Labor Day and the Cost Of Doing Business in Comics
Five hundred dollars.
When people talk about putting regular, old-fashioned comic books online, keep that $500 in mind.
That’s about how much it costs for an average page of comic book art, in terms of labor. Figure $100 for the writer, $150 for the penciller, $130 for the inker, $90 for the colorist, and $30 for the letterer. Those numbers go up and
down depending on talent and publishers, but that’s a nice round number for us to work with.
Let’s consider another number: 22. That’s the average page count for a monthly comic book story. It’s also the number of pages most average pencillers can produce a month. Neat coincidence.
Now start multiplying. That means a penciller will make $3300 a month, or $39,600 a year. With covers, round that up to $42 grand a year. Not a lot of cash there. And the penciller’s the highest paid talent on the book. A writer will make $2200 a month, and nobody pays him to write covers. He’ll probably have to write two books a month to make his nut. And so on.
But if you’re expecting professionals to create your comics, that’s what you’ll have to spend.
Graphic novels? From scratch? You’re looking at about 120 pages minimum– that’s $60,000 in labor costs. Unless you’re economizing and doing a lot of the work yourself, that’s going to almost insurmountable unless it’s commissioned by somebody– most writers don’t have a spare $48,000 to spend on an outside artist. This, of course, is one reason why many “literary” graphic novels are solo jobs– David Mazzuchelli, Darwyn Cooke, Alison Bechdel, Brian Fies, et cetera– because the economics simply aren’t there to support five hungry mouths.
Any proposal for getting books in print in paper– or publishing online– has to keep those numbers in mind. You either have to generate enough money to cover those upfront costs, or find some way to mitigate or reduce them.
So how would you do it? (And no, you can’t pay in Monopoly money.)
I always like the image conjuerd up by “Slave Labor Graphics”, in terms of keeping the costs down…
I always like the image conjuerd up by "Slave Labor Graphics", in terms of keeping the costs down…
This is a good question and I think it depends on where your looking at it from.
If you are a creative type it certainly makes sense to do as much as possible yourself. Especially if you are self publishing your own stuff. Professionals obviously don’t come cheap but there are a few boards/ communities where artists and writers from all over can try to hook up, and not being ‘professionals’ you can keep costs down.
From my own personal experience it comes down to a few dedicated individuals and some sleepless nights/ weekends. In that case it really does become a labor of love (and/or hope).
Actually, if you’re talking A list or B list talent, $500 a page is pretty cheap.
However, I really appreciate your art choice. Monopoly money, indeed…
As an independent comic creator, it really irritates me when people demand they be able to read my work online for free, or suggest that the paltry $2.99 I price most comics is too much for a book that has “nobody famous on it.” This is a very small number of people, but they exist.
I do put some stuff online, but not whole stories, and there’s a reason for that. I NEED you to buy the comic or I can’t keep creating them. I have very little artistic skill, so I need to pay an artist to draw my books, and even keeping the cost to a minimum by working with friends, and other folks who would like to some day work for the Big Two, it still costs around $3,000 to create a single issue. And I don’t keep a dime of whatever comes back to me, it all goes back to artists and publishing costs. I love comics more than any thing, and I’ll keep doing them as long as I can, but most folks have no idea what really goes into it either in terms of effort or money and many are continually clamoring for more books for a smaller price tag.
Hi Brandon, I'm an independent comic creator too so I understand where you're coming from here. However there is something to be said for letting new readers experience the work for free, or for even a paltry $2.99. As independent creators, we face an uphill battle to gain support for our work. To continue we need a large fanbase, and for that to happen we need people to see what we have created. Can you think of a better way for this to happen than the offering of the work for free?I posted a large collection of thoughts here in case anyone is interested in reading all of them: http://www.ultraist.net/journal/2010/09/05/though…Feel free to add to the conversation.Mike Kitchenhttp://www.ultraist.net
thats a great point, brandon. it reminds me of the problems i run into with my macramé hobby. people ask me why i’m charing 50 cents for a friendship bracelet, when they only want to pay 5 cents, or nothing(!). what they dont seem to realize is it costs EXACTLY 50 cents worth of yarn to make a decent friendship bracelet. i need them to pay me 50 cents a bracelet to keep making them, and all that money goes right to the yarn store, not to me. i love making friendship bracelets, and i’ll keep making them for as long as i can, but dont tell me to charge less than 50 cents for a friendship bracelet because it’s worth less than that to you! thats absurd. pay me what i want you to pay, thats fair.
Cost to whom, is my big question? I guess if I was Joe Blow, wannabe publisher, and I simply wanted to make A comic, and wanted to hire talent to do it all (write, pencil, ink, color, letter) for me, then yeah, $500 is a decent ballpark number. Although, I’d say $250 might be more accurate for what you could get away with, considering that was the Zuda Comics page rate, and they had no shortage of creators submitting (prior to shutting down.)
But usually, on the independent level, it’s the writer driving the boat. Writer has an idea he/she needs an art team to help deliver. So, what should writers do to keep costs down? Here are a few tips:
– Learn to do every conceivable aspect of comic production that isn’t penciling, inking, or finished colors. This includes page and file preparation, lettering, and color flatting.
– Look for co-creator relationships where writers and artists share the costs of production, and the eventual profits (should they come.) This may be hard to come by at first, as strong artists are more rare than aspiring comic writers. But writers who establish themselves as dedicated and professional can and do find these partnerships.
– Choose a style that omits some of those costs. Go Black and White, for example. I’m sure the fact that Kirkman’s Walking Dead was able to stay afloat in the early days was due in part to the fact that he didn’t have to shell out for a color artist or pay for color printing. (And of course, because it was awesome.)
Just a few ideas there.
As for the pay vs. free online debate, at this stage in my career, I sell FAR more comics because I give away just about everything online than I would if I did not. Right now, my focus is on getting my stuff out there, getting read, getting known. Trying to copy a Big Two publishing model is a recipe for disaster for small-press and independents in my opinion.
Zuda’s format was basically a standard comic page cut in half. So paying half of $500 was right in line with mainstream rates. (And again, that was if you won. Otherwise, you got nothing.)
Gotta disagree with you there, Glenn. Zuda pages were NOT half a full sized comic page cut in half. (Although people would make that claim.) More accurately, they were a full sized page turned horizontally. Seriously, ask any Zuda creator…a Zuda page DID NOT take half as long to produce as a regular sized page. Zuda pages did not typically have half as many panels as a regular page. And when it came time to print, DC did not put two Zuda pages to a print page…they printed the pages in widescreen.
I’ve worked out a deal with most of my artists whereby they’re producing at a slower rate, say a page or two a week, leaving them free to pursue other projects that pay more. It means an issue a year rather than an issue a month, but for some books, that’s fine.
But even my numbers don’t come in much below what Glenn’s outlined here for most of the books, because I work with great talent and I try to pay them as much as I can afford.
It’s a tough venture, comics.
i drew some cartoons in high school and tried to sell them to my friend for 10 dollars. and he was like, thats not worth 10 dollars. and i was like, well if you dont pay than i cant get rich. and he was like, correct.
man, what a lesson i learned that day.
I've worked out a deal with most of my artists whereby they're producing at a slower rate, say a page or two a week, leaving them free to pursue other projects that pay more. It means an issue a year rather than an issue a month, but for some books, that's fine. But even my numbers don't come in much below what Glenn's outlined here for most of the books, because I work with great talent and I try to pay them as much as I can afford. It's a tough venture, comics.
i drew some cartoons in high school and tried to sell them to my friend for 10 dollars. and he was like, thats not worth 10 dollars. and i was like, well if you dont pay than i cant get rich. and he was like, correct.man, what a lesson i learned that day.
Good question!
My answer is a little long so I replied by way of my own blog post. As an overview… I looked at just one possible solution, a solution that should be considered by anyone self-publishing and independents. Crowd funding.
You can check out my thoughts on this at http://pulpd.wordpress.com
It’s all very well and good to suggest that people “just” learn to do it all but the art…some of that is based on the idea that it’s easy to do that stuff. Until computers, everyone thought colouring was easy–now people think the difficulty is only in learning the techniques, and not understanding that there is a lot of theory behind colouring. Great colouring doesn’t happen by accident and bad colouring can really kill even good storytelling. And everyone assumes lettering is dead-easy (unless it’s Todd Klein hand lettering!): just grab a bunch of fonts and off you go. And that’s why you get lettering that’s all over the art, that’s confusing, doesn’t help to lead you around the page–lettering is more than just putting balloons by the characters’ heads.
I recently paid 4 bucks for a comic put out by an indy publisher. What drew me in innitially was the art in the previews, beautiful stuff, I would imagine inspired by Ed Benes. The coloring was pretty nice too. The editing was almost non-existent and there was a page of pixelated art that I’m guessing was because someone sent a low-res file instead of the high-res version. And the writing was horrendous. And the creator and publisher of the comic? The writer. There was no editor mentioned in the credits. So this writer had what he thought was a great idea, paid money to the artist (I hope, the artist really should be paid for being associated with this comic), and made his dream come true. But nowhere along the line was there anybody to say, “hey! Don’t waste your money putting this out! This is complete garbage! It’s totally unoriginal and the dialog is about as clunky as it gets!” And so now I’m left wondering what this artist will do next, and I’ll be avoiding this writer like the plague from now till forever.
My point is, just because you can afford to hire an artist, check to see if what you plan on selling is complete garbage first.
KT- You are correct. Coloring is a skill. Lettering is a skill. Both involve learning theory and technique, and practice. But that doesn’t make my suggestion wrong.
If writer’s want to be comic creators, they should learn what it takes to actually create comics.
ANYONE can learn to assist in the color flatting stage of production. It’s paint by numbers and can seriously help lower the costs and time for a quality colorist.
And ANYONE can learn to letter, with the tools that are out there. Yes, it will take practice. Yes your first attempts will be pretty poor. But it’s certainly worth it. The other added bonus for writers…when you letter your own stuff on actual comic pages, you learn a ton about what fits on a page/panel and what doesn’t, and about pacing of dialogue. It’s very hard to learn this just from scripting in Word.
Comic book visual artists (pencillers, inkers, painters) have another source of income–selling their originals. This doesn’t affect the cost to a publisher, but does often help an artist’s bottom line.
When originals exist (not a guarantee with computers nowadays) and if anybody cares (do you own any original colorist pages? I’ve got all the pages for Karate Kid #1, and I’ll bet you they’re worth under $100).
I don’t want to paint the selling of originals as a panacea. I’m just saying that when they exist, they can add to an artist’s bottom line. For some artists, this may be substantial. For the Alex Ross’s of the world, sales of originals may be his primary income. But obviously when we’re talking about less popular artists or comics, the sale of originals might only add a tiny bit. Still, it’s something (unless, as you say, there are no originals to sell or the originals have no market value).
Good question!My answer is a little long so I replied by way of my own blog post. As an overview… I looked at just one possible solution, a solution that should be considered by anyone self-publishing and independents. Crowd funding.You can check out my thoughts on this at http://pulpd.wordpress.com
I recently paid 4 bucks for a comic put out by an indy publisher. What drew me in innitially was the art in the previews, beautiful stuff, I would imagine inspired by Ed Benes. The coloring was pretty nice too. The editing was almost non-existent and there was a page of pixelated art that I'm guessing was because someone sent a low-res file instead of the high-res version. And the writing was horrendous. And the creator and publisher of the comic? The writer. There was no editor mentioned in the credits. So this writer had what he thought was a great idea, paid money to the artist (I hope, the artist really should be paid for being associated with this comic), and made his dream come true. But nowhere along the line was there anybody to say, "hey! Don't waste your money putting this out! This is complete garbage! It's totally unoriginal and the dialog is about as clunky as it gets!" And so now I'm left wondering what this artist will do next, and I'll be avoiding this writer like the plague from now till forever.My point is, just because you can afford to hire an artist, check to see if what you plan on selling is complete garbage first.
Comic book visual artists (pencillers, inkers, painters) have another source of income–selling their originals. This doesn't affect the cost to a publisher, but does often help an artist's bottom line.
When originals exist (not a guarantee with computers nowadays) and if anybody cares (do you own any original colorist pages? I've got all the pages for Karate Kid #1, and I'll bet you they're worth under $100).
I don't want to paint the selling of originals as a panacea. I'm just saying that when they exist, they can add to an artist's bottom line. For some artists, this may be substantial. For the Alex Ross's of the world, sales of originals may be his primary income. But obviously when we're talking about less popular artists or comics, the sale of originals might only add a tiny bit. Still, it's something (unless, as you say, there are no originals to sell or the originals have no market value).
My current creative team is three liked-minded guys in the same place in life (in our 30s, working professionals, families). Nobody is getting paid; it’s a shared investment of time towards a common goal – to eventually get published (from a pro pub, not self-published) and integrate into a at least semi-professional level of comic creation. The process is slow; it’s a struggle to get even a page a week done around our schedules. But the work is still rewarding.
I absolutely agree with the comment about writers taking on additional duties to offset costs and learn more about process. I’m the writer on our team (with a penciler and an inker/colorist rounding out the group), but I also handle lettering, book design, web design and post/print production. Learning to letter is a HUGE advantage – it teaches you how to judiciously use dialogue, to not over-clutter the page, how to control narrative flow. And, it helps in making last minute changes to better pair your dialogue/narration with the art.
Writers get a bad rap for doing the “easy part” of the process, but I think you can get a lot more respect from your creative team when you’re in the trenches with them. And the better understanding you have about the total creation process – conception to publication – the more seriously editors and professionals are likely to treat you later on.
My current creative team is three liked-minded guys in the same place in life (in our 30s, working professionals, families). Nobody is getting paid; it's a shared investment of time towards a common goal – to eventually get published (from a pro pub, not self-published) and integrate into a at least semi-professional level of comic creation. The process is slow; it's a struggle to get even a page a week done around our schedules. But the work is still rewarding.I absolutely agree with the comment about writers taking on additional duties to offset costs and learn more about process. I'm the writer on our team (with a penciler and an inker/colorist rounding out the group), but I also handle lettering, book design, web design and post/print production. Learning to letter is a HUGE advantage – it teaches you how to judiciously use dialogue, to not over-clutter the page, how to control narrative flow. And, it helps in making last minute changes to better pair your dialogue/narration with the art.Writers get a bad rap for doing the "easy part" of the process, but I think you can get a lot more respect from your creative team when you're in the trenches with them. And the better understanding you have about the total creation process – conception to publication – the more seriously editors and professionals are likely to treat you later on.
Maybe one approach would be to try to get the book funded by fans? This would probably mainly work for established authors, but maybe it would be possible to raise enough money with something like Kickstarter up-front.
This is how the Finnish team who made Star Wreck (a high-quality feature-length Star Trek/Babylon 5 spoof shot on green screen in a makeshift studio and composited on what was essentially a render farm running in an apartment kitchen) are planning to finance Iron Sky, their next film, featuring Nazis on the moon…
Maybe one approach would be to try to get the book funded by fans? This would probably mainly work for established authors, but maybe it would be possible to raise enough money with something like Kickstarter up-front.
This is how the Finnish team who made Star Wreck (a high-quality feature-length Star Trek/Babylon 5 spoof shot on green screen in a makeshift studio and composited on what was essentially a render farm running in an apartment kitchen) are planning to finance Iron Sky, their next film, featuring Nazis on the moon…