Free Comic Book Day: Big City Comix and Planet prep

If you can't tell, I rarely take myself seriously. 

Planet Comicon is coming up in a week's time. Thankfully, I seem to be ahead of schedule as far as organizing and finalizing my table presentation, bagging comics, and finishing up artwork.

(Left) New walls with banner. (Right) Pagan Zoetrope with extras.

I've had people ask me before about the various pack-ins that I do with my comics. It's kind of an odd mix of reasons on how it came about.

When I was a kid I was a sucker for promotional add ons or packed in extras in my sugar infused cereals and all of that sort of thing. After I had decided from the get go to sell my comics already in bags with boards, I didn't like the big blank white backings. So I started including various stickers, at one point with issue #1, the first edition came with some limited Pagan Zoetrope sketchbooks, or buttons. I've gotten good responses from people all the time I've been doing this, and I've got some new things coming down the line for future issues.

While getting ready for Planet, I was asked by Big City Comix to participate in their Free Comic Book Day event, actually the first one I'd ever done.

The five minute show setup.

I knew a few of my friends would be at the event (Tina and Joel of Galaxy Wrestling All Stars and Sara of Project Shiro), and I was looking forward to seeing the shop as I'd never been to Big City before. When I got there, I set up at the end of the line of tables next to a few guys that I didn't know, but had heard a lot about. 

Buster Moody, Matthew Fox, and Adam Smith were sitting next to me.

Buster Moody is a very kick ass artist. And if you've not heard of Matthew Fox and Adam Smith, they are the masterminds behind the award winning "Long Walk to Valhalla".

Thank you sincerely for those of you that picked up art and books from me!

I didn't get photos of everyone, but I do want to extend a heartfelt thank you for all of you for the conversations and for getting some of my creations.

Greek food. Is there ever a time Greek food is not just awesome to eat?

I want to say thank you, thank you, thank you to Andrew G. at Big City Comix for hosting and feeding us comic creators. The day was a blast, and I did get a bit more work done towards my upcoming sketchbook.

(Left) Dwarven warrior sketch. (Right) Holy hell, Hayley Atwell is coming to Kansas City!

So after it was all done and said, a few days later I managed to get over to A to Z Comics and picked up some great little finds. I needed a bit of time to refocus and clear my head from having done the Chicano Art Exhibit this last Friday, then went straight into Free Comic Book day, I was feeling a bit run down. And then, as if that wasn't all cool enough to be involved with, my interview with the Comic Bros. Podcast is now up for you all to listen to at the bottom of this update.

The podcast was a hell of a lot of fun, and as many of you know, I do my own one man variety show in podcast form. This was so freaking nice to have someone else, in this case my years long friend Mark from Comic Bros, chatting and just having a great time talking. I hope to do more stuff in the future with him.

Picked up some new indie titles and a few old favorites, especially the Gold Key and Whitman ones.

As noted above, I am at booth 2134, and somehow, I managed to snag a corner booth. I am so freaking happy for that. The last time I did Planet, I lucked into that set up, and it worked well then, so here's to hoping for repeat if not better business and interactions from that.

I plan on getting my usual abundance of photos and swag and books and all of that from the show, so expect at least a two part blog update about the show.

Until this next week, be kind to your fellow beings, support your local artists, RUN don't walk... to Planet Comicon!

- Mario, the Artisan Rogue