State of Self-publishing: Manga

This video gives me so much hope! I can’t wait to be sharing my own work at TCAF or at any other comic convention again for that matter. I’ve attended Anime Expo and a few other conventions before. For the most part, my experience has always been positive. I make up the costs of attending through commissions and it’s wonderful to meet other artists and people who like my work face to face. But I’ve always felt woefully unprepared in more ways than one.

While I do enjoy creating fan art, I’d always feel like I didn’t quite belong as I exhibited my work next to other artists. I had an ache in my heart that couldn’t be satisfied by my provision of prints, commissions and bookmarks of other people’s characters. I felt like I was doing things backwards. I have nothing against my fellow Artist Alley attendees some of whom I have great fondness and admiration for, but what I longed for more than anything else was to have an original body of work on the table: A story to share. I felt incomplete without it. I wanted something to prop up with the full force of my passion and it had to be something I created.

Ofcourse, I really have no idea how I’ll be around this time next year. Signing up for all these conventions at this point feels premature somehow. Perhaps, I’ll wait another year before debut-ing my work in Canada!

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Links I’m sharing this week:
Jason Brubaker’s post Growing Your Audience is like Growing a Tree is a fantastic must-read for aspiring comic creators. Just like improving your craft, building an audience that appreciates it also takes time and effort. The most important thing to take away is PERSIST!

Meanwhile, Jake Parker’s story of three travelers as they traverse The Known World of Visual Storytelling is insightful as it is playful.