Long time, no speak, personal website. I’m sorry but social media has pulled me away from here. BUT, here’s a quick update…. Today marks the publishing of the new Pittsburgh Current Newspaper (Alt Weekly/Monthly) I was honored to be asked to draw the first cover for it. And since they linked my old url inside I figured I better put a welcome note here on the dusty old WordPress blog. 🙂
If you want to follow my work in real time, Instagram is probably best. http://instagram.com/djcoffman or feel free to reach out on Facebook.
I’m currently working full time and promoting SPREADSHOP, which is a really awesome way for anyone to sell custom merchandise, and it’s free! Reserve your name and start yours today! I really enjoy my “day job” because I know all the work we do here supports creators like me, entrepreneurs and side hustlers.
If you’re looking for new comics by me…. I have something in the works I’ll post about soon. (follow the instagram!) And I’ve been slowly working on the Captain Freedom project which is taking a lot of time since I’m the only one on all the art duties (pencils, inks, colors) – Captain Freedom will probably be my last “traditional” print comic book.
Please follow me on instagram or twitter @djcoffman to get all the up to the minute news on my work, or basically stalk my life if you want. 🙂
Be excellent to each other!
Checking in… was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
Creative Side Hu$tle: How to use Spreadshirt in TWO ways to make money
My “BatFleck” shirts sold out a few years ago.
I talk to creative professionals on a daily basis, whether it’s at my day job at Spreadshirt or my work in and around the comic book world. I love talking shop with them and sharing as many resources as I can to help them with their creative endeavors. One big key to being a successful maker is having multiple streams of revenue. For many it’s website ads on their youtube channel, merch and consulting fees and of course freelance contract work. Today I’m talking about the MERCH game. Right off the top, for full disclosure, I work at Spreadshirt, but this is not an official post by them or on their behalf and they’re not paying me to say this. (Although HEY GUYS IF YOU’RE READING THIS, I ENJOY MONEY…and craft beers or coffee). I write about it because I know that it works for many creatives especially those just starting out on youtube or webcomics. And stuff that helps creatives always excites me so I wanted to share it with my audience, especially those who have read Cash4Cartoonists. It’s kinda funny because even before I worked at the company I wrote about them in the ebook 6 years ago because I used them then for many things from my webcomic work to jerseys for the local roller derby team.
For the past year when I’m at comic shows and talking with professionals who find out I work at Spreadshirt, they pepper me with questions about the print quality, is it easy to setup? Can they use it too? The answer is YES, you can do it. And YES it’s very easy to setup yourself, go see this link.
#1 OPEN A “SPREADSHOP”
Basically it’s your online storefront. You upload your designs, put them on products and set the design commissions to adjust your prices on how much you’d like to make. You’re going to make a standard 20% right off the top of the on sale price, BUT you can adjust that to be a bit more if you put a commission number on your design as well. If you work your numbers right even if you sell a shirt for around twenty bucks, you’re gonna make eight bucks. Spreadshop takes care of all the order fulfillment. Pretty rad. What’s even radder? Well if you were semi-popular and think you could upload a design that could sell like 10 or more in two weeks, they now add on a new bonus volume commission.
If you were a real go-getter or had some sort of fan base for your comics or youtube channel then say you’re able to sell a hundred shirts a week or when you put up a new design, suddenly you’re making almost twelve bucks a shirt instead of eight. That’s some coin. Of course it helps if you plug your merchandise and put things out regularly. With this system it’s easy to put up new shirt products quickly. Why not something like a shirt of the week for your fans?
I mean, that’s the DREAM right? Make 3k in two weeks off your merch? Seems far fetched for us little guys, but I know of Spreadshirt partners who are making some serious bank with their youtube channels and creative endeavors. It’s all about your audience and how many TRUE fans you have. But you gotta start somewhere! Hell when I was starting out in webcomics my plan was to have multiple streams of revenue to cover different costs. So looking WAY back my goal for a Spreadshirt shop selling shirts would have been a couple hundred bucks a month to cover my webhosting and internet bill. And heck, maybe you’ll only make enough to afford some coffee or something… BUT DUDE, You just got coffee paid for by something you made. That’s a step in the right direction.
My latest convention shirt is a fanBoy mashup.
I know as a comic creator and someone who’s dealt with screenprinting in the past. Sure I would make probably a couple bucks more per shirt, BUT I had to do the shipping the storage and maintain stock of sizes. One time I had a neatly organized shelf of Yirmumah shirts in different sizes to fill my own orders…. and then POOF a cat decided to get in there and make it a master bedroom. Cat hair all over my merch. AHHHHHGGGG!!!! So to me the thought of print on demand was always brilliant. I’m thankful that the technology has come a very long way in a very short time to the point where my personal opinion as a creator is that the quality is very up to snuff. I print all of my convention shirts here now, and I always get compliments on the color or the apparel.
That’s another big selling point for me is that I know I can put my art on quality brands like American Apparel (yeah it’s a little more) or trusty old GILDAN brand. Spreadshirt even has it’s own premium shirt we manufacture that has a higher thread count. PRO-TIP: The higher the threadcount the better your print with digital direct printing. So on something like a American Apparel or Spreadshirt brand the colors pop just a LITTLE more. That said I print my shirts on GILDAN to keep my costs down a little.
There ARE some technical aspects to keep in mind like CMYK vs RGB and I’ll maybe touch base on the “how to’s” in future blog posts. But for now this post is to just get this on your radar as a possibility for making more money with your creative hustle, whatever it might be.
 #2 PUT YOUR DESIGNS ON THE MARKETPLACE!!!
Search the marketplace for different topics. Check out the other cool designers!
The second big way to earn some extra dough with your art, ESPECIALLY for cartoonists is to upload your designs to the Spreadshirt Marketplace. Essentially you take a design or design element, let’s say its a picture of a cartoony TANK that you drew. Or a series of cool sugar skulls. You upload it to your account and put a price commission on the design. Let’s say five bucks. Then it goes into the marketplace where normal folks will randomly find it and use it to make a shirt for someone or sell it within their spreadshops and every time it’s sold, you make your commission. BRILLIANT. You can even tag your marketplace entries making it easier to find or send full products already mocked up into the marketplace as well. I taught my girlfriend to do this and she makes about $100 a month passively on average. But imagine if you were a cartoonist that could scale that and add new fresh designs?
This is kinda perfect for creatives like cartoonists. You might decide “TODAY I’m DRAWING SHARKS” and put up a few cool sharks into the marketplace. If you were even more clever, you’d time it to a couple weeks before SHARK WEEK. Or whatever event.
Or what about Tattoo Artists?? I know some with sketchbooks full of awesome designs. They could easily scan those, do some photoshop magic and make them into wearable shirt designs. Tattoo friends you could be the next Ed Hardy! (I’m just kidding, Don’t be that guy!) but seriously I wish I had some more shirts from my favorite tattoo artists.
It’s FREE!!!
We’re living, in the future man. It’s pretty friggin awesome that there’s no cost to you to use these kinda tools. Not just with this site, but so many online. Yep. It’s just sitting there waiting for you to use. Get started over at the mothership: Spreadshop.com
If you have any questions about this topic, feel free to comment here or shoot me an e-mail. I’m especially down to help other comic publishers or creators use Spreadshirt and I’ll share any tips or tricks to get your designs popping on merch.
Here are just a few cool content creators using Spreadshirt.
https://shop.spreadshirt.com/jaltoid/ (cool animators, great cartoon designs that pop)
https://shop.spreadshirt.com/H2ODELIRIOUS/ (One of the biggest gamers on YOtube, funny guy, great designs)
https://shop.spreadshirt.com/thediamondminecart/ (Another top youtuber over 11million subscribers!)
Here’s a nice little video also showing how much work goes into hand making each of your products. Spreadshirt has a factory in Greensburg, PA (My home turf) and out in Las Vegas area as well. PLUS other production facilities around the world so your product is usually made close to you for faster turnaround.
What are you waiting for? Get your SHIRT together and add this into your multiple streams of revenue.
Creative Side Hu$tle: How to use Spreadshirt in TWO ways to make money was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
PLAY BALL! Softball Comic Series announced at San Diego Comicon
He announced the project yesterday out at San Diego Comicon and it will likely debut next Spring. I did the initial character designs based on the real players from this amazing Youtube Series. You can check out all the videos over on “DodgerFilms” Youtube channel.
To summarize, it’s a fun group of real people of all ages and backgrounds playing in a fun rec league, pickup game style out in California, but what makes it even special are the fun play by play calls by Bobby Crosby himself. All players have nicknames and they’ve all grown into characters themselves and even have their own followings growing now. There’s always “Team Bobby” vs “Team Benny”, and one of my favorites of course is the loveable “Bradley Cooper” (no, not the actor) . So go watch and become a fan of the video series in the meantime, and then check back to see how we make it all interesting in comic book form! Here’s Bobby’s announcement… and check out that 26 foot tall cover! Holy geez!
As @comic_con begins, I can now announce that we’re developing a COMIC BOOK based on my channel’s #SOFTBALL series, and YOU can download a FREE preview book PDF at SOFTBALLCREW.COM. It also has samples of some of my other comics, for all the people who ask me what comics I write! And from now until Monday, if you use the promo code SCORING at checkout, you’ll get a huge discount on all shirts and hoodies in the store! I’m looking forward to a great week at #ComicCon! If any of you are here this week, come see us at booth #2635!
A video posted by Bobby Crosby (@bobbycrosby) on Jul 20, 2016 at 7:45pm PDT
Here’s a look at the first round of characters from the upcoming series.
PLAY BALL! Softball Comic Series announced at San Diego Comicon was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
Today I’m talking about “Digital Caricatures”. It’s topic #2 in my old ebook, Cash For Cartoonists. If you don’t have a copy, you can grab one at the link.
BUT, this post isn’t for cartoonist that suck. This post is for the cartoonists out there who get asked all the time “CAN YOU DRAW MY BOSS/GRANDMA/UNCLE/ AUNT/ DOG/SISTER INSERT ANY LIVING BEING. You know what I’m talking about. Seriously though, caricature skills are a MUST for just about any freelance illustrator or cartoonist. And being able to do it fast is even better. And keep in mind, I’m not asking you to go out and be one of those dudes who draws at easels at events…. although if you can do that comfortably there IS major bank to made there as well! I’ve turned down many party jobs or referred friends. Drawing live people in front of them just isn’t my bag. This is about “DIGITAL” caricatures. Which you can spend a little more time on and of course use cool tools like Photoshop for coloring and provide something a lot more professional looking to a customer as well.
The Process: A client will provide you with jpeg images to draw from, via email, messengers or texts. You will produce and deliver their digital caricature in a high resolution format for download (300-600dpi PDF works well), along with an optimized for web copy for sharing online easily. The client can also share the download link at their local print shops to have their caricature printed on quality paper at any size they’d like.
caricature.
What to charge: Again prices are totally up to you. I’m still suggesting $25-75 per person range depending on the level of detail they want and how long these take you to draw. Ideally you should be up to speed to do at least 1-2 of these per hour. But with “digital” it’s not like you have to hurry and churn them out either. Just be mindful of your time. You can offer your own printing and physical delivery at a premium price. If it’s a complex piece, I suggest having them pay you half down and show them a pencil rough before you go into inking and coloring the work.
Your Target Market: EVERYBODY! Everyone loves caricatures! Whether it’s seeing yourself drawn, or goofing on your coworkers or family. No matter who buys, they show it off and the service can become very viral and keep you very busy. You can use the social search trick I showed in the previous post to find people who are actively looking for something to be drawn too.
Where to start? If you’ve never done this sort of work before spend some time drawing your friends, or famous people online. Make a little sample page on your website to link to. Customers are far more likely to order from you if you have your own website url and not just a facebook page or free site. Dreamhost offers free URLs when you sign up there.
In my experience: Like I said previously, caricature or likeness drawing skills are a really a powerful addition to your cartooning toolbox. It can expand into WAY more than just a goofy drawing of a co-worker or gag gift. The ability to draw likenesses has transitioned into many other freelance art jobs for me. Everything from custom greeting cards for families, to custom sketch covers where I draw a family as super heroes (I just did one for Fathers Day! I’ll re-add it here when I get permission to post after the holiday :) )
I’ve posted just a few of the recent examples of online caricature commissions or likeness drawings I’ve done through this post. And beyond getting paid, it also feels great when you’ve nailed a likeness and a couple or someone who’s buying as a gift really gets blown away by your work.
Marketing Ideas: Facebook and social media have exploded since I wrote the original ebook. People would eat up the chance to be drawn for free if you ran a promotion to draw their Facebook Profile pic. Another great idea is to find your vocal friends online and just surpise them with a free drawing of themselves and have them link back to your page as a plug.
Go Premium!: There are plenty of online print on demand services for shirts and other merch you could offer to put these caricatures on. Might I suggest something like spreadshirt.com ? (disclosure, I work for there! 🙂 )
Youtubez: Youtube is ripe with rising stars and opportunities to draw their likenesses for merch they sell to their fans or even just promotional ads like headers for their channels, etc.
Run an Ad!: Once you get a nice portfolio together and maybe start generating a few sales, you may consider running a small targeted ad campaign on Facebook. I’ll probably touch base on this method in a future post, but if you don’t know how to use the targeted ads you should learn! In a nutshell, you can spend as little as $10 to boost a post on Facebook or create an ad to go out for people looking for Mother’s Day gifts, or other holidays or people looking for last minute or unique gift ideas. Only do this if you feel you’re ready to up your game though and if you can afford to.
In my experience, caricatures are not my most favorite thing to draw, but I’m told that I’m pretty good at it. I know you can get very busy very fast you do it well. It’s a very viral form of cartooning. Maybe the most viral form. If your customer shows off a sweet piece you did for them, you’ll often get follow up orders from simple online word of mouth. For me mostly it’s just a skill set that aids all my other freelance work, but this could easily be a full time cartooning business if you have the patience and focus.
What’s Out There Now: Take a search around online for “online caricatures” and ordering caricatures online. Many of the websites seem a bit outdated, but these guys stay super busy with a classic caricature style. I think there’s a great opportunity for someone who has more of a modern cartooning style or unique style. If you know how to make a nice mobile ordering shop as well you could OWN this market or put a big dent in it for sure.
Any questions? Feel free to comment and start a discussion there.
If you want to see other blog posts in this series, check this link http://www.djcoffman.com/category/more-cash-for-cartoonists/
Next up…. I’ll cover #3 ACEO (art cards) which I’m also expanding to include Original Sketch Art of many sizes.
– DJC
Make Money With Online Caricatures was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
Today I’m going to revisit the topic of making money with “Spot Illustration”, how much to charge, where this type of work can be found or how it may even go about finding you. I suggest downloading a copy of the original ebook over yonder to familiarize yourself with the topic even more.
 Pro-Tip #2 is… get your own website setup. While a facebook page or free site may work for you, you’re not going to be taken as seriously. I suggest Dreamhost, they have pay as you go pricing or you can save a lot by signing up for annual plans too. Another biggie for new folks is, they have “one click” installs on WordPress sites, so you can have a site like the one you’re reading now up and running in no time. Great for showcasing your portfolio of art and getting great SEO out of a great WordPress install. Here’s a link. Thank me later.
Spot Illustrations are small, usually stand alone drawings used in a variety of media to spice up articles or overall design of publications or products. I would say these are the types of drawings that should take no more than 1-2 hours of time to complete. You would want to keep an hourly rate in mind of anywhere between $50-75 when coming up with your quote. And that’s actually on the LOW end.
I highly suggest that EVERY cartoonist I know pick up a copy of the Graphic Artists Guild Pricing and Ethical Guidelines. It will be an invaluable reference guide for you and lists illustration pricing charts from everything from working with local weekly newspapers to working on storyboards for motion pictures.
Now, in the handbook prices for “Spot” illustration can range anywhere from $50 – $850!
So what the heck do you charge?!: What I suggest doing is first figuring out what your hourly rate is. Ask yourself, what do you want to make hourly when your pen is touching paper to make a cartoon. Please, for the love of god, don’t say “I’ll work for $15 an hour!” – remember that being a cartoonist or illustrator is a TRADE. It’s a skill that you’ve trained yourself to do, and in some cases tons of college education. So please think more along the lines of $50 an hour AT LEAST. That’s the low end. That would mean that if you were thinking you could bang out a small illustration for a blog within an hour, you can safely charge that blogger $50 for the spot art and you’d be happy. Some would even say that price is undervaluing your art. I guess it depends on where you are in life and your career. I’ve done spot art in the past for as low as $25 a pop. But these days my rate is generally something around $150 an hour. It’s completely up to you.
Here is a pretty great guidefrom designer Jessica Hishche “How much to charge for your design work” While that’s not directly related to rates for spot illustration it IS a great way to train your brain to work when quoting jobs.
BUT I DON’T WANNA!!!
What if there’s a job you’re not incredibly enthused about doing, but you’ve been asked to quote. I suggest bidding the job high, maybe even DOUBLE what you normally charge. You’d be shocked how many times I’ve done this and the client actually said “Sounds great!” – It really makes you rethink your rates, that’s for sure! And suddenly drawing that thing you weren’t enthused or passionate to draw is totally worth it.
Rates for Editorial Illustration (click for larger)
What we’re up against. There have always been worries by colleagues in cartooning about pirate cartoonists undercutting other prices and hurting the overall value of what we do. But even six years ago when I wrote the ebook, we didn’t have something like FIVERR around, where you can totally go hire someone (probably in a sweat shop in the Philippines) to draw you doodles for your blog for $5. They make about $4. It’s insane. BUT, I also believe you get what you pay for. Colleagues of mine used to complain about google image search and clip art services undercutting them, but now you have serious sweat shop things going on in other countries. Some of those listings will even say “WILL DRAW WITHIN 4 hours!” – THAT is what you’re up against. Scary, huh?
The good news is…. reputable print publications (print still exists!) and bloggers and online media and publications who want to be taken seriously are not going to be using FIVERR or other clip art sweat shops. Professionals know to build working relationships with other professionals.
Another tip I gave in the original ebook was building up your own “ready to order” drawings of differing topics. Basically your own “clip art’ but all drawn in your unique style. Charge $15-20 for a one time use and then offer the full price if someone wants it exclusive, so essentially they can buy it off the site so nobody can use it every again for $200 or $300 bucks. I’ve seen a few clever cartoonists doing something similar.
Taking your spot art to the next level.
Cartoonist Brad Fitzpatrick seems to be a master of this. http://www.bradfitzpatrick.com/ He’s put a lot of work into his site over the years. Think about it this way…. on one section of his site he has a selection of cool mascots for schools, Bulldogs, Eagles, Panthers, all drawn in his unique style. Check out this Bulldog. Pretty badass. I bet a bunch of schools with bulldog mascots have thought so too. Every time it’s downloaded, he makes 18.95. Now I have no idea how much he’s made off one illustration over the years, but even if that one picture of a bulldog was downloaded 20 times, he made $379 drawing that one pose. And he’s “scaled” it. He offers multiple poses, multiple animals. Even if this part of his freelance income is just the “side” surprise money for him, it’s smart. Disclaimer: I have not spoken to Brad Fitzpatrick, I only use him as an example to hopefully inspire others. BUT, now that i’m thinking about it, maybe it would be a great idea to do a little mini interview with him for the blog. If you have any topics you’d like covered, toss them in the comments!
Now I’m not saying everyone run out and be Brad Fitzpatrick. He’s a pretty amazing cartoonist and has been at this game for years. But I hope taking a look at how one lone cartoonist out there is really marketing himself and setting up multiple streams of income for his work. (educated guess)
How to find Spot Illustration Jobs… let’s go fishing!
One of the tips I wrote six years ago in the original ebook was to use “Twitter Search” and search for phrases in quotes like “iPad Reviews” or you can even get super targeted and find people looking for art.
Let’s have some fun and try one LIVE right now. I’m going to twitter search and just searching in quotes for “need a cartoonist” Check out the first two top hits I see:
So maybe that’s not how people really “talk” online. Maybe they simply say something like “I need someone to draw me a tiger!” – But I’m gonna search in quotation marks just “someone to draw” and look what I get….
LEADS. LEADS. LEADS. All over the damn place. Now, this is pretty vague I know. And those aren’t publications or bloggers, just REAL people wanting things drawn. It’s the type of way you should train your brain to be thinking when generating leads. Maybe you could contact these people blindly with a link to your website samples. When I was a creative career coach I would tell all my clients they need to do this stuff EVERY DAY. Just like exercise. Even just 10-15 minutes of your day.
THEY MAY FIND YOU FIRST…
This strategy is used by many editors, marketers and creative hustlers to also FIND YOU and many other things. If you had a solid website (like i mentioned way above) and social media presence and hashtagged your work well, chances are an editor or someone from out of the blue is going to get in touch with you. So make sure your site or social media is setup to be easily accessible and people know how to quickly contact you. Don’t be a recluse!
The Opportunist Cartoonist
Another possible situation you may consider is to work proactively. Find topics that are JUST happening and big news, things people are going to be blogging about. Draw up the best picture of the topic, then go jam to social search on not only twitter but Instagram and SEARCH HASHTAGS. Then find contact info for whoever is writing the blog and ask them if they’d like to use your art in their article at such and such a price. Take a look at that top comment from Twitter search…. Muhammad Ali just died and they wanted someone to draw him being announced by Howard Cossel at the Pearly Gates. If you’re competent cartoonist you could have had that comped up in under an hour and connected with whoever that is. Even if that guy declined, I bet you could find another article online to run your spot illustration in a non-exclusive way for fifty bucks.
Spec isn’t always evil.
In most cases, doing work for free up front is pretty evil, but not in ALL cases. When you’re just starting out, perhaps you would do the above and find some cool bloggers to team up with who would use your art in their articles and attribute it to your website. Then in this way you can also build up a working catalog of art you’ve done that is being used by publications. It builds up credibility in your work. Especially if you have a distinct style going on.
I hope you’ve found this post inspiring in some way! If you did, please feel free to share it with others on your social media of choice. And if you have ANY questions at all, feel free to comment here and we can have a conversation in the comments section. Grab a download of the original ebook.
If you want to see other blog posts in this series, check this link http://www.djcoffman.com/category/more-cash-for-cartoonists/
Next up…. I’ll cover #2 Digital Caricatures.
– DJC
Make more money with Spot Illustration was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
In an effort to get back into regular blogging again, I’ve decided to do a series over the summer revisiting the topic of helping cartoonists artists make more money with their work. Going on six years ago now, I put just about everything I know into an ebook “Cash For Cartoonists”. (link, it’s now “pay what you want”) I also offered one on one coaching to go with it, and boy did I get busy with that. I still offer some creative coaching on the side on a case by case basis, but I didn’t really set out to be the “Life Coach” for cartoonists. My ebook garnered some criticism from some of my webcomic contemporaries at the time as the title seemed like “GET RICH QUICK!” scheme. Of course the name itself was designed to catch your attention, and a little tongue in cheek, but it’s hardly a “get rich quick” or promise you can make money with your artwork. The bottom line is you have to have the HUSTLE first and put the work in.
Over the past six years I’m proud to say that the Cash For Cartoonists has helped hundreds of creators and cartoonists. (some testimonials on that link back there) Many even went full time freelance after being inspired and using the methods to start earning more with their artwork. I still get messages and Facebook tags to this day from artists who were struggling and then found the ebook inspirational or a good kick in the pants to get moving!
I’m also asked if I’ll be updating the ebook with new information. Lots of things have changed in six years since “Cash For Cartoonists”, there are definitely some things to add to each of the methods, which leads me back to this blog series. I plan on featuring each of the methods in the book in future blog posts right here (bookmark this!) And I’ll do my best to add as much new info and value as I can. And it’s all free. I love being able to share what I’ve learned from experience with other creators of all levels. Some creators are brand new, but others have been at this for a long time and maybe have overlooked a few avenues or should revisit some. Like many readers before, you’ll probably end up being surprised by how well some of these methods work, and things you never really thought of doing.
Okay, so look for the first blog very soon, where I’ll tackle the first method “#1 SPOT ILLUSTRATION” – In the meantime, you can brush up on the old ebook and all 15 methods by downloading it now.
If you have any questions, feel free to post and we can have a conversation in the comments. – DJC
More Cash for Cartoonists was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
My Comic Drawing Toolkit for Photoshop just won the 1st “Small Product Lab” by Gumroad.com today. Here is their official announcement.
“Over 2100 people went through or are currently going through the challenge. Of the 820 who were part of the inaugural contest (more on that below), 70 launched products on Wednesday, June 24th (the deadline). Yes. It’s legitimately and incredible hard to produce a product in such a short time.”-gumroad
I just want to say I’m thrilled to win, and quite surprised. I found out about the challenge by way of knowing about Gumroad via buying Kyle Webster’s art brushes there for Photoshop and I toyed with selling digital comics via gumroad as well but lacked the time to follow through with all my other commitments. I get the Gumroad email newsletters and this came in and I actually encouraged my girlfriend (Ally Monroe!) to write something up. I entered to challenge myself but to help her get started with this sort of informational product biz online. So I told her I’d help with her graphics if she wrote the copy to her deal. She wound up coming up with a GREAT automatic budgeting system for busy creators like us who also have full time jobs and busy lives. (btw her system is called BUDGET AUTOPILOT and it’s brilliant. Get it. Do it!)
My product itself was done much quicker than hers, seeing as how I decided to pretty much deliver something I already use almost daily. A great digital Photoshop template specifically configured for those who draw comics. It’s something I’ve built up slowly as I actually worked. I cleaned it up a bit and at one time I was actually overthinking it a bit, wanting to PACK it full of awesome! Like I wanted more color swatch sets specifically for comics, more brushes, etc…. it was Ally who suggested I put the brakes on and not overthink it. It’s the SMALL product challenge for a reason. So I spent the time cleaning things up and making the message pretty clear and then targeting my specific nice audience to tell them about this.
Now, in my case, I was SUPER NICHE. Not only is it for people who draw comics. It’s for people who draw digitally or want to. You have to have Photoshop. You have to have a graphics tablet. The price tag of $5 is a no brainer. There are seriously other templates out there now selling for $30 and $50 that are just generally basic files. I feel that price is a bit out of the target market… comic artists are generally poor! Believe me, I know!
Here are my initial launch notes (drawn in my trusty Field Notes!) :
I guess if there’s one “secret” or clue, it would be that everyone knows something that someone else needs or wants to know. In my case? I know about drawing comics and drawing them this way and I know other artists ask me about Photoshop and think it’s still super expensive. (it’s only 9.99 a month for the single program at Adobe Creative Cloud, do it!) – In Ally’s case, she knows that the budget system she put in place for us worked wonders for our busy lives, so she did that. I don’t suggest just making something up because you heard it sells well. It has to come from an authentic place. Sure, there ARE people selling a lot of stuff they don’t really care about on the internet…. that’s them. Don’t let that be you. Be real! It’s awesomer that way.
And secret two is… transparency+community. Since I joined this with a group of people who were in a closed Facebook group, there was a lot of sharing and encouragement for each other. Lots of people helping lots of people. I wish I would have had time to take more part in the daylight activities but I have a day job first and foremost. I was still able to do what i could to check in on lunch for the twitter chats, and scour through in the evenings. When I started to get some data, I shared a screenshot of my account hoping that others would follow suit or maybe we could gleam something or learn something from the data.
In my case, my niche is very small and generally very poor (artists), like I said. But to me, it’s really not about making tons of money. I can make a little on a little product. It’s a product I believe in and I know is well worth 5 bucks. If you’re going to pursue this further, keep thinking small. Because a little on one small product is fine. Start building more small products as you go. I’m going to guess you can scale that somehow. Right now I have ONE small product. But what if I had TEN? We’ll see… I have a lot of comics to draw first!
In closing I just want to say HUGE thanks to Gumroad & everyone in the Facebook Group. Also Kyle Webster and his brushes which made me hear of Gumroad in the first place. My girlfriend Ally Monroe who is amazing and smart and I can’t wait to share the prizes with you so we can make new stuff together!
Comic Creators who may have stumbled on this post… I was also inspired to begin a new newsletter via my Gumroad page where I will share tips and resources I find for comic creators and self publishers. You can follow me and sign up for updates at http://gumroad.com/djcoffman/follow
That’s all from me! BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD!
Small Product Lab Winner! was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
So, I’m creating a new small product to launch of Gumroad as part of their #SmallProductLab Challenge. It will be a “Digital Comics Drawing Toolkit for Photoshop” which will include my 11×17 master template a bunch of other stuff. That’s launching June 24th.
It occurred to me that I talk with many creators who believe Photoshop still costs $600+ to get started. Or they illegally pirate the software and run the risk of jail and fines. UGH! Don’t do that.
How I use Adobe Creative Cloud for making my comics & more
Now, this is NOT a paid endorsement of any kind for Adobe. I just talk to so many artists who still believe they have to spend hundreds of dollars or illegally pirate old versions (not a good idea!!!) When you can have all the new hotness for a a small monthly fee. I wanted to share the link with the pricing plans for you: https://creative.adobe.com/plans
The thing I personally love most about Adobe’s Creative Cloud is the great file syncing and libraries. So say I’m drawing a page here on the iMac, and I save it, it syncs to the cloud and then POOF! Automagically it’s over on the SurfacePro or my other computer if I want to work on something there. Also the libraries sync as well. So If I use Adobe Shape on my phone, it will create vectors and pop them into my library in all Adobe programs. That’s rad.
Are you worried you know nothing (Jon Snow) about Photoshop or Illustrator? Don’t. There are TONS of free resources and video tutorials on Adobe’s site. In fact, I’ve been wanting to teach myself Adobe Muse. It’s a drag and drop website maker, no code required! (Supposedly!)
That’s enough from me today! I need to get to work on some art and my toolkit. If you have any questions about Creative Cloud or how I use it, feel free to comment and I’ll get back to you! – DJC
Using Creative Cloud for Making Comics was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
Special Edition NYC Recap: "Rule 1: Look em in the eye and speak from the heart"
Here is my re-cap of the 2015 Special Edition NYC comic show.
 The Marvel Panel
I decided to go pretty last minute after a tweet I saw a few weeks back from CB Cebulski about Marvel possibly looking at work there, plus there were a ton of our favorite creators and my old colleagues there too, PLUS we love New York. It just seemed like a no brainer road trip to do what we love.
As an artist seeking work at Marvel it’s also nice to have a feel for what’s coming and read everything going on. So I wanted to get the scoop on what was up with Marvel and hints to what was coming soon. That way if you do get the call, you can jump right in and have an idea of what’s up.
So the Marvel Panel…
God bless those guys and girl for being patient with the mic situations, apparently the speakers were all wonky, and then there was a neighboring panel next door to contend with…. wait, “next door” is too kind. It was behind a neighboring curtain which seemed an odd setup for these “theaters” for paneling. A minor inconvenience as the mighty Marvel panel moved on with top Marvel creators Charles Soule, Brian Bendis, Marguerite Bennett, all dropping knowledge and appreciation on fans. Also of note, moderator Rickey Purdin, who is pretty new at Marvel, did a great job of leading the panel and keeping it fun for the audience.
The biggest thing I took away from that panel was that these people friggin care about the stuff they are making and a lot of thought and planning goes into this. Not some willy nilly “reboot” some news sites were on about. As I’ve been away from comics for some time, it’s a refreshing thing to step back into.
New ideas and characters are being published, and stories are progressing forward instead of rebooted again and again. I was also impressed with the idea of Cosplay photo cover editions, as it seems like a way for Marvel to say, THANKS FOR DRESSING UP & LOVING US SO MUCH. I’ve heard some creators complain about cosplayers at shows “not having money” or being in the way, but when I see cosplay I just kinda smile and think… WOW MAN. Those fans are super passionate. This will probably increase the amount of cosplay now, but maybe it will make people work on EPIC costumes and not just putting a shirt over their head. (but hey, black mask Daredevil outfits get a pass)
Oh, and for Star Wars fans like me… there’s going to be a mother fraggin LANDO CALRISSIAN comic! I like the way Charles Soule said the character would be written as a bad gambler always chasing the next big bet to cover the last fail. Excited for that. Alex Maleev draws an awesome Lando!
Closing note on that panel is that Bendis will fight Charles Soule till they are bloody for an Indiana Jones comic writing gig. Bendis told Soule he could write the Short Round comic. Haha.
Business of Comics panel
The business of comics panel was headed up by writer Alex de Campi (the writer of wrongs) and she had some good info for beginning creators about bad contracts and things to avoid. I wish I would have had panels like this at the comic cons I grew up with, but sadly for years nobody wanted to talk about these types of things for fear of being blackballed or whatever. I’ve signed a few bad contracts in my day, but I feel like I’m all the wiser now for it, and it totally makes me appreciate everything they have to say. It’s truth. Listen! One thing I wanted to share for fellow creator friends, if anyone was in any trouble with rights, or “fuckery” from companies as Alex called it, there are lawyers who will rep you for like $25 bucks. See www.calawyersforthearts.org for details. There was also a nice page rate graphic I’ll have to dig up. I get a lot of aspiring creators asking me about that stuff.
On a personal note…
It was great to run into old friends in comics. People genuinely happy to see me and that I was back at this. I’ve been away for a bit and out of the hustle and flow. Running into Bendis randomly, who embraced me with a big hug when he realized it was me (I look completely different now) and humbling had words about my art, it meant a lot to hear. Bonus: I was able to pull Ally out of Jason Latour’s line to say SEE, I told you I knew that guy. Bonus bonus side note… Ally was in line for Latour and I guess fans in line were grumbling about “wow all those people are waiting in line to see Bendis and he’s right there…” and then I come bumbling along and wave her over to meet my old friend. Sorry suckers! BOOM BOOM STUDIOS FAN FOR LIFE. Seriously though, I left the show feeling very humble, grateful and inspired. This is such a small industry, knowing that it is one where people ultimately take care of each other, makes me proud to play a part in it.
At some point Ally says…. “Dude, it’s like people just thought you were gone and didn’t know where you went.” And I was gone. But now here I am again.
The 3 rules….
I’d like to end this entry with the 3 rules of show business…
Special Edition NYC Recap: “Rule 1: Look em in the eye and speak from the heart” was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
I’ll be hitting the road a bunch of weekends doing regional comic shows and drawing live. Sounds odd, but I’ve never really drawn live at shows before and I’m having a blast doing live commissions. I’m honored to be a featured guest at the new WizardWorld Pittsburgh Comicon this September! I have a complete list of upcoming conventions on my facebook events page.
Lately I’ve been working up some new samples and sending to Marvel, who have been doing some really fun things in comics with the new Secret Wars mash ups and Battleworld in general. Anyone see the Captain America riding Devil Dinosaur?! FRIGGIN AWESOME!!! I feel like a kid again checking the comics out each week and just keeping up on what’s going on. Or at least TRYING to keep up on what’s going on. Tried to explain to a co-worker what’s going on with DC Convergence and Marvel Secret Wars and I think they were confused– I ended that conversation by promising that comics were fun and left it at that. I miss working in that genre (heroes, etc) – Man, wouldn’t it be awesome to work on an ongoing Marvel webcomic? Years ago Jason Embury and I pitched a Action Webcomics thing to Zuda/DC but it was way too soon for digital then…. A boy can dream!
This weekend I’m super excited to be traveling with writer Ally Monroe to NYC, (one of our favorite cities!), to visit to check out the Special Edition NYC comic show. We were surprised to see so many of our favorite creators will be there, Jason Latour, David Mack, Brian Bendis, Ryan Ottley, Stacey Lee…. and gosh, so many others. Just go see the guest list! – There’s a good chance I’ll be instagraming or tweeting the trip if you want to cyber stalk us.
 Make Mine Special Edition NYC was originally published on The Comic Art and thinking of D.J. Coffman
1.Click here for a random color palette.
2. Click here for a random animal (you can set it to however many animals you wanna draw.)
3. Make beautiful, unnaturally-colored thing.
