Long Beach Comic Con

I was meaning to post this earlier in the week, but coming back from the convention things got hectic. But now I can finally write a little about my time at the Long Beach Comic Con. It was great.

 

Here's my table on Saturday, Day 1.

 

Day 2, I changed it up a little

All in all, this convention went great. As I keep telling myself, slowly but surely, I keep trying to build an audience. My first goal for conventions is to try to cover the expense for the show itself, which means table fees, transportation, and any hotel costs. While I've yet to cover the costs of a convention, this was the best convention I've done so far, and I made nearly half the money back. Some people might think that's not worth it, but that's coming a long ways from the first convention I ever tabled at, where I think I sold 3 comic books. 

Another great discovery at this convention was that I brought out my wrestling artwork to some good reception. As it says in some of my social media profiles, I'm a pro-wrestling fan, so I thought I'd put out the artwork and see what happens. I've heard before, and always thought, that there was a good crossover audience out there of wrestling fans and comic books fans, and it's true. The artwork caught eyes and people came over and checked it out. I was doing my "5 Dollar Doodles" and I was able to do a number of those commissions for some pro-wrestling fans. And even if they didn't want any artwork, it was cool to chat with other wrestling fans out there! For my next show I'll definitely be doing my 5 Dollar Doodles again, I think I might do them in watercolor. But I'm going to work on some prints of a few things, as those seem to be better sellers.

Speaking of my next show, I was hoping to make it to Comikaze in October, but it doesn't look like that will be happening. So, my next show will most likely be the Long Beach Comic Expo in February. 

Thanks to everyone who stopped by, got a copy of Urban Myth Investigators or just talked wrestling. 

Here some pictures I took of some great cosplayers at the con.

Alrighty, that's it for now. I'm working on finishing up the color in Urban Myth Investigators and also working on a new prose book. Any Dieselpunk fans out there?

See ya in the funny pages!

It's not how many times you fall down...

I don't think I'm in any position to give any advice about comics. Whether it's breaking in to comics, or making comics, or selling comics. I'm just trying to figure it out as I go.

As it is right now, I have published a terribly bad first comic, struggled through a webcomic, published two mini-comics that, while not outstanding by any means, were remarkably better than the first comic book I published, and now have two more full comic books out and published. The said two mini-comics and latest two full comic books are the Cutlery mini-comics and Urban Myth Investigators, respectively. And they can be downloaded as my digital comic shop, gumroad.com/imrontucker. *plug*plug*

There are times when I get a little down, and think my dream of becoming a full-time comic book writer and cartoonist is never going to happen (and by "full-time" I mean being able to support myself fully on my creative works). Those times, as far as I've read, seen, and researched seem to happen to a lot of creative souls.

But then I plop myself down at my desk, whip out a pencil, some pens and some paper and just press on. Just keep moving forward, because this is what I want to do.

Getting a little personal here, I'm in my thirties, though many people tell me I don't even look 21. I've come to grips with family life just not being for me. Sure, it could happen, but by happenstance and by choice, I'm single, with no one I need to support but myself. That means, I do have a leg up, in pursuing my dreams, as crass as that may sound. I don't have a wife, or a child that depends on me to feed, or pay bills, or even spend time with. Like I said, I'm come to grips with that, for the most part. Because of the career I want. So I draw. I write. I create.

My current comic book being published right now is Urban Myth Investigators. Currently the first two issues are available to download, and on the website, umicomic.com, is being updated currently with pages from the second issue. I update that webcomic through tumblr, as a means of easy navigation, and more importantly, an easy way for people to come across it and to share it. Today I gained my 14th follower on the tumblr site.

As low as that number may seem, I got that notification today and smiled. After three month of posting pages, I'm slowly building an audience.

And now in the next couple months I will be at two comic conventions, to hopefully keep growing that audience.

There's a saying, that it's not how many times you fall down, but how many times you get up. You have to keep pressing forward. I will achieve my goal of becoming a full-time cartoonist. It will happen. You have to believe. I believe.