Breaking Into Nothing
(This one, for urzafailure)
To break into something, whether it’s the comics cottage industry of the Philippines, or your sister’s bedroom, understand what it is you’re breaking into.
In the case of the cottage industry of Philippine comics, understand that there is no true industry to speak of, at least not anymore. As of this writing, Atlas has just closed up shop, leaving pretty much, to the best of my knowledge unless Gasi is still around, only Mango Comics as the only true comic book publisher in the country.
This lack of a “true” comics industry in the Philippines is both a bad thing and a good thing for those who are hoping to break into comics.
The Preramble
Before I continue, a definition of terms: by “true” comic book publisher I am referring to a business entity that possesses the following qualities:
a.) publishes locally-produced, original content,
b.) in any kind of format (magazine, graphic novel, etc.) with any kind of predictable frequency (weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.),
c.) with the goal of remaining a sustainable commercial and/or artistic venture (although primarily commercial).
This immediately discounts Summit Publishing, which deals exclusively in foreign material reprinted for local audiences. Culture Crash (which itself seems to have fallen by the wayside, if their lack of recent releases are any indication) and Nautilus Comics don’t also count; despite appearances to the contrary, both are very much small press, independent producers of personal content - vanity presses, for lack of a better term. Traditional publishers like Adarna House and Visual Print have released graphic novels - After Eden and the forthcoming Mythology Class from the former and Zsazsa Zaturrnnah from the latter - but their primary focus remains that of children’s picture books (in the case of Adarna House) and essay and prose collections (as with Visual Print).
As an aside, and there will be many of them as I ramble on and on about this, trying to get all my thoughts about comics in before I forget them: while it may seem that, both here and on my blog, I bash Summit a lot, I don’t. At least, not really. Despite their insistence in reprinting only foreign material that have been proven successes abroad, I do like the fact that they’re at least publishing comics in the first place. I’m hoping this gets a new generation of creatives who would be persuaded to try their hands at telling their own comics stories.
Psicom Publishing is a more interesting case study, as it regularly publishes reprints of foreign material via their DC Superheroes titles, but occasionally also dabbles in local, original content. One of their most successful publications is the series of Philippine Ghost Stories, which isn’t even a comic book, I know, but, it proved so successful that it spawned more than a dozen books in the series and even had a special all-comics issue and a Goosebumps-type collection of short prose stories spinning off of it. In the past they have also published original comic book content in Jason Banico’s TxTMen, the Cherry Blossom High anthology, and Hainaku!, among others. But the lack of regularity, and the philosophy behind such ventures, is such that…
Tsk. Sige na nga, make that two true comic book publishers.
The point being, one - ah, two - comic book publishers does not an industry make. Especially since said publishers don’t even have product directly competing with each other! Aside from the medium itself, which hardly qualifies as grounds for “direct competition,” the content of the titles the two entities publish - heck, you can even throw in Nautilus Comics’ Cast and Siglo series, and Culture Crash as well - deal with a vast array of subject matter, geared towards differing demo- and psychographics.
So, really, where’s the industry that you want to get into?
The Meat of the Matter
Now, like I said, this is both a bad thing and a good thing for those who are looking to get into creating comics for a living.
It’s bad for you because, well, the landscape looks bad in general. Take Culture Crash, for example: its recent death knell, whether official or rumor, is being taken as symbolic of the awful state of the comics market. “If a super-popular book like Crash,” they say, “crashes and burns, what hope is there for the rest of us?” I’d like to think there are other factors that need to be considered: poor distribution, an over-worked, under-manned crew, and the lack of companies willing to invest and sponsor projects like these. I have to say though, that the comics landscape looks promising now, especially when compared to the state of the industry five or so years ago, but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done.
The good thing is that for those few brave souls, there is ample opportunity to contribute to the landscaping. Appeal to the spirit of the pioneer in you, and blaze new trails. I’ve mentioned some of the obstacles above; the challenge now is to find ways of circumventing the problems, of finding solutions. This means going beyond the creative side of comics, I know, and may not be something most aspiring creatives would be interested in. But, for the sake of ensuring that your creative output is even paid attention to in the first place, these things do have to be considered.
Heck, it should be child’s play for you comic creator types to learn new things. Consider the idea that you’re working in a medium that can be best described as interdisciplinary. By this, I mean that comics works best when one is aware that comics is more than just words plus pictures. It is words and pictures working in synergy, and even then there is more to the words than just words, and more to pictures than just pictures. There is a need to hone your vocabulary, your grammar, the way you write dialogue, exposition, metaphor, and so on, while as an artist, you must sharpen and continually improve your facial expressions, body language, anatomy, perspective, etcetera.
Which brings us to…
Lesson number one: interdisciplinarity is an important (and impressive) word to keep in mind.
Comics as a medium is inherently against singular technical specialty, and seems to demand a holistic understanding of the world it inhabits. Similarly, the first thing you as a creative type should know is how to be interdisciplinary. And that means, yes, trying to understand the problems facing the industry, beyond the creative side of things, and perhaps suggesting ways to improve or solve the situation at hand. (An obvious and popular alternative right now is the internet, which I may or may not get to later,
At the very least, an understanding of the workings of the industry should keep you from bitching about why you get paid a paltry page rate, why your book comes out from the printers looking so crappy, and why there’s not many companies wanting to publish your work.
Lesson number two: bitching is unproductive.
For the most part, at least. It is still, after all, very good stress relief.
So bitch, but remember to get back to work eventually.
Lesson number three: Work, work, work.
And more importantly, at least for me, be open to criticisms and commentary. Because even if you have the work ethic of an ant, and yet possess the ego the size of an entire solar system, chances are I wouldn’t like you anyway. In fact, chances are I wouldn’t like your work either, as you will most probably be productive, yes, but productively churning out crap that never improves because you’re unreceptive to ideas. Please, I beg you, spare the world from you.
Lesson number four: learn as much as you can.
In some ways a corollary to lesson number one, lesson number four encourages you to learn as much as you can, when you can, however you can. The world is a classroom, and there’s always something new to be discovered. Read books or live them yourselves. Listen to what people have to say, and how they say it. Observe. Smell. Touch. Taste. Have sex. Find out when toilet paper was invented (580 AD, by the Chinese). Because you’ll never know when your story will need it.
And, you know, to be fair, it’s bad, but it’s not that bad.
But this one’s gone on too long, and I think I’ll save what I have to say next for another post.
Next: How Now, Brown Cow?
To break into something, whether it’s the comics cottage industry of the Philippines, or your sister’s bedroom, understand what it is you’re breaking into.
In the case of the cottage industry of Philippine comics, understand that there is no true industry to speak of, at least not anymore. As of this writing, Atlas has just closed up shop, leaving pretty much, to the best of my knowledge unless Gasi is still around, only Mango Comics as the only true comic book publisher in the country.
This lack of a “true” comics industry in the Philippines is both a bad thing and a good thing for those who are hoping to break into comics.
The Preramble
Before I continue, a definition of terms: by “true” comic book publisher I am referring to a business entity that possesses the following qualities:
a.) publishes locally-produced, original content,
b.) in any kind of format (magazine, graphic novel, etc.) with any kind of predictable frequency (weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.),
c.) with the goal of remaining a sustainable commercial and/or artistic venture (although primarily commercial).
This immediately discounts Summit Publishing, which deals exclusively in foreign material reprinted for local audiences. Culture Crash (which itself seems to have fallen by the wayside, if their lack of recent releases are any indication) and Nautilus Comics don’t also count; despite appearances to the contrary, both are very much small press, independent producers of personal content - vanity presses, for lack of a better term. Traditional publishers like Adarna House and Visual Print have released graphic novels - After Eden and the forthcoming Mythology Class from the former and Zsazsa Zaturrnnah from the latter - but their primary focus remains that of children’s picture books (in the case of Adarna House) and essay and prose collections (as with Visual Print).
As an aside, and there will be many of them as I ramble on and on about this, trying to get all my thoughts about comics in before I forget them: while it may seem that, both here and on my blog, I bash Summit a lot, I don’t. At least, not really. Despite their insistence in reprinting only foreign material that have been proven successes abroad, I do like the fact that they’re at least publishing comics in the first place. I’m hoping this gets a new generation of creatives who would be persuaded to try their hands at telling their own comics stories.
Psicom Publishing is a more interesting case study, as it regularly publishes reprints of foreign material via their DC Superheroes titles, but occasionally also dabbles in local, original content. One of their most successful publications is the series of Philippine Ghost Stories, which isn’t even a comic book, I know, but, it proved so successful that it spawned more than a dozen books in the series and even had a special all-comics issue and a Goosebumps-type collection of short prose stories spinning off of it. In the past they have also published original comic book content in Jason Banico’s TxTMen, the Cherry Blossom High anthology, and Hainaku!, among others. But the lack of regularity, and the philosophy behind such ventures, is such that…
Tsk. Sige na nga, make that two true comic book publishers.
The point being, one - ah, two - comic book publishers does not an industry make. Especially since said publishers don’t even have product directly competing with each other! Aside from the medium itself, which hardly qualifies as grounds for “direct competition,” the content of the titles the two entities publish - heck, you can even throw in Nautilus Comics’ Cast and Siglo series, and Culture Crash as well - deal with a vast array of subject matter, geared towards differing demo- and psychographics.
So, really, where’s the industry that you want to get into?
The Meat of the Matter
Now, like I said, this is both a bad thing and a good thing for those who are looking to get into creating comics for a living.
It’s bad for you because, well, the landscape looks bad in general. Take Culture Crash, for example: its recent death knell, whether official or rumor, is being taken as symbolic of the awful state of the comics market. “If a super-popular book like Crash,” they say, “crashes and burns, what hope is there for the rest of us?” I’d like to think there are other factors that need to be considered: poor distribution, an over-worked, under-manned crew, and the lack of companies willing to invest and sponsor projects like these. I have to say though, that the comics landscape looks promising now, especially when compared to the state of the industry five or so years ago, but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done.
The good thing is that for those few brave souls, there is ample opportunity to contribute to the landscaping. Appeal to the spirit of the pioneer in you, and blaze new trails. I’ve mentioned some of the obstacles above; the challenge now is to find ways of circumventing the problems, of finding solutions. This means going beyond the creative side of comics, I know, and may not be something most aspiring creatives would be interested in. But, for the sake of ensuring that your creative output is even paid attention to in the first place, these things do have to be considered.
Heck, it should be child’s play for you comic creator types to learn new things. Consider the idea that you’re working in a medium that can be best described as interdisciplinary. By this, I mean that comics works best when one is aware that comics is more than just words plus pictures. It is words and pictures working in synergy, and even then there is more to the words than just words, and more to pictures than just pictures. There is a need to hone your vocabulary, your grammar, the way you write dialogue, exposition, metaphor, and so on, while as an artist, you must sharpen and continually improve your facial expressions, body language, anatomy, perspective, etcetera.
Which brings us to…
Lesson number one: interdisciplinarity is an important (and impressive) word to keep in mind.
Comics as a medium is inherently against singular technical specialty, and seems to demand a holistic understanding of the world it inhabits. Similarly, the first thing you as a creative type should know is how to be interdisciplinary. And that means, yes, trying to understand the problems facing the industry, beyond the creative side of things, and perhaps suggesting ways to improve or solve the situation at hand. (An obvious and popular alternative right now is the internet, which I may or may not get to later,
At the very least, an understanding of the workings of the industry should keep you from bitching about why you get paid a paltry page rate, why your book comes out from the printers looking so crappy, and why there’s not many companies wanting to publish your work.
Lesson number two: bitching is unproductive.
For the most part, at least. It is still, after all, very good stress relief.
So bitch, but remember to get back to work eventually.
Lesson number three: Work, work, work.
And more importantly, at least for me, be open to criticisms and commentary. Because even if you have the work ethic of an ant, and yet possess the ego the size of an entire solar system, chances are I wouldn’t like you anyway. In fact, chances are I wouldn’t like your work either, as you will most probably be productive, yes, but productively churning out crap that never improves because you’re unreceptive to ideas. Please, I beg you, spare the world from you.
Lesson number four: learn as much as you can.
In some ways a corollary to lesson number one, lesson number four encourages you to learn as much as you can, when you can, however you can. The world is a classroom, and there’s always something new to be discovered. Read books or live them yourselves. Listen to what people have to say, and how they say it. Observe. Smell. Touch. Taste. Have sex. Find out when toilet paper was invented (580 AD, by the Chinese). Because you’ll never know when your story will need it.
And, you know, to be fair, it’s bad, but it’s not that bad.
But this one’s gone on too long, and I think I’ll save what I have to say next for another post.
Next: How Now, Brown Cow?