For weeks
I’ve been waffling about exhibiting at Fan Expo in Toronto this year. It seems
like a huge deal to me, and I’m not sure the pay off will be worth the effort.
Today I
went to the website http://fanexpocanada.com/ to poke around and discovered tickets are
now officially on sale. What? Uh oh. This made its approach a lot more
imminent. It seemed like a big scary deal. Should I or shouldn’t I? Is it
possible to produce something when I’ve got my two kids usurping all my
attention? The summer break is coming up, will I actually be able to crunch it
and draw when my kids are with me all summer long??
Then I
thought of something. If I commit to this, I’ll have a real deadline to strive
for. It was a galvanizing moment. I suddenly realized this could be a good
thing. So instead of worrying about it like a big wiener, I thought I’d try and
look at the positive things this experience will bring:
a solid deadline
This always
gets me focused. A real deadline. Not some made up one that I’ve vaguely marked
in my mind. A deadline that I have to hit or it’s game over. This has
definitely helped me in the past. I’ve pitched a number of animated show ideas
over the years, and they never would have coalesced had there not been a
deadline for submission. Panic is the engine of proliferation.
getting my name “out there”
I
understand this is likely a fantasy or myth, that by attending a comic con I’ll
somehow get discovered. But writing on a blog that nobody reads is pretty
pointless, so at the very least maybe I’ll get a couple people interested in
following my blog. And I might meet some interesting locals in the comics field
too. I’m a total comic book noob so any exposure at this point is good.
feeling of accomplishment
My biggest problem is my comic book feels so overwhelmingly
huge I fear it will never get done (I’ve planned it out as a series of twelve issues).
I’m thinking for the show I’ll
do a manageable little ‘preview’ of my first book that I can hand out, and
maybe do some character sketches to display (or sell?) at my booth. This is a
doable chunk of work in my mind, and feeling like you’ve accomplished something
is important when you’re working in the void of your own creative project.
learn about running a business
I saw a
cool thing on the FAN EXPO website about PayD, a service that let’s you turn your iPad
or phone into a credit/debit card reader. I think this is super cool. Scary,
but cool. If I’m going to sell some artwork, it seems like a really neat thing
to have on hand to make it easy for people to buy my stuff.
My first run in with this technology
was at ‘Police Day’ at my local police station, where a number local vendors
had their wares on display. I bought some green tea from a nice lady who used
her smartphone to read my credit card. So cool.
So I’ll have to start thinking about
the business side of things, maybe even incorporate myself so I can start
writing off some business expenses (as they look like they’ll pile up if I go
into this Expo thing whole hog.)
have fun
I haven’t
been to Fan Expo in like ten years. It’ll be nice to take a look around and see
stuff! Like comics!
G.S.
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