Why?

Because as more comic artists and writers embrace its Q & A approach to direct interactions with fans,  it virtually eliminates any work associated with my role as an interviewer/blogger. I mean, why would you limit yourself to reading the answers to a finite set of questions constructed by a stranger when you could just ask the artist whatever was on your mind yourself?

In theory, I could aggregate interesting Formspring answers rather than independently pursuing one-on-one interviews with artists and other creative types, and effectively save myself a butt tonne of work while diversifying content to the max.

But wait – as TV’s Zack Morris would say, “Time Out”. You may not be familiar with Formspring yet, despite its meteoric rise from zero to over twenty million users in just over a year. I would then encourage you to check out this page on the site itself. Or this article on CNET.

It should be noted that this is definitely not a filler post in place due to a slow period for interviews. Ha ha.

Man, uncomfortable laughter translates poorly onto the internet.

But enough peripheral information about the question-driven social website Formspring. Which it may have become apparent I have been spending probably too much time on lately.

I mentioned that a bunch of comic artists and writers are already using it as a method to answer relevant, compelling, or as the case often is, utterly ridiculous questions posed to them directly by their fans.

Here are some comic-related Formspring accounts that you might find worth a perusal:

Angela Melick of the webcomic Wasted Talent has a Formspring wherein she answers questions like:

What is your zombie apocalypse plan? What do you do to keep focused on your work? -and- How do you sell Individualism?

Jeph Jacques of the webcomic Questionable Content also has one, and he answers stuff like:

What’s your favorite ridiculous internet meme? -and- If you had to have a pen name, what name would you use? (note: I’m exceptionally partial to Jeph’s wisely concise method of answering Formspring questions. There’s an almost… I want to say Hemmingway quality about them.)

Husband and wife superteam Stuart and Kathryn Immonen rock the occasional Formspring. (Stuart has done ample artistic work for Marvel on such titles as New Avengers and Ultimate Spider-Man, and Kathryn Immonen has had written Runaways and is currently working on a Wolverine and Jubilee mini-series. They’ve also also done a webcomic together titled Moving Pictures. ) They field such questions as:

-to Stuart – Who are your greatest influences in the comic book industry? -and to Kathryn- Do you have a particular attraction to (Marvel character) Patsy Walker, and if so, what is most compelling to you about her character?

Tom Brevoort, Senior Vice President of Publishing and former  Executive Editor of Marvel Comics, is a Formspring demon. He cuts through swaths of general Marvel questions like a heated Adamantium claw through butter. Questions like:

Would Marvel consider making an ongoing She-Hulks series? -or – Do you worry that increasing top titles’ prices will cause people to drop lower tiered titles in order to offset the increase?

A couple of other Marvel types that Formspring are Fred Van Lente (Marvel Zombies Cowboys and Aliens), and Jonathan Hickman (Secret Warriors, Fantastic Four).

Back to the realm of webcomics, Der-shing Helmer of The Meek also keeps a fairly active Formspring account. Der-shing answers stuff like:

What helps you understand anatomy, and do you use references? Are there any story arcs/episode types you find really cliche? -and- How often do you cut your nails? (Meek fans are a special sort, turns out)

Just look at all those interview questions and answers provided without anyone actually doing the interviewing! Well, except the fans posting the individual questions, I guess. But that hardly counts.

It’s relevant to mention that, should you choose to peruse some of the above accounts  – or any other belonging to a comic writer or artist for that matter – don’t expect to see many questions about plot. Asking for spoilers is a generally frowned upon practice.

Stay tuned for more actual interviews in the coming weeks.

-posted by Kevin de Vlaming

In keeping with tradition, we’re ringing in the new year by looking at some of the stuff that’s impacted our little corner of the interweb over the past twelve months. This includes some of the news bits the Fabler Blog has reported on, some of the changes and landmarks the main site has experienced, and of course, a Coles Notes list of the interviewees we’ve featured on the site throughout 2010.

Let’s start by talking about The Fabler directly. Our second year online has been filled with small triumphs (and minor road bumps), but a few in particular stand out.

First, our presence at the 2010 Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo was much stronger than at the ‘09 Expo, which was when the Fabler first launched. The 2010 Expo gave us a great chance to network, spread the good word about the site, and nab some pretty nifty interviews in our first (and, to date, only) Fabler Blog video segment. The Expo itself was a huge success last year, bringing in over 20,000 attendees – over twice the amount of the 2009 Expo. We were thrilled to be a part of that.

The Fabler’s next landmark came in May, when the site’s founder, Bruno Steppuhn, took home the Digital Alberta Media Fresh Award for Best Use of Social Media on behalf of The Fabler. You can read more about that in Bruno’s post here.

Shortly after, we launched our first major comic contest, which ran from June 15th to September 15th.  The Fabler gave away a Sony PS3 Bundle, a Wacom Intuos4 XL, and for first prize, a Wacom Cintiq 21UX. Competition was stiff, as many new contributors to the Fabler submitted a diverse and colourful array of sequential entries into the contest, but ultimately there could be only one grand prize winner. The first place finalist was Scott Ferguson, for his comic Scout Crossing.

As a reminder to all interested parties, the second Fabler Comic Contest started on October 15th and is currently still on until January 15th. If you’re interested in tossing your hat (comic) into the ring (upload section), you can view the full rules and regulations here.

To briefly touch on some of the larger news items we mentioned on The Fabler Blog, the year opened with a fresh new lawsuit between legendary comic artist Jack Kirby’s heirs and Marvel regarding copyrights to the work he did on a tonne of iconic comic characters. The latest news on this legal battle is that there really is no news. Honestly. There was a counter-suit at some point, Marvel wasn’t forced to pay damages, the Kirby Estate’s case wasn’t thrown out… It’s all sitting fairly stagnant in judicial purgatory.

In Canadian Comic news, Seth’s George Sprott: (1894-1975) unsurprisingly garnered the Doug Wright Award for Best Book, while Michael DeForge won Best Emerging Talent for Lose #1, and the Pigskin Peters Award went to Marc Bell for Hot Potatoe. Meanwhile, over on the Joe Shuster Awards side of town, Stuart Immonen earned Best Artist, Maryse Dubuc won Best Writer for her work on Les Nombrils, tome 04, and Karl Kerschl’s fantastic comic The Abominable Charles Christopher was named Best Webcomic.

In July, the world of digital Indie comics was changed forever when Zuda Comics announced it was shutting down. Zuda was DC’s online imprint and a place for independent creators to post their works in hopes of earning a publishing contract with one of DC. They were shut down as part of a DC corporate restructuring that also saw half of their staff relocate from New York to California.

This led into a host of additional major industry announcements that came to light around September and October. The Wildstorm Comics imprint was shut down, much to the chagrin of fans of The Authority and Astro City. DC and Marvel announced that their monthly issue comic prices would drop an entire dollar in 2011. Dark Horse announced a new digital publishing initiative, also coming in 2011.

As we venture forward into 2011, the state of the industry seems to finally have some sort of gameplan for adapting to a changing market. That market is of course the digital market, which had grown from an estimated value of around $1 million in 2009 to $8 million in 2010.

The Fabler Blog will continue to have its eye on the industry in this regard, and we’ll post the ‘news that fits’. Whatever that means.

This year you can also expect to see more big changes in store for the main portion of The Fabler, but I wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise on that front.

In bringing this, the  first post of 2011, to a close, I would like to thank all of you Fabler fans and comic creators who have brought something to the site over the past year. I would also like to thank you for reading our humble little blog, when the internet is such a big, wide, interesting place.

On that note, for your handy convenience and ready perusal, here’s a list of all the interesting individuals we featured on the blog over the past year:

Gibson Twist (Pictures of You, Our Time in Eden)

Kelly Tindall (Archie Snow)

Ben Steeves (Zom-Ben, Our Time in Eden)

Aaron Leighton (Illustrator, member of Trio Magnus)

Colleen MacIsaac (Minicomic creator and multimedia artist)

Marta Chudolinska (Back + Forth: A Novel in 90 Linocuts)

Eric Vedder (Aardehn, Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors)

Adam Bourret (I’m Crazy)

Ryan Sohmer (Least I Could Do, Looking for Group)

James Turner (Warlord of Io)

Nick Thornborrow (The Anthology Project)

Ethan Rilly (Pope Hats)

Jenny Romanchuk (The Zombie Hunters)

Evan Munday (Quarter-Life Crisis)

Damian Willcox (dorkboy Comics)

Jason Loo and Arthur Dela Cruz (The 3 Second Rule)

Robin Thompson (Vancouver Comic Art teacher, and artist on Champions of Hell)

Jonathon Dalton (A Mad Tea-Party, Lords of Death and Life)

Angela Melick (Wasted Talent)

Cloudscape Comics (Vancouver-based comic collective)

Jim Zubkavich (Skullkickers)

Eric Kim (The Complete Plays of William Shakespeare)

Mike Jasper and Niki Smith (In Maps & Legends)

Noel Tuazon (The Broadcast)

Scott Ferguson (Scout Crossing, Nerf This)

Ty Templeton (Northern Guard)

Danielle Keller (GHOST!, Acid Monday)

Sarah Leavitt (Tangles: A Story About Alzheimer’s, Mother and Me)

Derek McCulloch (Stagger Lee, Pug)

Matthew Dunn (Lonely Monsters)

Scott Chantler (Two Generals)

Rhian Engel (My Life as a Grum)

Jason Bradshaw (Boredom Pays, the Worst in Everything)

Salgood Sam (Dream Life, The Rise and Fall of it All)

-Post Written by Kevin de Vlaming

Which doesn’t mean we’re a newsblog. If anything, we’re an expositoryblog – or a selectively focused varietyblog. Maybe a comic-centric infoblog.

But what’s in a name anyway? Definitions only detract from the potential of any form of medium. For all intents and purposes, The Fabler Blog is The Fabler Blog. Nothing more and nothing less.

Although, for the record, we’re not a newsblog.

Right-O, with that established, a few things:
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1.) I would be remiss if I didn’t mention first and foremost the latest aesthetic overhaul to TheFabler.com. That’s right folks,  our home in this here little corner of the internet is evolving.

Click on over to observe the beauty – nay, the majesty – of The Fabler’s latest iteration. I’ll understand if it takes you a few minutes of breathless wonder before you return to peruse the rest of this comparatively humble post.
We even have some sneak peeks into the future of The Fabler posted on our brand-spanking-new About page. Also worthy of mention is the addition of Groups to the site, which you can learn more on at that same link above.

2.) Free Comic Book Day is right around the corner, and coming up fast! Of course, the figurative ‘corner’ here is actually a measure of roughly two months time, but still – I’m sure May 1st will be here before any of us knows it.

In fact, the day (which I personally believe Canadians should petition for to become a nationally recognized holiday) is so fast approaching, the official Free Comic Book Day website now has previews up for this year’s slate of comics.

The lineup is decently impressive. Marvel has an Iron Man/Thor comic written by Matt Fraction and illustrated by John Romita jr. on there, while DC and Top Cow are each using the opportunity to launch major imprint events. DC has War of the Supermen # 0 up, while Top Cow is releasing Artifacts: First Look.

One of the highlights looks to be Dynamite’s Green Hornet # 1, featuring Kevin Smith’s debut take on the legendary character. Another would be the Mouse Guard/Fraggle Rock double feature (the second title I’m oddly excited for), and another still is Fractured Fables – a kid-friendly collection of fairy tales turned upside down by a wildly talented collection of artists/authors. Alex Grecian, Doug TenNapel, and Camilla d’Errico are among the names associated with that last project.

Victoria Day is a fairly cumbersome Canadian holiday that could use the axe. A holiday celebrating the birth day of the current British monarch? The Canada Act was so twenty-eight years ago, people.

Free comics is a much more culturally relevant subject of celebration for modern Canadians.

3.) Back in January I made a post about the lawsuits currently brewing between Marvel and the heirs of Jack Kirby. Somewhere amidst the senseless gibbering I made reference to the ongoing legal woes between Jerry Siegel (original co-creator of Superman) and Warner Bros./DC.

In the latest piece of news regarding the Siegel/Warner Bros. litigation, it seems that WB has chosen to replace its existing outside counsel with Daniel Petrocelli.

Petrocelli made his name originally representing the father of victim Ronald Goldman in the infamous O.J. Simpson murder case. He’s also represented Disney in a licensing battle over the rights of Winnie the Pooh.

If there were a witty correlation I could find between the three cases, you would be reading it right now. Sadly, not the case.

What this means for the trial is that Warner Bros. is essentially baring its teeth and bringing out the big guns. Marc Toberoff, who is representing the Siegel estate in this matter as well as the Kirby family in the aforementioned case, is going to have his hands full in the coming months.

4.) If you’ve scoped around The Fabler Blog before, (and chances are if you’ve read to the end of this post you probably have) you’ve probably heard me gush adoringly about Scott McCloud at some point or another.  My fascination with the works and ideas of Mr. McCloud is so great, it probably even rivals the level of contempt I feel for Boise, Idaho.

Well, that may just be hyperbole.

In any case, Graphic NYC posted on Monday what just might be the definitive profile of Scott McCloud.

Christopher Irving, who wrote the article, is meticulously thorough in detailing the career and ideas of the Understanding Comics’ author. McCloud himself gives ample insight throughout into the background processes behind everything from Zot! to his upcoming 2012 graphic novel, tentatively titled The Sculptor.

Seth Kushner also provides some nifty photos of Scott looking all professorly in front of a blackboard covered in diagrams and doodles.

Why should you read this profile? Because Scott McCloud is one of the most influential minds in comics today, and has vested more time in deconstructing and explaining the nuances of the medium than possibly anyone else alive.

Also because you’ve already wasted at least five minutes of your life reading  this comparatively shallow post, and you will be roughly twenty times more enriched for spending another ten minutes learning about Scott McCloud.
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That’s all for this Wednesday. We have another double-feature of interviews in the works for the next couple of weeks, so check back soon for that double-dip of artist insight.

I now find myself oddly craving Dunk-a-roos.

This is Kevin@thefabler, signing out.

-Written by Kevin de Vlaming

At the other end of the lawsuit, we find… the artist responsible for creating the original likenesses of all of the above properties.

Okay, okay – so as we all know, legendary comic book artist Jack Kirby has been dead and gone for over a decade and a half now. The man who (alongside Stan Lee, Joe Simon, Steve Ditko, and several others) helped build Marvel as a major player in the comic industry is not in fact the direct catalyst behind this latest nugget of comic book conflict.

Last September, Jack Kirby’s heirs made it known that they intended to invoke a copyright law which would terminate existing copyright claims to many of the characters Kirby co-created. Apparently, there are certain tenets within the murky waters of rights and ownership legislation that allow an author (or that author’s heirs) to regain copyrights a certain number of years after those rights were initially granted out.

Last year, the heirs of Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel made headlines with a similar court case. They wound up winning a packet of rights back concerning the Man of Steel, including his origin story, the names of his parents (as well as of the planet Krypton), and publishing rights to some of the earliest Superman appearances in comics. Marc Toberoff, the lawyer who represented Siegel’s heirs, is now onboard helping to defend the Kirby copyright claims.

The big news now is that, as of a week and a half ago, Marvel is suing to render those claims invalid.

And so the soap opera that revolves around creator rights versus those of the major comic book publishing companies spills over into yet another decade.

This daytime drama is one that has been around as long as the very concept of comics as we know them today.

Jerry Siegel’s own struggles with creative ownership go back to 1938, when he and Superman co-creator Joe Shuster originally sold the copyright for the character to Action Comics for a measly $130. After receiving a comparatively tiny fraction of the revenue generated by their creation for nearly a decade, they sued to void their original contract in 1947.

The attempt was met with failure, and for several decades more the creators of the most wildly successful comic character in history continued to go uncredited and underpaid. In 1973 they made another (ultimately futile) attempt to regain rights to Superman, though at least this time the press rallied around their cause enough to effect some kind of change. Warner Communications (who by that time inherited the rights to the character through the acquisition of National Comics) responded to press coverage of the unfair treatment of Siegel and Shuster by offering them each a pension of $20,000 per year.

In addition, they would finally be credited with creating Superman on all Supes-related media. Over thirty years after the event.

After Siegel and Shuster passed away in 1996 and 1992 (respectively), their heirs attempted to reclaim copyrights in 1999 and several times again between 2002 and 2008. It wasn’t until just last August that they actually gained some significant ground in the courts.

Marvel has had its own share of discontent within the ranks of its creative talent to deal with in the past.

One notable example would be Marvel’s infamous tendency to merchandise characters and art created by freelance artists without allowing those individuals any creative control or proportionately reasonable royalties.

In 1991, Marvel experienced a coup of sorts in reaction to this. A number of popular artists then-freelancing for Marvel decided to collectively demand more rights with regards to their creative contributions to the company.

Many are now familiar with how Marvel’s flat-out refusal of their requests led those disenfranchised illustrators to branch off to form their own independent comic company, Image Comics. Those artists were Todd McFarlane, Erik Larsen, Rob Liefeld, Jim Lee, Marc Silvestri, Whilce Portatio, and Jim Valentino.

If you’re starting to get a sense that ‘copyright law’ and ‘creative rights’ are vastly important terms in comics, you’re bang on the money. As an artistic medium historically dependant on complex relationships between publishers, artists, writers, distributors, and everyone else in-between, ‘who controls what’ and ‘who deserves how’ much become paramount questions.

It’s no wonder that many prefer to go the route of self-publishing their creative material.

Establishing creator rights in the comic book industry is such an integral concern to artists that many even got together to draft their own ‘Comic Creator’s Bill of Rights‘ back in the eighties. Scott McCloud, Dave Sim, Kevin Eastman, and Peter Laird were but a few of the big-name creators involved in the Bill’s conception.

The latest case of the Kirby heirs versus Marvel does represent another soap-operatic episode in an industry pointedly prone to such drama, but it is important nonetheless to pay attention to its outcome.

Some are claiming that the heirs are merely partaking in a cash grab now that the window to terminate existing Kirby copyrights is approaching, especially since Hollywood is experiencing a surge of popularity with movies based on comics. It doesn’t help their case that the initial letters of termination were distributed to most of the major production studios in Hollywood, nor does it help that they came on the heels of news that Disney was buying Marvel.

The argument put forth by Marc Toberoff on behalf of the Kirby Heirs is that they are just seeking “proper compensation and credit” for the lasting creative contributions he made to Marvel in his lifetime.

Meanwhile, Marvel claims that Jack Kirby’s creations were all work-for-hire assignments, and thus not covered by laws regarding termination of copyright.

Toberoff has pointed out that, “It is a standard claim predictably made by comic book companies to deprive artists, writers, and other talent of all rights in their work.”

I’m tentatively siding with Toberoff and the heirs here, mostly because I don’t want to see further precedent set against artists (or their heirs) trying to regain some form of artistic control or monetary compensation from corporations that have reaped disproportionately vast profit from their creations.

That being said, here’s hoping that – whatever the outcome – what Jack himself would’ve wanted winds up factoring in at least a little amidst all of the talk of dollars and cents.

-Written by Kevin de Vlaming

I find it interesting, as I’m diving deeper and deeper into the business; I would like to clarify two very major points. I will say that my friends, Riley Rossmo, of Proof, Jim Zubkavich, of Udon Entertainment, and Salgood Sam, of the Sequential blog (and various other cool works), helped me realize this during my adventures in Calgary, to the east in Toronto, and quite recently in the last few hours as I wake up in Montreal, coffee not quite yet in hand, before I write this.

The first note I want to point out is that in all of this is the point of thefabler.com. We are trying to create a place to both enable and maintain Creator Owned Comics. There seems to be muddy lines in “indie” comics, where print on demand, print quality, poor cartoonist artwork, expressionistic visual storytelling, etc, seem to leave a bad taste in some peoples mouths, and for that matter make it relatively difficult to define. In fact these mediums and outlets aren’t low quality at all. I recently purchased a book in a Montreal store (Planete BD), called, “Drowtales: Moonless Age,” by a team of very skilled fabler’s who come collectively all around the globe. Salgood Sam also did a very good job and pointing my nose to some mainstream comic artists and writers, including himself, that create very awesome black comic self published books such as the very rare, “Revolver.” The guys at Transmission-X have created an opportunity where they can tell their own stories in the midst of their more sanctioned works. These in fact help push the boundaries of visual storytelling and can become opportunities for trade paperbacks you may see in the future. Will most of these see the light of the high volume offset press then to the big screen? Maybe not in the very near future, but they do help fuel the passion for this unique industry by everyone from the upper escalon to the outskirts.

Despite all the flash, dazzle, alternative press, distribution opportunities, blah blah, we may throw your way, our goal is to adhere to your best interests always. I’ll make a point that we’ll do our very best to support and you as creators, small press, fans, and retailers in your path to success. I assure you also that we will probably get it wrong. I say this because it’s important that you, our community knows, that you have a voice and we do, and will continue to listen, to your ideas, suggestions, or even concerns. That’s not to say we can implement the farm, but we will do our very best to remain conscientious of that which we do put in place.

Secondly, there is no secret war between what would be “indie” and mainstream. I want to thank Diamond, Marvel, Red 5, Arcana, and the guy down the street from my house. If you take a hard look at the playing field, you’ll realize that one evidently could not exist without the other. Creator Owned Comics, allow new talent opportunities in the books from mainstream that you may very well read religiously. I’d have to say that one of my favorites so far is “Proof,” by Alex Grecian, and Riley Rossmo. The dedication and passion of these two rising stars is astounding. Marvel closing their open submission policy wasn’t a slap in the face to upcoming talent, but a way of saving costs through economic turmoil, to an industry mechanic that wasn’t functioning as intended. They are right when they say not everyone can be at the top. Otherwise we’d all be there. But don’t give up hope. A friend said to me recently, discover and know what your good at, but let passion drive and define you (okay I interpreted and paraphrased a little. Thanks Jim). To make it to the top takes a complex combination many elements including little luck. Understanding however in your journeys as a cartoonist, a comic artist, a writer, a retailer, an events creator, etc, regardless of your current professional stature, though we can’t all be Scott McCloud’s, Todd McFarlane’s, or Neil Gaimen’s, there is a place for you somewhere in this industry.

As The fabler, we may open a few doors from time to time. Thanks to all you loyal fans that frequent our pages, and for you new guys out there, expect to see some interesting things as even we The Fabler, find our place in this sea of opportunity.