It’s Wednesday night before a deadline. I started the day with exactly 4 pages done for this week’s issue. Front cover, inside front cover, inside back cover and back cover. Pretty much the easiest pages I have done and I’m still thinking of redoing one.
Right now, it’s about 10:43PM Eastern (ignore whatever Facebook’s time stamp says), and I’m up to about 11 actual comics pages done out of 20 (24 pages total for the issue with the above mentioned pages) and I have three and a half hours to go until bed. I don’t think I’ll finish the next nine, but I’m in good shape to have this all done by the Friday afternoon deadline.
Don’t be THAT impressed. The issue I’m working on now is a conversion of the old issues from last year. It’s a near-total rewrite, but the plot is the same from the issue it’s based on and that makes things easier. I’m going with total or near-total rewrites on a lot of these converted issues because I just can’t get into the mindset I was when I was writing the originals.
I know, I know, it’s the same thing every year when I try this. I WANT to preserve the original comics in all their, well, whatever it is I have that passes for glory, but, at the same time, converting them to the modern format also means that I have to compromise in the story I was telling at the time simply to fit the space I have to tell that story.
Last year’s issues, for example, I had switched to a forty-page format. The forty pages were essentially half pages from a normal twenty-page comic book. Except, as I went along, the forty pages or so became forty pages. I filled every nook and cranny I could on those pages with text and a lot of times the story I wanted to tell was diluted because instead of straight to the point, I was filling all those pages and not satisfied with what I was doing.
As I’m converting them now, there’s simply no room to cram forty pages of story into twenty pages. I’ve experimented and ended up throwing those pages out simply because there’s not enough space in a twenty page issue to get everything in unless I started using six point fonts and telling you scroll in on every page just to read it all.
For the older stuff, where I can get into the mindset I had all those years ago (flashback to 2008!), I will use the same text. The game plan right now is to have the same starting and ending points for the issues. I’m not adding anything to the story other than changing to our current style (no “real world” references, etc.), though issue the issue ones for what was @insanity and the first attempt at Amazing Incredible will be significantly changed since I hate writing the same darn story over again. Panties. Me-Bay. Sub-basement 13. Yelling in the elevator. I have it memorized and so should you by now.
Just like you’ve read a variation of this blog post before. I know, I’m so simple, I always fall into the same patterns. Hopefully I’m worth it, but hey, you’re the one reading these so I’ll leave that up to you.
I’m heading back in now to see what I can get done. Because that’s what I do…
Jim