Con Season Survival Guide - Part 1

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In the aftermath of one convention, and about to embark on another one, I thought it was a good time to share a few things I've learned over the years about surviving conventions.

  1. Prepare Ahead of Time. No one likes going in to a presentation with their speech unwritten, right? It's just the same when you find yourself packing your stapler and paper cutter to take along to a convention. Although sometimes this is hard to avoid (cut to me tying ribbons around Bonnie N. Collide triple packs at this year's Stumptown), at least try to get all your books packed and ready to sell out of the box at the show. The last thing you want to worry about along with packing, traveling, jet-lag, and set-up, is having to assemble your books as well. And at the very least, it saves you dirty looks from your tablemate as you constantly wiggle the table with the loud KA-CHUNK of your stapler.
  2. Pack Your Goods Among Pillows. Having a devil-may-care approach to your packing is all fine and dandy until you get to the show and realize certain customers aren't interested in books with the corners all bent and prints all folded and ripped. I try to avoid this by wrapping my books in plastic wrap, bubble wrap, and adding scarves for cushion. It's not a fool-proof system, but at least it tries to account for various weather conditions. Whatever your method, realize that if you're flying, the luggage you've stored all your books in will be beaten, ravaged, squished, jostled, thrown into immovable objects, and left out to get drenched in the rain. So remember that your goal at this convention will be trying to sell books. Not the most durable creatures.
  3. Sprinkle Happy Traditions Into Your Traveling. I'm not a big fan of flying, but I am a fan of my flying foods - in other words, foods that I almost only get at airports or on planes. For me, these are Bloody Marys and bagels. True, I could eat both of these things every day for the duration of my life and be very content. However, if I restrict them only to travel days, I remain excited every time I get to eat/drink them again. Plus, I stay a little thinner. (Now, this rule does not extend to when I visit New Orleans, in which case I drink only Bloody Mary's at every meal).
  4. Care and Feeding When Dragging Along Your Significant Other. At one point or another, some of us have managed to trick our significant others into going with us to conventions. "Look, Honey! You've always wanted to go to Austin - now here's our chance!" Although this makes the trip infinitely more fun for us comickers behind the con table, we must remember that it is hour after hour of thankless torture for them. They are doing this solely out of love, and will never (unless they're comickers themselves) understand our constant drive/need/ambition/delusion to want to create and sell comics in the first place. For them, it is a lost weekend spent sitting and amusing themselves until the battery on their iPhone wears out. Sprinkled amongst awkward comickers mixers, hurried introductions of who's who "OMG it's so-and-so who wrote that comic I was obsessed with and told you all about 14 months ago!!", and relentless whining/screaming with excitement about your profit or loss that day. So my advice is - take care of your significant others. Remember that they're there to actually experience the city they're in, not just its convention hall. Make sure to carve out some time to spend with them alone, and not at a restaurant you're picking just so you can overhear the conversation of your favorite comicker at the next table over.
  5. Choose Tablemates/Hotelmates Wisely. This one won't take you that long to figure out - it kind of happens organically. It only takes a couple times of sitting next to someone all day who does nothing but criticize everything about comics and the industry (while desperately trying to sell theirs) or sharing a hotel room with someone who never, ever lets you have the bathroom before you realize you might want to pick people you gel with. I lucked out and met amazing people the first couple of shows I went to who happened to share my love of quoting Christina Applegate movies, dancing embarrassingly when bored, and choosing (sometimes) to stay in and watch movies in the hotel room even though there was comic shmoozing to be had.
  6. Beware the Alter Ego. This is an extension of #5 - there is something to be watchful of in comickers you've just met and have decided to maybe table with. Sure, they're awesome and funny in social situations, and you get along with them swimmingly one-on-one. BUT! Get them behind a table and they are no holds barred don't look at anyone's crap but mine SELLING MACHINES. They will stop at nothing to get a sale, and this includes stepping in front of you to interrupt your conversation with a potential customer to hand them their book. Beware of these people. They will do it every time, no matter how nice they are once the con whistle blows at the end of each day. As soon as they punch in at that convention, it's ON.
... more to come tomorrow!

Con Season Survival Guide - Part 1

/

In the aftermath of one convention, and about to embark on another one, I thought it was a good time to share a few things I've learned over the years about surviving conventions.

  1. Prepare Ahead of Time. No one likes going in to a presentation with their speech unwritten, right? It's just the same when you find yourself packing your stapler and paper cutter to take along to a convention. Although sometimes this is hard to avoid (cut to me tying ribbons around Bonnie N. Collide triple packs at this year's Stumptown), at least try to get all your books packed and ready to sell out of the box at the show. The last thing you want to worry about along with packing, traveling, jet-lag, and set-up, is having to assemble your books as well. And at the very least, it saves you dirty looks from your tablemate as you constantly wiggle the table with the loud KA-CHUNK of your stapler.
  2. Pack Your Goods Among Pillows. Having a devil-may-care approach to your packing is all fine and dandy until you get to the show and realize certain customers aren't interested in books with the corners all bent and prints all folded and ripped. I try to avoid this by wrapping my books in plastic wrap, bubble wrap, and adding scarves for cushion. It's not a fool-proof system, but at least it tries to account for various weather conditions. Whatever your method, realize that if you're flying, the luggage you've stored all your books in will be beaten, ravaged, squished, jostled, thrown into immovable objects, and left out to get drenched in the rain. So remember that your goal at this convention will be trying to sell books. Not the most durable creatures.
  3. Sprinkle Happy Traditions Into Your Traveling. I'm not a big fan of flying, but I am a fan of my flying foods - in other words, foods that I almost only get at airports or on planes. For me, these are Bloody Marys and bagels. True, I could eat both of these things every day for the duration of my life and be very content. However, if I restrict them only to travel days, I remain excited every time I get to eat/drink them again. Plus, I stay a little thinner. (Now, this rule does not extend to when I visit New Orleans, in which case I drink only Bloody Mary's at every meal).
  4. Care and Feeding When Dragging Along Your Significant Other. At one point or another, some of us have managed to trick our significant others into going with us to conventions. "Look, Honey! You've always wanted to go to Austin - now here's our chance!" Although this makes the trip infinitely more fun for us comickers behind the con table, we must remember that it is hour after hour of thankless torture for them. They are doing this solely out of love, and will never (unless they're comickers themselves) understand our constant drive/need/ambition/delusion to want to create and sell comics in the first place. For them, it is a lost weekend spent sitting and amusing themselves until the battery on their iPhone wears out. Sprinkled amongst awkward comickers mixers, hurried introductions of who's who "OMG it's so-and-so who wrote that comic I was obsessed with and told you all about 14 months ago!!", and relentless whining/screaming with excitement about your profit or loss that day. So my advice is - take care of your significant others. Remember that they're there to actually experience the city they're in, not just its convention hall. Make sure to carve out some time to spend with them alone, and not at a restaurant you're picking just so you can overhear the conversation of your favorite comicker at the next table over.
  5. Choose Tablemates/Hotelmates Wisely. This one won't take you that long to figure out - it kind of happens organically. It only takes a couple times of sitting next to someone all day who does nothing but criticize everything about comics and the industry (while desperately trying to sell theirs) or sharing a hotel room with someone who never, ever lets you have the bathroom before you realize you might want to pick people you gel with. I lucked out and met amazing people the first couple of shows I went to who happened to share my love of quoting Christina Applegate movies, dancing embarrassingly when bored, and choosing (sometimes) to stay in and watch movies in the hotel room even though there was comic shmoozing to be had.
  6. Beware the Alter Ego. This is an extension of #5 - there is something to be watchful of in comickers you've just met and have decided to maybe table with. Sure, they're awesome and funny in social situations, and you get along with them swimmingly one-on-one. BUT! Get them behind a table and they are no holds barred don't look at anyone's crap but mine SELLING MACHINES. They will stop at nothing to get a sale, and this includes stepping in front of you to interrupt your conversation with a potential customer to hand them their book. Beware of these people. They will do it every time, no matter how nice they are once the con whistle blows at the end of each day. As soon as they punch in at that convention, it's ON.
... more to come tomorrow!

Table Display in Action

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So after all that careful measuring and planning .... I discovered that I actually had 4' x 2' of room to play with for my display, instead of 2' x 2'. Which worked out perfectly, since I had too much stuff for my puny 2' x 2' space anyway. Hooray for inaccurate planning! Here's the finished display at this year's Stumptown:

It worked out really well - and I was able to keep switching things around and adjusting as the con went on.

I used these new book holders that came in different sizes and weren't as unwieldy as ones I've bought in the past:

To get my signs hanging up over the top of the books, I used a couple of things - photo cubes (with my logo added to the inside):

And wire holders to sit on the photo cubes and hold my name and website signs:

I had to tape everything down with masking tape and add some cardboard to the back of the signs to keep them from flopping over, but in the end - success! They even withstood the steady draft of the air conditioning that pelted us throughout the convention.

And now - Lipstick & Malice Triple Pack is available in my Etsy store, woot!

Table Display in Action

/

So after all that careful measuring and planning .... I discovered that I actually had 4' x 2' of room to play with for my display, instead of 2' x 2'. Which worked out perfectly, since I had too much stuff for my puny 2' x 2' space anyway. Hooray for inaccurate planning! Here's the finished display at this year's Stumptown:

It worked out really well - and I was able to keep switching things around and adjusting as the con went on.

I used these new book holders that came in different sizes and weren't as unwieldy as ones I've bought in the past:

To get my signs hanging up over the top of the books, I used a couple of things - photo cubes (with my logo added to the inside):

And wire holders to sit on the photo cubes and hold my name and website signs:

I had to tape everything down with masking tape and add some cardboard to the back of the signs to keep them from flopping over, but in the end - success! They even withstood the steady draft of the air conditioning that pelted us throughout the convention.

And now - Lipstick & Malice Triple Pack is available in my Etsy store, woot!

Book Cover Experiment

/

One way I've decided to save space at this convention is to combine each of my comic book series into cute little packs. For example, since I have three Lipstick & Malice's for sale, I'm going to sell them as a cute triple pack instead of individually, hence taking up less room on my table. I can do the same for Bonnie N. Collide (three of those) and Gods & Undergrads (two of those).  But how to bind them together?

Over the years and conventions, I've seen a couple of cute ways to bind several books of a series together. But frankly - I haven't got much time and I'm not very gifted in the crafty. So I decided (as is my custom) to just haphazardly try something out and see if it worked. Here goes ...

First, I got the books together I wanted to combine.

Then I started out by wrapping a plain piece of cardstock around them to see how it would look.

Since that seemed wayyyy too big (since it's 8 1/2" x 11"), I thought I'd try out what half of a sheet of paper would look like when wrapped around my books.

This was better, but I still felt like it was a tad big, so I halved it again, ending up with a 1/4 sheet of paper.

So I wrapped it around, testing out the size, and started to make sketches of the design I wanted to put on it.

I punched a hole where the two ends overlapped, giving me something that would (hopefully) hold the wrapper in place.

Now that I had roughly the dimensions I needed my wrapper to be, I sketched light pencil lines where the creases were ....

And scanned the scrap of paper in, sketches and all. This gave me a template to use for creating a more polished looking design in Photoshop.

I used the pencil lines as guidelines for where to keep my edges. And when it was done, I printed it out - 4 to a page (since I made mine 1/4 the size of a piece of paper), printed on cardstock with the settings to "borderless printing".

Now that I had it printed and cut up, I punched holes in the wrapper.

And wrapped it around my books to make sure it still fit okay.

Then, for flare, since you can never have enough flare ... I cut a piece of ribbon out to thread through the punched holes.

And tied a neat little bow. So - voila! There you have it - a tiny little book sleeve for a 3-pack series of books, all totally possible to recreate yourself.

 

Book Cover Experiment

/

One way I've decided to save space at this convention is to combine each of my comic book series into cute little packs. For example, since I have three Lipstick & Malice's for sale, I'm going to sell them as a cute triple pack instead of individually, hence taking up less room on my table. I can do the same for Bonnie N. Collide (three of those) and Gods & Undergrads (two of those).  But how to bind them together?

Over the years and conventions, I've seen a couple of cute ways to bind several books of a series together. But frankly - I haven't got much time and I'm not very gifted in the crafty. So I decided (as is my custom) to just haphazardly try something out and see if it worked. Here goes ...

First, I got the books together I wanted to combine.

Then I started out by wrapping a plain piece of cardstock around them to see how it would look.

Since that seemed wayyyy too big (since it's 8 1/2" x 11"), I thought I'd try out what half of a sheet of paper would look like when wrapped around my books.

This was better, but I still felt like it was a tad big, so I halved it again, ending up with a 1/4 sheet of paper.

So I wrapped it around, testing out the size, and started to make sketches of the design I wanted to put on it.

I punched a hole where the two ends overlapped, giving me something that would (hopefully) hold the wrapper in place.

Now that I had roughly the dimensions I needed my wrapper to be, I sketched light pencil lines where the creases were ....

And scanned the scrap of paper in, sketches and all. This gave me a template to use for creating a more polished looking design in Photoshop.

I used the pencil lines as guidelines for where to keep my edges. And when it was done, I printed it out - 4 to a page (since I made mine 1/4 the size of a piece of paper), printed on cardstock with the settings to "borderless printing".

Now that I had it printed and cut up, I punched holes in the wrapper.

And wrapped it around my books to make sure it still fit okay.

Then, for flare, since you can never have enough flare ... I cut a piece of ribbon out to thread through the punched holes.

And tied a neat little bow. So - voila! There you have it - a tiny little book sleeve for a 3-pack series of books, all totally possible to recreate yourself.

 

Book Cover Experiment

/

One way I've decided to save space at this convention is to combine each of my comic book series into cute little packs. For example, since I have three Lipstick & Malice's for sale, I'm going to sell them as a cute triple pack instead of individually, hence taking up less room on my table. I can do the same for Bonnie N. Collide (three of those) and Gods & Undergrads (two of those).  But how to bind them together?

Over the years and conventions, I've seen a couple of cute ways to bind several books of a series together. But frankly - I haven't got much time and I'm not very gifted in the crafty. So I decided (as is my custom) to just haphazardly try something out and see if it worked. Here goes ...

First, I got the books together I wanted to combine.

Then I started out by wrapping a plain piece of cardstock around them to see how it would look.

Since that seemed wayyyy too big (since it's 8 1/2" x 11"), I thought I'd try out what half of a sheet of paper would look like when wrapped around my books.

This was better, but I still felt like it was a tad big, so I halved it again, ending up with a 1/4 sheet of paper.

So I wrapped it around, testing out the size, and started to make sketches of the design I wanted to put on it.

I punched a hole where the two ends overlapped, giving me something that would (hopefully) hold the wrapper in place.

Now that I had roughly the dimensions I needed my wrapper to be, I sketched light pencil lines where the creases were ....

And scanned the scrap of paper in, sketches and all. This gave me a template to use for creating a more polished looking design in Photoshop.

I used the pencil lines as guidelines for where to keep my edges. And when it was done, I printed it out - 4 to a page (since I made mine 1/4 the size of a piece of paper), printed on cardstock with the settings to "borderless printing".

Now that I had it printed and cut up, I punched holes in the wrapper.

And wrapped it around my books to make sure it still fit okay.

Then, for flare, since you can never have enough flare ... I cut a piece of ribbon out to thread through the punched holes.

And tied a neat little bow. So - voila! There you have it - a tiny little book sleeve for a 3-pack series of books, all totally possible to recreate yourself.

 

My Comics Process: Table Preparation

/

As I'm sitting here, frantically alternately printing out books for my upcoming convention and replacing paper/ink cartridges, I'm starting to think about how to best display my work at said convention. I've already shown some of the ways I've displayed books in the past, but every show is always a wee bit different. For this show, one of my big challenges will be the size of the table space I'll have:

 

I'll be sharing a 6-foot table with two other comickers, so that leaves me with about 2-feet x 2-feet space for li'l old me. Considering that at my last convention, I had an 8-foot table to myself, I'm going to need to do some creative re-working of my products.

First, what am I even bringing along to sell? There are some books:

... And then there are some prints.

 

Now, clearly there isn't enough room to lay everything out flat - I'll have to start combining some things. I'll also need some good display items - racks, stands, what have you. Over the years I've dabbled in some different options, but so far I seem to have only these at my disposal, currently:

Hmm. I might need to hit up Michael's this week and see what else I can find. Stay tuned for the next installment - how on earth do I fit what I have into the space provided??

My Comics Process: Table Preparation

/

As I'm sitting here, frantically alternately printing out books for my upcoming convention and replacing paper/ink cartridges, I'm starting to think about how to best display my work at said convention. I've already shown some of the ways I've displayed books in the past, but every show is always a wee bit different. For this show, one of my big challenges will be the size of the table space I'll have:

 

I'll be sharing a 6-foot table with two other comickers, so that leaves me with about 2-feet x 2-feet space for li'l old me. Considering that at my last convention, I had an 8-foot table to myself, I'm going to need to do some creative re-working of my products.

First, what am I even bringing along to sell? There are some books:

... And then there are some prints.

 

Now, clearly there isn't enough room to lay everything out flat - I'll have to start combining some things. I'll also need some good display items - racks, stands, what have you. Over the years I've dabbled in some different options, but so far I seem to have only these at my disposal, currently:

Hmm. I might need to hit up Michael's this week and see what else I can find. Stay tuned for the next installment - how on earth do I fit what I have into the space provided??

Crazy Check

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When I was nine, I remember trying to get out of the house wearing a leotard, half-shirt, different colored socks, and who knows what else, and my mom stopping me and saying, "Uh-uh." I was so angry at the time, but now when I look back at it I accurately recognize the fact that she saved me a lot of embarrassment. Sure, she wasn't there to stop me in high school when I wore corduroy pants I got at the thrift shop that were four sizes too big, (tied on with a rope) but hey - at least she'd checked me for years before that. That's what I feel like I sometimes need now - a Crazy Check. Someone to look me up and down before I go out the door, and say - "No, you're wearing too many patterns." or "Good lord, where did you find that shirt??" or, simply: "Start over". This morning, luckily my boyfriend provided a Crazy Check. Because I was wearing this:

I mean, I liked this outfit ... but I just didn't know, you know? But surprisingly, he let me go!  All day I still couldn't help feeling like the polos-and-khakis crowd was eyeballing me at work .... Oh well - like it would kill them to throw in a little crazy or two, now and then.

My Comics Process: Table Displays

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Thar's another convention on the horizon! Unfortunately, no, for me it's not MoCCA, which is this weekend in New York. I'm a bit bummed I'm not going this year, but it was too close to the one I'm going to next weekend ...

STUMPTOWN!

And conventions always bring up the age old question - what to pack, how to pack it, how to get it on a plane/train/car, and, ultimately, how to display it at the show. So for the next couple of posts, I'd like to dip into my past table displays at conventions, see what I've done, and dream up something new in time for Stumptown. So I present to you a photo collection of my past table displays through the years ... some got lost in the shuffle, but here are the ones I could scavenge ...

2003

The Small Press Expo (SPX) in Maryland, 2003 - Aww, first convention!

With my pals Matt & Lauren. Not a good view of the table but aww - sentimental. No selling - just giving away free postcards alerting people to my comic, Gods & Undergrads.

 

2004

The usual lamp, minicomics, and candy available. Help selling from my friend Nick Prevas!

Now there are THREE Gods & Undergrads books, minicomics, and boxes that contained buttons.

 

My first craft show! I added framed prints and buttons into the mix.

 

2006

Again, framed prints in the mix, as well as buttons and more professional looking minicomics. On the left - the lovely Craig Bostick. On the right - Mike DiMotta!

 

2007

My stuff's on the right, in front of a bored Matt. Tabling with Tim is one of my greatest convention pleasures.

 

Manservant Matt AND Mike DiMotta! This was the year we were blessed with the natural lighting and breeze of the airy 7th floor. Viva la Magical Airship!

 

A hidden Lauren ... behind a monkey purse. The table's looking pretty minimalist.

Introducing a tablecloth with a bit of a pattern.

2008

Me and Dennis back in the Magical Airship! With oodles of Moo cards, buttons, comics - you name it!

 

This is when we started to get a little creative. Fake clothesline, paper lingerie. Delve into my closet of secret girl comics!

 

2009

Hey look - that's Andy Perez in the background! This was my first time having a full table to myself - so my stuff looked a little sparse

 

2010

Well - we're mimicing the Shake Weight commercial. Yeah. Featuring Kyle Cummings and Greg Lockard!

 

Tabled with/near Abby Denson, Tim Fish, and Tim Piotrowski!

 

Very streamlined for 3 people sharing one 1/2 table.

 

 

This time, FOUR people sharing one table!

 

2011

 

 

Back on the Wheels!

/

Okay, I did it. After 3 months, I put the skates back on Sunday. (Well, if we're being truthful, I put them on Friday and rolled around my kitchen - SHHH.) And you know what - I didn't forget how to skate! It's unbelievable!! True, I was just as unwilling to turn right as I always am, but hey. I skated consistently instead of my default all-eight-wheels-on-the-ground position (which is what I do when I'm scared/tired/exhausted and need to reset). And we went around the 1.3 mile track 4 times - impressive when I think about how when I was training to try out for derby, some days I could barely go around twice. 'Course, I was skating with a friend who just recovered from dislocating her knee and she was keeping up with me fine ... and I ran into another former rollergirl who was whizzing around the track way more times, wearing way less padding ... maybe I shouldn't pat myself on the back too hard.

But - skating! Yay! Something I can still do!

Back on the Wheels!

/

Okay, I did it. After 3 months, I put the skates back on Sunday. (Well, if we're being truthful, I put them on Friday and rolled around my kitchen - SHHH.) And you know what - I didn't forget how to skate! It's unbelievable!! True, I was just as unwilling to turn right as I always am, but hey. I skated consistently instead of my default all-eight-wheels-on-the-ground position (which is what I do when I'm scared/tired/exhausted and need to reset). And we went around the 1.3 mile track 4 times - impressive when I think about how when I was training to try out for derby, some days I could barely go around twice. 'Course, I was skating with a friend who just recovered from dislocating her knee and she was keeping up with me fine ... and I ran into another former rollergirl who was whizzing around the track way more times, wearing way less padding ... maybe I shouldn't pat myself on the back too hard.

But - skating! Yay! Something I can still do!