Still recovering from the craziness that was New York Comic Con! It was a HUGE success for me! I'll post more about it later this week :)
NYCC Day 1 recap
I'm writing this post Thursday night, but people on the email list will get it Friday. Today was Day 1 of New York Comic Con, open only to Professionals. It was pretty slow, and is mostly a time where professionals can meet new professionals and reconnect with old friends. In the pic above, you'll see some new items on the table - my drawing sign and my friend Ellen Stedfeld's comics (she's helping promote my work by handing out fliers and sitting in for me at the table :)
I'm next to a really cool guy, Scott Zambelli, who's also from Michigan! He was really encouraging today and had lots of helpful advice on exhibiting at large conventions. He suggested drawing mainstream characters interacting with the misfortune cookie, because fans are drawn to more well known characters first. He even drew Batman looking scared of a misfortune cookie! Such a nice surprise!
I'll try drawing Deadpool with the misfortune cookie, because I've done Deadpool work before. I did draw a little bit of my own stuff:
It's the pomeranian from the first Misfortune Cookie comic:
Since it was so cute, Scott suggested I draw My Little Ponies to sell. Going to be drawing a lot tomorrow!
Luckily, I was smart enough (and allowed enough time) to use the elevators this time, for the stations that HAD them.
NYCC begins today!
New York Comic Con begins today for comics professionals! (It opens to the public tomorrow). I'm super prepared and super excited! This is a momentous point in my career :) Not much time to blog now, but if you're going to the con, please visit my table in Artist Alley table Z19!
New mindy indy Sign!
It's time for a new mindy indy sign! My old one was getting pretty shabby, and was a make-shift one to begin with. Now it's time to get more professional, especially for New York Comic Con! I was thinking of printing a banner, but wanted to go the cheaper and more fun way of hand painting it! I thought it would save time too, but it ended up taking longer than expected.
I thought I could do it in one night, but it took 3 (working for about an hour each). I'm a muralist too, and love painting big, bright pictures! I started painting multiple coats of the letters, then outlined with a black paint pen. If only I'd discovered the paint pens sooner! I painted about 3 murals of cartoon characters in the past and had painstakingly used a regular small brush for the outlines, and it was hard to keep the line weight consistent. I guess working at art supply stores has paid off in interesting ways - I discover cool new supplies I didn't know about before.
I used "artist's tape" to tape off the radiating lines. Artist's tape is gentler than painter's tape so it doesn't damage the artwork. I used a hair dryer to dry where the black triangles intersected in the middle, because I couldn't put tape on top of wet paint to do the next triangle. It was more complicated than I anticipated, but the end result looks great!
Hope this helps attract attention to my table! Not sure if it's the most legible from afar, after adding the lines for the background, but we'll see. I'm happy about my cool sign!!
mindy indy is on official NYCC site!
Awesome news! New York Comic Con added me to their official site! You can find me by 2 ways: When you go to the NYCC site, click on the tab "Who's Coming" and hover over to Artist's Alley on the right, where you'll see "Artist Alley List" and "Artist Alley Gallery." The pic above is my image in the "M" zone (where it should be, not with the "I"s like Baltimore Comic Con listed). You'll see a larger image and description of me when you click on the mindy indy thumbnail:
It's pretty freaking cool to be on the official site. This way, I'll get even more exposure! Hope it works to draw more people to my table :)
Here I am in the "Artist Alley List" section. I wonder why they didn't combine the list with the gallery, but whatever, I can't complain. I'm up there!
And NYCC is officially SOLD OUT! I'm excited to be part of such an enormous event!
REAL Misfortune Cookies!!
THEY'RE HERE!! The REAL Misfortune Cookies have been delivered to me! Super excited and can't wait to see people's reactions to them. Since I only printed 150, I've decided to mix them in with the normal fortune cookies, so it will be even more of a surprise. Cookies are free with purchase of any mindy indy product :) Also, everyone that brings a flyer I printed (see last blog post) to my table (Z19 in Artist's Alley) gets a free cookie.
I made the custom fortune cookies from a site called www.tankinz.com, and their prices were pretty good. I got 4 different custom fortunes for ordering 150 cookies for $30. It seems like a lot, considering I'm giving them away for free, but it's New York Comic Con so I want to do something special :) Oh and the picture above was on a little thank you card that came with the cookie box. Apparently their motto is "So fresh you'll want to slap us!" Wow :P
Misfortune Cookie Flyers!
I can't believe the New York Comic Con is NEXT WEEK! I planned ahead and was able to order some flyers for really cheap! 500 flyers for $20 at Clubflyers, which is pretty good! I ended up paying extra to make sure they got delivered on time though. I'm teaming up with a friend who will distribute these flyers with the real misfortune cookies at NYCC to draw people to the table :) There are still some tickets to the con for Friday left if you still want to experience the craziness that is NYCC!
Oh and last night I went to this awesome event: "Pronto Comics NY Comic Con Survival Show." Pronto Comics is an awesome group of comic creators, writers, editors, comedians, and all-around cool people that self publish their comics. They have monthly stand-up nights, and last night was a combo stand-up comedy show/interview with comic creators like Simon Fraser and other great people. A good time! It's great to live in NYC and be able to go to events like that.
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Table Z19A
I found out my table number for the New York Comic Con! Table Z19A. The Artist's Alley aisles are labeled alphabetically, so yeah.....aisle Z.... I'll pretty much be in the corner. But the corner of NYCC is better than not exhibiting at NYCC at all! Artist's Alley is in the North Pavilion, as shown on the map above. It's separated from the main show floor by a corridor thing, but I think it will still get lots of traffic. You can see the NYCC interactive map here.
So from the next picture above, you'll see that at least I'm not in the corner of corners, but slightly inward, so that's good. I have half of a table, so that's why it's Z19A instead of just Z19. I think I'll do just fine with the half, because I usually double my comics up to fill a big table space anyway.
If you were on the fence about buying a ticket to NYCC, better get it ASAP before they're all gone! There are still some day passes for Friday October 12 for $35. Buy them here. Ask for a day off work and go! Comic con is a total blast and it's totally worth it :) The whole show was sold out for the past 2 years online (no tickets sold onsite even).
More news: the new "real" misfortune cookies are going to be shipped this Tuesday! I have big plans for them :)
SUPER PUMPED!
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A semi-true story. On my Baltimore Comic Con trip, my huge suitcase was SO heavy from all the books I printed. I was going up an escalator, and the suitcase didn't quite catch the next step right, so it fell and almost took me with it! It was actually more of a slump than a fall. No undies were flown, however. That same trip, it broke a wheel under the sheer weight of the books (like 50 pounds).
New York Comic Con and REAL Misfortune Cookies!
Exciting news! Not sure if I mentioned before, but I'm definitely going to be in Artist's Alley at the New York Comic Con in 2 weeks! Single day tickets for Fri & Sat are still available, but buy them online before the show, because they didn't have door tickets left last year. Anyway, this is a super exciting momentous event for mindy indy! And I'm getting the REAL Misfortune Cookies ready in time for the show! So many people requested real misfortune cookies that I had to do it! I'm curious to see how people react :) I'll see if I can pull a few more tricks from my sleeve in time too.
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Written in a coffee shop :P
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Yes, I know the Daily Misfortune is supposed to be daily, and I've missed a few lately. Sorry about that! Some news: more Misfortune Cookie mini comics sold at the Desert Island comic store, and I gave them my Daily Misfortune and Flip Book to sell. I hope it sells well there!
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This one was inspired by a girl I met at the Baltimore con who said she went to the same Chinese restaurant all the time and kept getting the same fortunes :) The good thing about The Daily Misfortune: They're always different and new!
Also, I told many people at that convention that I'll be setting up an online store soon. It's in the works! I just need to learn more about it. Someone suggested BigCartel.com and Etsy.com, and a friend sells through facebook somehow. Does anyone else have suggestions? Please feel free to post a comment - anyone can!
Unlucky Numbers/Symbols
At the Baltimore convention, I had at least 2 or 3 people ask what the symbols at the bottom of the Daily Misfortunes were. They're supposed to be the lucky (or unlucky) numbers. It started with just a slight quirky change, as shown on the cover of The Misfortune Cookie:
Here, 13 is definitely an unlucky number, 22 for a "catch 22", then it got odder with the fractions and math symbols like pi, and schwa e is just ridiculous. But as I did more of these, the unlucky symbols kept getting more and more absurd and wacky, not only because I ran out of numbers and symbols, but because I really wanted to make that part creative.
Here, we have the quadratic formula as an unlucky number. I think I have lots of math equations in the numbers because I used to work as a graphic designer for a group called GRIP (Geometry Reasoning and Instructional Practices). Yes, the quadratic formula is algebra. I did some animations about algebra for GRIP too.
Here, we have music notes as an unlucky symbol, just because it's ridiculous and goes with the theme of the misfortune. Not all the numbers/symbols match the misfortunes exactly, though. Usually at least 1 or 2 do. The first number in the sequence is always the number of the comic (if you have the book "Mindy Indy's Daily Misfortune and Flip Book", you'll notice the numbers go up in order.)
Here, I put tiny trees as the last symbol, because Bob Ross always loved "happy little trees." The pictures as unlucky "numbers" started out with me typing using symbol fonts in illustrator (like Zapf Dingbat, etc, for that flower symbol just before the trees), and evolved because I wanted to have specific symbols.
You'll notice that I've changed the words on the Daily Misfortunes to have "Unlucky Numbers" or "Unlucky #s" now to lessen confusion. There may also be only 3 numbers instead of the usual 6 (for lottery purposes), but that's ok, because it's my comic and I can do what I want :P Enjoy!!
Baltimore Comic Con Success!! :D
The Baltimore Comic Con was a super success for mindy indy! I made back my table money and more! The table was $200, and I made $219, so that's pretty darn good for my first big convention :) Especially considering lots of artists don't make their table money back. I'm so glad people like my comics, and appreciate everyone that stopped by my table! Special thanks to anyone that bought anything and/or signed up for the mailing list! I loved meeting new people and talking about my artwork. It was a pretty exhausting weekend, but it was totally worth it :)
I didn't get to see much else of the convention, but you can see a bit more of artist's alley in this picture (taken before the convention opened to the public). I was lucky to get a table on the corner. Oh yeah, and see that huge purple suitcase behind me? I lugged like 70 of my new books from New York on the Megabus in that thing!
Here's my new book, "Mindy Indy's Daily Misfortune and Flip Book!" It's 2 books in one! On the right page is a collection thus far of all the Daily Misfortunes that I've been posting here on mindyindy.com, and on the left is a brand new quirky animation that's a flip book! I spent most of the time for this book drawing the animation. I wanted it to have the same look as the comic, so it's all hand drawn. It involves a giant godzilla-like-pacman-like misfortune cookie eating a city, then trying to eat a spaceship and getting zapped by the ship. At first I wanted it to be a simple animation, but it got more complex as I kept drawing :P Oh and in the picture above, the artist at the table next to me cleared their table early and I took it over :)
My friend Tracy, who helped me out with the table, suggested stacking my books, because people are attracted to vertical things. It was a super great thing to do, because if you just have flat objects, people can't see your stuff until they're already at the table. I even stood up my mini comics too. I think it helped!
Here's Tracy modeling another new addition to the mindy indy table: Misfortune Cookie Charms! My mom made these tiny cute charms BY HAND out of sculpey! You can put them on your cell phone, key ring, rear-view mirror, and other stuff :)
I had to take a picture of the GIANT box of fortune cookies. I stayed with Tracy in Washington D.C., and there's a super awesome China Town where I got this box of 350 cookies for $15. I wanted to make sure we had enough to last the whole convention, and we certainly did. I have enough left over to last like A YEAR.
Again, thanks everyone for making this convention a big success! And more good news, a spot in artist's alley opened up for the huge New York Comic Con, and I got a half table! Since I did well at Baltimore, I feel more comfortable spending $300 for the table at NYCC. It's the next big step in my career and I'm super excited! To all peeps in Baltimore, it's only a $9 Megabus ride to New York! So please stop by and see me and other spectacular artists and cool stuff at NYCC October 11-14 at the Javits Center in NYC!
No, I won't be at SPX (Small Press Expo). I missed the application deadline, and already have plans that weekend. Maybe next year!