! There’s a genuine case for three distinct versions — WaRP, Starblaze, and Aria/Image — but that’s just two “restarts” (and the second of those could be considered just a revised edition). Everything else is just reprints.
This web version is not — and should not — be considered a “restart” as it in no way supersedes any previous versions. Colleen has always made it clear that the final episodes will appear in pamphlet form.
*sniffle* I never left… I’ve been here since that first preview. *sniffle* I’ve driven miles out of my way to get issues. Harrassed stores because the latest issue wasn’t in even though the distro said it was going to be out (but didn’t know about the date change. I placed my first issues in a green Japanese painted box and duct taped it and it has gone with me no matter where I went. I spent my last $20 on Immigrant Song when I had no clue when I was going to get income. I stopped collecting everything else and tell stores I only collect ADS.
*sniffle* I never left, Colleen. Never.
Sob. GROUP HUG!
ADS has almost always swung wildly between popular and marginal.
There is always the hope you can claw your way back up to popular, and there is never enough bummer in the marginal to just walk away.
This is the plight of the middle class comics creator. Always betwixt and between. Never rich, though fans always think you must be. One day you’ve got decent money, six months later, you’re getting foreclosure notices.
Fortunately, I haven’t had that experience in a long time, because I simply refuse to sink myself financially to draw comics anymore. I’ve got a limit, and I won’t cross it.
At a certain point, drawing a comic becomes a luxury sideline in which you work like a dog for no apparent reason except the need to make the comic.
Most small press folks would kill for my sales, and over the years, I’ve sold hundreds of thousands of books (somewhere around 700,000-?)
But the income is front loaded. On the back end, not so much moolah.
More comics than I can count with a huge sales bell curve. Mine would be one of them.
I’m pretty sanguine about it, though. Like I said, happens to most of us. Many big selling titles found their sales drop 85% over the years.
Actually, most comics had that drop.
I remember when DC canceled books which sold 50,000 copies! Now a 50,000 sale is big news.
I started reading ADS way back when it began. And I remember being very confused when the characters’ personalities changed (except for Minetti), and Seren and Liana both have the emotional maturity of five year olds.
Kovar put in his appearance and I like him.
I bought up to Image Comics Coda. That’s rather where I stopped because I couldn’t tell where to start again. As I said, very confused.
The place to stop is Coda because that is where I stopped.
Yeah…. leaving us all hanging in space. Literally.
(Just a friendly nudge. We’ve got to make you excited about getting back into it, yes?)
I am really dying to get back to it. I am backed up with work though. I have THREE months on the calender for it, beginning in October.
I sent you money. A little. *smile*
SQUEE! Thank you!
I’m still here too. These last few semesters have been crazy but I just had to buckle down and focus on getting my degrees. I’m the kind of person that if I start trying to do too much at once I do lousy at everything. So I got hyper focused.
I graduated on May 14th with a Bachelor of Arts in History and a Bachelor of Arts in Gender Womens Studies.
I got accepted into the Masters Program for Information Resources and Library Science. The prep class starts on Monday and runs through mid June.
I still remember the comission you asked for. I still have plans to do it. I just needed to focus on my education first so that I can afford to work on my art.
For the weekend I am relaxing. 
NO offense, but one comment has been removed due to spoilers.
Please remember some people are reading this book here for the first time! Thanks.
And all wonderful news from Marina! Great to see you!!!
And THANKS farbeitfromme!
Btw, I posted a link to this page on the comicart-L list in a thread where people were complaining about creators not finishing what they started and taking other work instead of working on their creator owned comic.
Hopefully, they will read it and get educated.
Also someone posted a link to an interesting blog by Neil Gaiman where he replies to a similar inquiry.
http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/05/entitlement-issues.html
I remember that essay. I love it more than life itself.
Sometimes you need to do other things, if for no reason than to recharge the batteries. Sometimes you are too close to a problem. Sometimes the project simply doesn’t make any money.
Last night I went to a concert. I have been to two concerts in the last three years. I don’t think this is excessive slacking, but I felt bad for going anyway because I am running behind schedule at the moment.
I am having trouble with some layouts, and just in case I got any ideas, I took my work with me.
Before the main band, I was subjected to two opening bands both of which were so bad, I thought “This is my punishment for not staying home and working.”
However, in the 20 minute breaks between bands, I figured out the problem with my layouts, and was able to redo five entire pages of design. Sitting right there in the theater. I’ve been trying to figure out this opening scene for weeks. And I sussed it all out later while I was goofing off.
Sometimes you just need to walk away and come back fresh.
If I were as popular an author as Martin, I might get to do more personal projects, but then, I bet he needs to recharge sometimes, too.
And I know exactly how much time I spend online and blogging. There’s a timer on my system. And it shuts me off when I go over my limit.
I am sure I spend less time blogging than most people spend just watching TV.
Ooh, that was me. Right, sorry about that!
So, what concert did you go to? Was the live performance what you expected?
If I say where I went, someone will be on the internet trying to figure out where I live.
But the concert was great. I see this band whenever I can.
You live in a lovely house with a garden. See? I’ve sussed it out! *wink*
I, on the other hand, live in a well-ventilated house with little insulation, and under lots of lovely trees so no garden.
Just a quick note to let everyone know that I received a kind note of apology from the webcomicker who made the comments. She (not he,) had gotten the info about the 5 “restarts” from a third party.
No hard feelings, and we’re done.
Cool beans.
wow, that came back fast XD glad it had a positive ending.
Yes, I am glad to be proven wrong.
btw thanks for the link about what happens when you take a hiatus on a project, I needed that. I am staring at Book Four and tearing what’s left of my hair out, because I know it has to get written and the series finished but my heart is not in it right now. I’m more into two other whole different projects but my guilt over not working on the series is preventing me from diving headlong into either of the other two, so they’re in one of those three way standoffs where everyone’s holding guns on everyone else.
I need to give myself permission to step back and go where the creativity is pulling me, or I’m never going to get ANYthing done.