Shout-out: Aron Nels Steinke

DIGESTATE CONTRIBUTOR:

ARON NELS STEINKE!

Portrait of The Artist as a young wolf

Aron Nels Steinke first studied hand-drawn animation before eventually drawing and writing comics and children's books. In 2006 he received a Xeric Grant which propelled him into the self-publishing and cartooning world. Aron has published 5 issues of the autobiographical comics series, Big Plans, and has frequently participated in numerous anthologies including Not My Small Diary and the award winning Papercutter anthology. 

Aron's all-ages graphic novel, Neptune, first published by Sparkplug Comic Books and Tugboat Press, has been translated and published into French and selected as a notable book for this year's BestAmerican Comics, published by Houghton Mifflin. Aron's two early-reader children's books, The Super Crazy Cat Dance and The Super-Duper Dog Park were published by Blue Apple Books. The latter of the two was chosen as a Publisher's Weekly honorable mention for the Best Comics of 2011. Bozo the Teacher, a comic strip based on the author's daily life as an elementary school teacher updates weekly on the author's website, www.aronnelssteinke.com.

Editor's note: I touched on this in the previous post about James Kochalka, but I am a big fan of simplicity in comics. Aron Nels Steinke is very adept at drawing in a style that can appeal to both children and adults. Given his other profession (elementary school teacher), it's not surprising that he is able to tap into the fun & innocence many of us associate with childhood. 

My introduction to Steinke was through his self-published autobiographical comics. I recommend checking out his Big Plans series...very compelling and fun to read!

Creating Independent Comics

Rabid Rabbit's C.M. Butzer asked me to do a lecture for his 'Creating Independent Comics' course at SVA the other night. I was worried about being able to fill the hour he'd requested, but I somehow ended up flappin' my gums for about two and a half hours (the class is three hours long, and they had a critique at the end).

I don't know that I was in any way inspiring, but I tried to cover all the boring but important stuff they didn't teach me in college. Promotion, distribution, production, all that jazz. I hope the students took at least a few helpful pieces of information away from it. Seems like "the kids" are much more prepared than I was at their age. The fact that there's a cartooning/comics program at all kind of blows my mind. I majored in illustration because it was the closest I could get, but the illustration field kinda dried up in the mid-nineties. Or, at least they stopped paying as well as they used to.

Each student will have a finished comic at the end of Butzer's course, and from what I saw at the critique they're gonna be fantastic. I hope they all apply for the Xeric grant, because that was such a helpful learning tool for me in learning about publishing & distribution.

Now I'm thinking about trying to get a teaching gig at SVA. The catch is that the course couldn't overlap too much with either Butzer's class or Choi's (which focuses on storytelling in comics). I'll have to think on it. I suppose I could seek out another college that doesn't have a course in creating comics, but I've always admired the quality of both the teachers and students at SVA.

P.S. Pick up a copy of the new Rabid Rabbit. It's awesome.

Tony Shenton distribution

Although Diamond is distributing Old Man Winter, once you've spent most of your (my) life savings (well, to be fair, a good chunk of the Xeric grant) on an ad in their 'Previews' magazine they don't do too much for your continuing sales. For small press guys like myself, anyway.

Luckily there's Tony Shenton, distributor extraordinaire. He works tirelessly to get mini-comics and whatever else ya got into indie-friendly comic stores. I am honored to receive word that he'll be distributing both Old Man Winter and my other minis across the country. Thanks, Tony!

For Nerds Only

In preperation for my upcoming media blitz for Old Man Winter & Other Sordid Tales I'm having these nifty/nerdy bookmarks printed up.

I actually use book marks, but I'm sure I'm in the minority. I have this irritating (to the wife, anyway) reverence for books. I refuse to break their spines (Karen relishes doing so), and I ALWAYS use a bookmark.

Anyhow, I'll be leaving piles of these at my local comic book stores, sticking them into each book I sell and giving them away at any conventions I have a table at.

In other news, I've started inking pages for my "Tales of Snoop Doggy Dogg" mini-comic. The cover is pretty much done as well, but I've tried using a small linoleum block print to add some color without great success. I can't seem to get the registration to work out properly. I'm going to visit the cheerful pudgy Scottish (Irish?) guy that runs a tiny custom stamp place in the neighborhood to see if he can attach a handle to my linoleum block. That may fix the registration problem.

The Devil Went Down To Georgia then Back To NYC

I'm back from visiting with my family in Georgia. This blog is supposed to be "business related", so I won't tell you about how cute my niece is or how I hung out with baby goats. I can mention two comic-related anecdotes, though.

Chris Staros of Top Shelf was kind enough to interrupt his busy schedule (including a visit from his dad!) to have lunch with me. He gave me all kinds of good advice and even a couple of important contacts (a printer in Canada, Lebonfon Printing, who may have better prices than Brenner Printing and an indie-friendly contact at Diamond Comic Distributors) as well as a delicious meal at a Thai place in the Marietta town square. While we were talking in his home/office James Kochalka (a huge inspiration for me) called, which had me nerding out in my head. This photo I've lifted from an article in Atlanta's Creative Loafing shows the view I had from the couch, although Chris wasn't looming over me.

An important bit of advice that he gave me, something I was struggling with, was in regards to sending out books for review before publication. It seems to be a Catch-22 that a publisher is supposed to send out copies for review before they've been printed. For a self-publisher like me that means going to a copy-shop and running off copies at about $9 per book (keeping in mind that the cost of professional printing will be around $2.50 or less!). The bigger publishers can afford to print galley prints (although they're still expensive), but I can't. So, Chris suggests just printing them up, sending them to my house and using actual copies stamped 'Review Copy' to send out. This is what I'll undoubtedly end up doing, although it will be inconvenient to have all these boxes in my already ridiculously crowded apartment. Also, I'll have to do all the shipping for all orders rather than having Diamond or whoever is distributing send them out from their warehouse. I plan on seeing how much it will cost for Diamond to store some of the books at their warehouse should they agree to distribute me.

Chris also told me that many of the bigger review publications won't review a book if it appears to have already been published, so most publishers put blank covers that say 'review copy' on their galley copies. I don't have the option to do this, so I'll just stamp them and hope for the best.

Another quandary is Diamond's new policy regarding minimum orders. They now require $2500 worth of orders, which ain't easy for a small independent publisher like myself. Fortunately, according to Chris, Diamond is more likely to work with a Xeric award winner and make an exception. We'll see!

The other comic-related episode in Georgia was that I got to hang out with all three of my childhood friends featured in the "Logging Sanjay" comic (Sanjay, Matt & Dewey). It was great to see them all again.

Applying for the Xeric Grant

So, being the masochist that I am, I've applied for a self-publishing grant from the Xeric Foundation. I've gathered a bunch of my comics, including a long one loosely based on an old man that comes into Utrecht Art Supplies (I work there one day a week). He breaks my heart every time I see him. Getting old is a bitch.

Part of the process of putting together the application was getting cost estimates for printing. This has been a real eye-opener for me. It's no wonder nobody makes any money from publishing graphic novels! It also makes me that much more appreciative of the bells & whistles people like Chris Ware and Jordan Crane work into their book designs. Anytime you see a die-cut cover or even something as simple as an untraditional sized cover you know it cost some bucks.

I'll hear back from the Xeric Foundation in November (I think), so wish me luck. Or don't.

You can see most of the comics I'll be including here. I don't think I'll be able to afford to print them in color, so revel in the dizzying full color while you can!