So yesterday morning I launched my official Patreon campaign. Admittedly I sort of spammed it across all platforms of social media -- but I did so with just a promotional message. I didn't exactly explain why I'm doing this.
So hey, I figured I'd do that now.
For those of you who don't know, Patreon is a way to set up recurring donations to creative types. The theory is that "patronage" can be crowd sourced to support artists. It's modeled similarly to Kickstarter in its format of reward tiers and goals, but with a Patreon project you're instead backing an ongoing work -- not a one time production.
I admit I don't expect to get a lot of donations from this. The existing Paypal donation button on UnCONventional only nets me a couple donations a year right now. But I figured rather than me going "this will never work" and not trying it, I should just put it out there.
If you like my comics and can spare a dollar a month (or more), why not consider making a pledge? Yeah, I put some reward tiers out there for people who give more money -- but I don't anticipate many people will take advantage of them. But hey, a guy's allowed to dream, right?
If you can't donate I won't be offended. I get it. Frankly, I'm well aware most of my fans are flat broke. And don't worry, the comics will continue to update the way they do now, and reading them on the web will always be free.
And as I always say, free is cheaper than food.
So yeah, that's my pitch. If you want to support my making UnCONventional and The Chronicles of Crosarth consider making a recurring donation via my Patreon campaign. If you don't want to, that's cool too -- but consider telling your friends about it.
That'd be neat.
- Traegorn
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So yesterday I reblogged David Willis's response to a "Lil Formers" comic on Tumblr. The comic depicts two characters (Windblade and Drift) talking about how "Fanfictiony" they are. For those outside of the fandom world, most people consider stereotypical original fanfiction characters to be overpowered, self inserts -- so needless to say, it's a criticism. In the comic, Windblade is agreed to be more fanfictiony than Drift in part because she is a woman. David Willis called this out -- and in my small (and insignificant) part I referred to Mr. Willis as a marvelous human being, and went about my day.
Frankly, I didn't think twice about it.
Until I received a message from Matt Moylan, artist of Lil Formers on Twitter.
First thing in the morning.
I posted this to Tumblr earlier, but here are screenshots of most of our Twitter interaction.
I may not have been the most polite person in the world, but hey - I had just woken up and hadn't asked to be contacted in the first place.
Moylan backpedals in a couple of places here which are telling -- first off he claims that something being "fanfictiony" isn't a bad thing. But... what exactly else is it supposed to mean? Not all fanfiction is bad -- but good fanfic doesn't feel any different than any other literature. The only reason people describe things as "fanfiction-esque" or "fanfictiony" is because of the negative connotation derived from the piles of bad fanfic that do exist.
And if it's not a criticism, where exactly is the joke? Moylan is now in a position where he has to admit the (albeit minor) sexism in the comic or that he literally made a comic with no punchline.
Moylan also says some ridiculous stuff like how sexism is about intent... which is just insane. Whether a person is sexist is about intent, but an action or comment can be sexist all on its own. People do unintentionally sexist things all the time - that's literally how institutionalized and societal sexism works.
In the end, Matt Moylan is just getting defensive because he's unwilling to look at how his own behavior might be sexist -- because it doesn't fit into his personal narrative or identity.
But dude - you did a thing. It's okay, but you need to learn from these things and not freak out...
...and send angry messages to random people on Twitter.
P.S. Read my comic. Or the other one.
- Traegorn
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So it didn't happen exactly like this, but this weekend Crysta and I went out and saw the Veronica Mars Movie. This meant we got in the car and drove almost an hour to Kokomo, IN to see it.
The disadvantage to not living in a major city is that it's a crap shoot to find showings of films with limited releases.
As for the movie itself, I will say it was definitely worth the drive. I'm a big Veronica Mars fan, so it was nice to get another installment of this prematurely cancelled series. I will also say you don't need to be an existing fan to understand the movie - as it offers a decent jumping in point for the series as well.
Hell, this movie was so good it made me finally like Piz. In fact, now I like Piz a lot.
Damn.
If it's showing near you, go see it. If it's not, consider buying it on Amazon or iTunes. You won't regret it. But while I loved the movie, that's not the part that's had me puzzled -- it's how this film coming together will effect the future of the business.
Over the weekend the film brought in just about $2 million, but that doesn't include any digital or on demand sales (as it was simultaneously released online). In fact, it's hard to wrap my mind around how profitability is going to be calculated for this film... because it's kind of a unique beast.
Most people know that the Veronica Mars movie was funded primarily via Kickstarter. They raised, after Kickstarter's fees, about $5 million. Warnder Brothers reportedly kicked in another $1 million for reshoots. Normally we'd think of this as a movie that cost $6 million, so it would need to make that much back to be a success.
But... $5 million of it's budget was paid for by fans. Many of whom received a digital download of the film as a reward. So, arguably, this film needs to only make back what the studio spent on it to be successful... right?
I think? I'm so confused.
But most people writing about it are talking about it in normal film terms (with only a couple of exceptions). Buzzfeed's take is especially pessimistic on the subject - but it's still framed in old thinking. It's still thinking about this in the way studio funded films have always been thought about.
But it's a hell of a lot more complex than that.
- Traegorn
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So there have been a couple of situations I've been following which really entertain me... right up until I think about what's actually happening.
At that point I just get kind of sad.
The first of which I talked about a lot when I was actively engaging with the person having issues. I won't link back to it, but if you go back through my blog entries from the recent past, you'll find my vast documentation about it. That entire thing has kept going, most recently on the Something Awful forums and the person's tumblr...
...and it's kind of sad.
Simultaneously, I've been digging about the apparent freak-out of a (significantly more notable than me) webcomic artist who went and burnt a bunch of their kickstarter books. And all I can think of is that for every moment I find it fascinating... it too is super sad.
And my only hope is that both of these individuals find the professional help they need. I can't say that enough.
...on the other hand, a part of me still finds it really entertaining to watch.
I think I'm kind of a horrible person sometimes.
- Traegorn
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Over and over again I hear the advice "Do what you love" and that working for just money is a path to misery. And while that isn't exactly wrong (and I encourage anyone to follow their dreams), it's not really... complete advice.
Some of us work jobs we don't like, not because there isn't something else we'd rather be doing, but because we have obligations to fulfill. I have rent, bills, car insurance... stuff that I can't afford to keep paying if I were to quit the job which I don't really love.
I wish my living costs were low enough where I could leave my job, or that there were people able to financially float me while I tried to make it... if those are options for you -- great!
But there's something frustrating about seeing "Quit that boring job! Do what you love!" advice.
It's just so... incomplete. It doesn't really tell you how.
- Traegorn
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So I know it's short notice, but I've added another convention to my schedule. On Sunday, March 30th I'll be at the INDYpendent Show in Indianapolis, IN. I'm going to this as part of my attempt to focus on smaller shows and shows closer to where I live.
The INDYpendent Show isn't your typical con, as it's focused on independent comic producers, and I think it will be a lot of fun. Besides my normal excitement to get my work out in the public more, this is going to be a really fun opportunity to see what other artists are producing in my local region.
Because it would be nice to talk about comics with other creators for once. I haven't done that for a while.
Anyway, it's a small one day show, but admission is only $3. You should totally come down if you have the chance and say hi to me. Because that would be awesome.
You know you want to be awesome.
I may be adding more Indiana dates to the calendar down the road, but nothing major. There are a couple of attempts at creating large "Comic Cons" in Indianapolis this year, but I want to see how successful they are before I ever try and get a table at them. Right now their prices are justifiable if they're big shows -- but with no attendance history, it's hard to see if that will pan out.
So I'm taking a wait and see approach.
The con scene in Indiana is still so alien compared to where I came up in Wisconsin. I see attempts to build it out and do more with it, and shows like the INDYpendent Show are a step in the right direction.
But there's a reason I still drive up North four times a year.
- Traegorn
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So a while back I did a panel breakdown for UnCONventional, but I thought it might be fun to do another. Last time we looked at a panel where I built a structure from scratch. This time around, we're going to take a look at a panel where I transformed an existing photograph with additional elements to create a scene in a snowstorm.
I like to refer to this image as "The Mad Dash."
Whenever I do something like this, I like to start with any hand drawn elements, which are (of course) Lynn, Megan, and the backend of Lynn's 1986 Grand Marquis. I do each one of these three separately so I can reposition elements as I go along.
Even though I draw digitally, I still follow the traditional method of "Pencils" -> "Inks" -> "Flats" -> "Highlights/Shading" in my work. Once I have all of these hand drawn elements, I combine them into a single layer.
Now that I've got that part done (and still maintaining them as separate layers), I move on to the hard part.
I start out with an image of a gas station which I found on Morguefile.com (a really good source for free images). Now since this isn't a winter scene, I need to do some base-layer modifications. First thing I do is apply an "Oilify" filter which will flatten some of the colors for me. Then I randomly start filling sections as white with the fill tool. This gives us the approximation of some snow in the background.
My next step is to separate the foreground and background spaces. I want the snow to be thicker the further back you go, so I select a portion of the image and turn it into a new layer. Then I create my first "snow" layer. I use an RGB Noise filter on a black layer which gives me a lot of nice, random white pixels. I then color select the white noise, grow the selection by one pixel and fill the selection with white (to thicken the snow) and float it to a new layer. I then add a touch of motion blur to the "snow" to emulate falling in wind. Along with a basic white to transparent gradient, I put my snow between the "background" and "foreground" layers.
Next I add another layer of "snow" up front (without the blur) to put some snow over the foreground and thicken our blizzard. It's at this point that I also bring in the hand drawn elements from earlier. It's very exciting, I know.
Once I'm sure that I like the positions of the characters (and get everything done right), I toss on one more layer of "snow" upfront, and voila! We're done!
Personally, I'm happy with the way it turned out.
- Traegorn
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I haven't posted a Hummingbird Interior from The Chronicles of Crosarth in quite some time, but since I had to finally design another space on the ship, I thought I'd share this one.
(Previous Interiors: The Central Hall, Friday's Quarters, The Mess, and The Bunkroom)
What we see above is Fleet Admiral Hayworth's private cabin. As the Hummingbird was intended to be his flagship in the field, this is a space that wouldn't exist in most ships of the class (it's been carved out of the cargo bay). The room's ceiling is very short, as it's designed specifically for Hayworth's small size.
While its been previously mentioned, Wednesday is going to be the first time you guys actually see it.
- Traegorn
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So... this "thing" happened on Tumblr. I don't know how to describe it, other than "holy crap, people like this are real." I thought about listing this as a Craptacular World entry, but frankly the person is far too unimportant to warrant such attention.
But I had to write something about it.
As you may know, I'm a fan of David Willis's comics, including Dumbing of Age. David Willis has a tumblr blog dedicated to just that comic, and he encourages people to submit to it and ask questions. Well, last Saturday, the most insane thing was submitted to his blog by the tumblr user Shreddedmoosememorialwebsite.
In it, SMMW (which I will refer to the tumblr user by from here on out) said:
David Willis, you and your cohort Jeph Jacques are responsible for poisoning the webcomic community and creating the current depression it exists in today.You mindlessly shove SJW propoganda into all of your comics and are spreading the acceptance of toxic SJ beliefs that will someday be the DEATH OF OUR FREEDOM
I realize you'll censor this post just like you're censoring freedom of speech BUT hopefully you'll still read this post and realize some of us webcomic fans are not mindless cattle. And if not you'll probably sic your syncophantic fans on my tumblrs but I hope you know that what you're doing is killing the 1st amendment. For the record, I am NOT a hater, I am spreading the truth. I am transsexual myself and I cannot accept what you are doing to the webcomic community.
I just want you people to know that you killed a webcomic called Shredded Moose which empazized freedom of speech and belief. Now the only thing that remains are "progressive" "safe" "handholdy" mindless drivel that will destroy our freedom of individuality.
My first reactions were first "What the f***?" followed quickly by "What the hell is Shredded Moose?" because I had never heard of it
Googling Shredded Moose, it appeared to be a webcomic that was, frankly, fairly terrible. It was full of frat boy humor, misogyny, and relative mediocrity. Was it the most misogynist webcomic I've ever seen? No. Was it the worst drawn? Far from it. But it wasn't, y'know, good. And because of this, it got fairly negative reviews.
Like many webcomics in the grand sea of the net, the authors (for reasons never communicated to the readers) eventually gave up and ended the comic. And because they were paying for hosting, eventually stopped paying the bills and the comic disappeared into the ether.
This is not an uncommon story.
So one has to ask, what the hell do webcomic artists David Willis and Jeph Jacques have to do with this? How could these unrelated artists have killed a webcomic that likely wasn't even on either of their radars? Why do people have no clue what the first amendment actually says?
I felt the need to find out.
So I went to their tumblr and submitted an ask (and got the following response:
John Soloman is a guy who used to write webcomics reviews. There's an archive of his stuff out there if you feel like googling him. The "Bad webcomics wiki" is exactly what it sounds like. Neither of these though have anything to do with Willis or Jacques. Hell, John Soloman wrote a fairly negative review of David Willis's work back in the day too. This response prompted me to dig deeper.
It actually took me a while to figure out how weird this answer to me was. First they say that "kill" is just a metaphor, but then they propose that there was something physically preventing readers from accessing Shredded Moose. This person honestly believes that's a possibility. Sadly, I didn't immediately pick up on that.
Somehow I had "slipped up" apparently. How?
And here's the crux - the person running this tumblr can't accept that it died a natural death. I mean, seriously. SOME lowly read webcomics keep going, while OTHERS die off. The only difference is whether or not the creators keep making them. That's it. No external player has a part in this. I was, frankly, done at this point.
So apparently, somehow, "Social Justice" propaganda magically prevented people from reading the comics. And that lack of readers made the creators give up. Except that makes no sense. Because if the so called "Social Justice" community had the power to shut down sites... lets just say they'd go after a target a little more important than a comic no one was reading.
I could go into this more, like how the person running the tumblr accused the critics of Shredded Moose of being Transphobic. Because apparently we all knew that she was a transwoman (I have independently verified this claim as true to the best of my very surprised ability).
Which, y'know, we didn't. Because why would we? Especially when they're ranting about the evils of "Social Justice." You know, that same "Social Justice" umbrella which includes fighting for trans* rights.
The person has since wiped out almost all of their tumblr, including my asks - but it's slowly filling up with new weirdness. For a while I thought it was a troll, but after digging into this person's background, I honestly think this is an unbalanced individual who needs to get help. That's why I'm not talking about who they are.
But damn it, they're kind of entertaining.
Update! SMMW found my tumblr post about her, and the interaction has continued to be hilarious!
Another Update! It's gotten a lot less hostile, but even with a change to her Tumblr username... it keeps going.
- Traegorn
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