Tag: publisher companies

How to Choose between Self Publishing or Publisher Company?

So recent I have choice to pull out of Zazu Zine + Comix Publisher in Oct 2019. This was not an easy decision to come up with, however, it did not sound good for my business. From the beginning, I kept hearing that we will not talk about sponsorship, distribution, and marketing until after we get comic done. As we where getting closer to the deadline for the submitting comic, we start to discuss sponsorship, distribution, and marketing a little.

The conclusion with sponsorship was that it was going to pay for start up cost of publishing and first round of prints of comic. I asked will we have continuously revenue coming in to pay for re-stock and marketing because if we divide up the revenue from sales to all artists, and publisher individual, than where will the money come for paying for re-stock and marketing? However, will you start up a company on the first project without investing money from product to keep it up? The answer I got was we will deal with it when we get there. That answer sound too much like “Lets wing it.” The publisher say that she will pull money from her other business to pay for marketing and more re-stock.

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So I made the decision to pull out because I don’t think this will be any different than publishing myself. Yes, I would not pay for the cost of publisher if I do that, however, I would we be doing more work to promote this publisher and not get much out of it. I believe a company need to invest in it self from the very beginning or it will not be able stand on it own very long. I also believe that many investor would not support a company that is not willing to create it own revenue coming in to keep it running.

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I have deciding to look into self publisher or another publisher company. I am working on writing out the first five chapter of Angie’s Adventures. My plan is to still plan for the release in Oct for Chapter 1. I will be looking at digital comics as well. I am hoping that I could get three Chapter done by Jan 2020. For I have plans to go to Mars Con Jan 2020 in Williamsburg, VA.

I would like to hear your thoughts on self publisher vs publisher company. I know there is more work and investing more money when it come to self publisher. However, I feel it is do able and I have the skills to market myself. Also, I would like to hear your thoughts on how long is a series you enjoy reading. I am looking into making Angie’s Adventure into a long series or break it up in parts. I am also thinking about making one shot comics for individual characters such as Fredrick and Alphonse background and Two-bit background. Fredrick and Alphonse story will be very different from Two-bit story. One will be very serious and the other will be more humor. One story will be around tragic and revenge while the other story will be around heart break and money.

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The good news out of all of this, I will be bringing more content to the viewer than what I had plan previous. Which Chapter 1, I will be able to add more papers to it than what I original plan under ZAZU.

Competitive Irrational People in Anime Industrial USA

As an illustrator and comic book writer, I have been following the dramas on Twitter and YouTube of anime and comic culture in the USA. I starting following it after hearing from one of my writer friends getting accuse of harassment and it was his girlfriend they accuse him of harassing without knowing that was his girlfriend (it was third party looking in). And another friend of mine who is a cosplayer is getting stalk by a follower of #kickvic because he believe what they are doing is wrong. This is all due to the #metoomovement but this year it is worst than past years due to new hashtag on Twitter #KICKVIC.

If you have not heard there is a war on social media around the subject Vic Mignogna vs Funimation and a few voice actress/actor. I don’t normally care about Hollywood or celebrity dramas, but unfortunately these people have a huge follower who going out to attack people who disagree with them. This does not effect most normal people; however, if you go to comic con or anime con, than you will be dealing with this drama indirectly. Such as voice actor/actress cancel events because they don’t want to be at the same comic con or anime con as the person they don’t like. And some of their follower will troll people at con that disagree with them or they just out right hate the person. Also, on looking who see what is going on with #KICKVIC think to themselves “hey, I could do the same thing to my rival,” meaning other writer, voice actor/actress could be target with false accusation. For example, it is just like a famous serial killer break out on the scene, there are copy cat who want to copy the crime and get their five minutes of frame.

Most of the force that is pushing this is people in power who ego have gotta so big. I have staff at some anime con. I have learn thought staffing that in the last few years, that voice actor/actress charge like $5K or more depending on their celebrity status to be a guest at comic con or anime con. However, it was not like this several years ago, because in recent years, anime have made it way into pop culture and is very popular in the US. The anime english dub industry have little to no pubic relations, because people who work in the the field, say whatever they want on Twitter ever if it is harmful to someone else.

I will be following the law sue Vic vs Funimation because I am hoping the court will change our Twitter culture and stop some of the harmful campaign that is in our culture. There is one positive thing about this, this does open the door for anime con and comic con to explore at invited small publisher companies, authors, illustrator, cosplayers, and less known voice actor/actress as guest. I am a big believer when the people up top gotten too big for their britches, they can be taking down a peg by a new comer.

Now if you are wanting to be a comic writer or artist, you will have to face some of this. However, I feel like this is very similar to dealing with an ex-husband. You just have to practice good organization and be out spoken. I believe when you are outspoken and show to the world that you are confidence than people will think twice before they decide to mess with you. You will just have to learn by trial and error like everything else in business.

If you would like to follow me on Twitter, my Twitter username is @hargis_maria. You can follow me on Facebook as well at Maria Hargis Art and Instagram at @mariahargisart. I am also on YouTube, my channel is Maria Hargis. I sometimes go live on Facebook and I will be setting up live stream on YouTube.

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