Hey everybody, how’s your summer going so far? Does it feel anything like this:
…Same. Not so much in the “how about this weather?” way, more like “Oh $#!#, I gotta put out this fire I made.”
“MEEP!” indeed, Beaker.
I just finished up the third story arc of KAYA and I intended to take a little break. Just a week or so. We’d been getting this book out on an (almost) monthly basis since we started (with the incredibly hard working team of colorist Jason Wordie, letterer Tom Napolitano, and designer Erika Schnatz). NINETEEN issues! I earned it, right?
“Man plans, God laughs” as they say.
What happened instead? I ended up getting an offer for work that I couldn’t say no to and now this summer is gonna be BUSY. (I’ll give you a hint as to what that big offer is at the end.)
My dad use to work at an oil refinery before he retired, and sometimes he’d work what was called a “shut down” where they’d close off a section of the refinery. It was intense shift-work, he’d have to pull double and triple shifts, but it also PAID really well. That allowed him to get work done on the house, or make car payments, or maybe a little vacation for the family, whatever he needed it for.
So for me, the next two month are the comic book equivalent of working a shut down. I get to work on characters I love and get paid to do it, and hopefully get more exposure for KAYA. But I have to do this extra work AND keep KAYA coming out monthly.
Hey, if John Romita Jr. can do it, so can I, right?
maybe?
…hopefully?
So, I’m working weekends, working late nights, and generally, not wasting time. I won’t be online unless I have to, and I’ll be cutting out a lot of extras that I’d usually enjoy like going for a run now and then. For now, that has to go away until August. Does writing this newsletter count as extra work? Yeah, it does. But I thought it’d be an interesting topic, so here we are.
On the other hand, there’s a lot of talk these days about over-working yourself and burnout. I think those things are important to keep in mind. But also, working in comics is, in my opinion, the best job in the world, but it DOES require long hours. That’s just the nature of the beast. So I don’t believe in constantly GRINDING away until you’re a nub. But when a great offer comes along, sometimes you just have to take it and make it work.
So what is this work? It started with taking on extra cover gigs. Lots of fun characters to play with. Expect to see me doing some cover work on Absolute Power and Action Comics for DC, the Ultimate universe for Marvel, Transformers and Void Rivals for Skybound, and Ninja Turtles for IDW.
Here’s what I can show so far:
I’m wrapping up work on a short story for Boom Studios in their horror anthology “Hello Darkness.” There’s some great creators on that book and I can’t wait to see what they’ve done, especially my buddy Becky Cloonan, always fun seeing her work. In the tradition of my Blackhand Comics collection I’m doing the whole thing, writing, art, colors, and lettering. The story is called “Apocalypse in Slow Motion.” If you want to check out Blackhand Comics, just go to my shop over here: wescraigcomics.bigcartel.com
But the BIG job I have to balance with KAYA over the summer is a stand-alone one-shot for DC Comics that I can’t say anything about just yet. But, for real, this thing is a big deal and I’m excited to be working with the creative team, the characters, the story they have planned, all of it. It’s 26 pages, but they gave me two months to do it, so that’s allowed me to take it on while keeping KAYA on schedule. What they’re building with this story, their overall vision, it was too good an offer to say no. You’ll be psyched to hear about it in all it’s glorious detail when it’s time. I promise.
Anything else I can say about it?
And like I said, I’m going to keep rolling on KAYA. The first issue of the next arc is coming in AUGUST and you can order your copy from your local comic shop now. Much more on that in the next newsletter which is coming (I hope) on a more regular basis.
So go out and get KAYA on at your local comic shop, and say a little prayer for me to whichever cosmic entity you pray to.
I’m gonna need it.
“MEEP!”