I’m looking at the web site as it comes along and begin wondering if I should go back to coloring the comics. There’s a part of me that wants to do it, just because with the current state of the comics industry, especially given that Diamond Comics has raaised it’s minimum dollar amounts that a comic has to be expected to make for Diamond and for the publisher to be carried again. Don’t ask me to explain it, since , as wiith most things with Diamond, it’s not been made entirely clear. Nevertheless, it creates problems for smaller publishers at the time that they’re trying to establish a foothold to get into the comic book marketplace.
Those of you that favor free market capitalism should find this move by Diamond to be deplorable. Diamond sits, thanks to the exclusivity deals signed with the major publishers in the 1990s, as the one company that a comic shop must do business with in order to draw any traffic. These exclusivity deals took Diamond’s competition and neutered them, making it impossible for get orders from comic shops in any amount that could be considered profitable based solely on small publishers struggling to keep publishing in an era where comics were selling in numbers only previously enjoyed in the days of paper drives. There are still smaller distributors out there, but they remain small fish feasting off the castoffs from the big fish called Diamond.
With this move to only carry those comics that make them the most money, they have determined which publishers shall survive. A publisher can, in this market, put out books of indomitable artistic merit, but until it gets the word of mouth necessary to survive, its numbers will most likely not reach these new numbers to survive. These publishers need to do a print run at quantities that they can afford to sell to Diamond at a 60% discount and hope to make a profit, not just to recoup the expense of the printed book but for the next comic to be printed as well. Unfortunately, given the sales of most independent comics, this is nearly impossible to do and presnt a $2.99 price point, the standard in the industry until, if rumors are to be believed, Marvel’s greedy profit-grabbing move of raising the price on comics to $3.99. Even at $3.99, this meansthat a small publisher has to be able to print their comics at a rate of eighty cents each. It’s been a while since I did any offset printing, so I don’t know how possible that is.
Which brings me back to my original topic, whether to color the comics or not. Well, the leading factor is that this is probably the most exposure these comics will ever get. Presenting them in color doesn’t cost me anything but time. The real issue that has me riding the fence is if I can do it in a manner that serves the story well, and is esthetically sound. I’ll let you know how that works out.
