Starting Today, at 11.30AM, through till Sunday at 5PM, I will be exhibiting at San Francisco’s biggest comic-book show, WONDERCON, at the Moscone Center.
This time I will be sharing the Abismo/Nerve Bomb booth with none other than the mighty RAFAEL NAVARRO, creator of the awesome SONAMBULO comics. Among other things I will have the ROCKET RABBIT COLLECTION on sale.
So come by and see us both at BOOTH #511!
For the EMERALD CITY convention in Seattle this week, I have a “new” book to sell; a 56 page collection of all the Rocket Rabbit stories that I’ve published so far.
KENESS has really come through with yet another fantastic print job. At 8.25×10.5 inches, this format is much bigger than any of the earlier Rocket Rabbit books and the print quality is much better too. Some of the earliest stories were out of print so this was a way of bringing them back to light and they have never looked better.
I still plan on getting NEW Rocket Rabbit stories done by the end of 2011 but frankly it has been hard to find the time in what has been a busy work year so far, so this collection is a good place-holder till I generate some new pages.
Starting this Friday 4th of March and through Sunday the 6th, I will be sharing booth Space #606 with the same two gentlemen who gave me a spot last time around; DEREK THOMPSON & TED MATHOT. Emerald City is a wonderful show and I hope to see some of you there!
Gung Hay Fat Choy, everybody! In the chinese zodiac, 2011 is the year of the Rabbit. Coincidentally, it is also the 10th year of my self-publishing efforts, which started with Rocket Rabbit back at Comic Con in 2001. If I can find enough spare time, I intend to publish an anniversary ROCKET RABBIT edition (collecting old stories plus new material) sometime later this year. The working title is YEAR OF THE RABBIT.
Last weekend I exhibited at CTN ANIMATION EXPO and although I may not exhibit there again in the short term, I had a very good time meeting old friends and new.
I am genuinely happy that the US animation industry now has a show of its own; I don’t think there has been anything like this since the ANIMATION CELEBRATION of the late 1980s and 1990s. Judging from the booming attendance at CTN last weekend, many others want this community get-together too. But this show has yet to find its own identity. CTN is part student job-fair, part pro-seminar and part fan-convention and while the blend of the 3 is part of the appeal, at the moment, they blur together in a confusing and sometimes counter-productive way (at least from an EXHIBITOR point of view).
Some exhibitors were comped their tables in exchange for appearing at a panel or doing an art-demo but, not being a part of the show myself, I paid full-price for my space. My goal was to promote and sell my own books and artwork, but most people who came to my table were not in a buying frame of mind; they wanted information on the animation industry, so I spent most of the weekend reviewing students’ portfolios and answering their questions. I really enjoyed meeting these new people and talking about the industry that we all love, but unfortunately the expense of exhibiting, combined with the lack of sales meant that I was out of pocket to give out job advice. Besides, I’m not really sure if I was able to give these job-seekers any useful insights into the industry anyway, simply because it is very different and much more competitive now than when I started in the early 1980s.
It makes sense to me that STUDIOS would want to pay to meet new talent and maybe even that the talent would pay to meet the studios but I don’t think that exhibitors should be splitting the bill in that dating game. And speaking of THE BILL, they could afford to bring down the prices a little. The exhibitor-table at CTN cost me about twice what a table the exact same size would cost at APE, so with the air fare and hotel it turns out to be a much more expensive proposition, especially when the SALES are so bad.
Being an exhibitor, I missed out on the seminars and panels, which were my favourite aspect of being an attendee the first time. But I wasn’t the ONLY one who missed out; CTN has grown so dramatically in just one year that many who had paid a lot of money to attend were unable to get into the seminars. I heard about the overcrowding from students all weekend long. Some new system needs to be figured out so that nothing is oversold… perhaps a lower overall admission price with each seminar pre-sold with an additional ticket; no more tickets sold than there are seats. Otherwise, it will only escalate to that COMIC CON madness…
Likewise, there should be a CLEAR way of separating the different aspects of the show, so that there IS a job-fair for people wanting to get into the biz, but that it is separate from the sales area (maybe requiring a different pass?) Alternatively, the exhibit spaces should be free (or substantially cheaper) if portfolio reviews are a part of being an exhibitor, because if that’s the case “exhibitors” are actually a part of what attendees are paying to see.
I definitely want to go again, because the socializing each time I have gone has been a great deal of fun. I met friends from every phase of my career at the show; people I worked with in Sydney, in Asia, in Europe and the USA… but I may wait until the year after next because CTN has already outgrown the space that they still have a 3-year contract with. It was something of a madhouse this time around and I think the only way to improve that is extra SPACE. So I eagerly await finding out what that bigger, better space may be (maybe even the same space in Pasadena that the Animation Celebration used to occupy?)
This show has a great deal of potential so hopefully, after some growing pains and identity issues have been sorted out, the animation biz will have a truly wonderful show of its own. Though I wont be exhibiting, I am looking forward to attending again at some stage.
Here is an AD I made for the PROGRAM GUIDE of the CTN ANIMATION EXPO that I will be exhibiting at next week, (Friday, 19th through Sunday, 21st of November) down in Burbank.
This is only the second time that they’ve held this event, and I was at the very first show too, though as an attendee, not as an exhibitor. There were some very interesting seminars and panels which I enjoyed, not to mention the fact that I met people from just about every phase of my career (and some new people too) so it was fun from start to finish.
I was tempted to go as an attendee again this time around too, because as an exhibitor it is hard to attend the panels and so forth (plus I can’t sleep in!) But, in the end, I thought I’d give exhibiting a try. I have been meaning to do more shows each year, so why not this one, which is focussed on the community that I work in? I am very much looking forward to it.
A TON of friends will be also exhibiting this year; Patrick Awa, Maverix, Ghostbot, Jim Capobianco and more. A MAP of all the exhibitors is online HERE. It isn’t too late to get tickets, and if you quote the code BAKRX10 there is a discount.
I hope to see you all there!
Here is one of the 3 NEW prints I was selling last weekend at the Alternative Press Expo.
This was the 2nd time that I’ve exhibited solo at this show and it went very well, financially speaking, perhaps because having the whole space to myself allows me to display more product. I still need to work out the ultimate stripped-down travel package for shows out of town that I fly to on my own (which I’ll focus on next time for the CTN Animation Expo).
A plus this year was being surrounded by so many friends in that same row. (for example John Hoffman and his pals Chris Pearn & Craig Berry seen in the photo above). In the SWAG department, I picked up EVERY one of Corrine Mucha‘s books (that I didn’t have already) and I scored a copy of Anthology 451, paid for with some of my own craptacular stuff.
Saturday, we all had dinner at Poc Chuc which serves Mexcican food with a Mayan slant. It was very good, especially as it was chosen in a hurried scan of YELP. The evening ended at a very fun party hosted by GHOSTBOT, MAVERIX and CINEMATICO. Sunday night we had a fantastic meal at a German place called Schmidt’s. I should have left well enough alone and gone home on a high note, but my desire to end the show with the traditional ice-cream posse to Mitchell’s unfortunately went awry in a multi-pronged miscommunication fiasco, climaxing in a sad, weary wander through the Mission district looking for transportation…
The Rum & Raisin cone DID taste pretty good though.
I just bought some portable lightweight stands to hang my CONVENTION BANNERS from. It was a bit of an intelligence test trying to figure out how they work but I prevailed and will use them for the first time at the Alternative Press Expo (APE) this weekend. Mostly these book-shows and conventions provide a backboard behind the exhibitor spaces to hang stuff from, but not always. So I thought these would be a good investment. I also bought a velcro banner to display my PRINTS, of which I will have a couple of new designs. The SEPHILINA book I launched at COMIC CON will also be on sale. This year my booth Number is #108 and looking at the exhibitor map, I am surrounded by some pretty awesome neighbours: Julia Lundman at #102, Derek Thompson & Ted Mathot at #106, John Hoffman (Anthology 451) at #107, and Steam Crow (Daniel & Dawna) at #100. And there are many other friends exhibiting as well in OTHER parts of the hall (Jennifer Chang, Ghostbot, Charlene Kelley, Michael Aushenker, Rafael Navarro, Ben Walker and many more!!). I hope to see the REST of you there too!
Lately, I’ve been planning my self-published books for next year. 2011 will mark the 10th year of my self-publishing efforts, which began at Comic Con 2001, when I exhibited for the very first time (sharing a table with Bosco Ng and Derek Thompson).
Although there has been a steady flow of comics and minis in the interim, my output of published pages has not been as much as I’d wanted. Based on the amount of time I spend thinking about, and planning for this stuff, it should have been 5 times as many pages by now. I’ve been scribbling away on ideas for that entire decade (filling ring-binders with thumbnail layouts and story outlines) but lacking in the follow-through on some of the half-started ideas, which is partly an issue of TIME but is more accurately a lack of SELF-DISCIPLINE. So I’ve decided not to work on any NEW ideas until I’ve sifted through this pile of stuff to see if any of it can be made into something.
With that resolution in mind, I’m planning a big collection of Rocket Rabbit stories, probably broken into 2 books (possibly even 3). I hope to have the first collection coming out for Comic Con 2011, containing ALL the Rocket stories I’ve published, PLUS about the same amount of NEW material. A 10 year Anniversary Rocket Rabbit collection is in order, as HE got me started with all this self-publishing silliness in the first place. I have bashed together an outline for all (well, most) of the ideas I’ve ever had for that character, so that they can be combined under some sort of “story arc” though that is a grandiose term for what I hope to be a very silly book.
Now I just have to start the process of tidying it up…
RECENT COMMENTS