DemonCon 11... first Con of the year.

It's become a bit of a tradition that Accent UK start their convention season with a trip down south, and via a number of motorways end up in Maidstone for the Demon Con event run by the local Grinning Demon store.
It's a small event when compared to the MCMs and SuperCons but it is great fun and actually we do OK sales-wise too.
This year, as with previous years, me and Gary Crutchley were the Accent UK team, which we like to call the A-Team. Armed with a good selection of stock, including the newly printed Tales Of WesterNoir #2, we were set up by 10.30 and had time to wander around the event before the doors opened to a decent sized crowd at 11am.

We took the customized Lego with us again as this tends to interest the kids but left the Standees at home as the table was quite busy and last year were forever knocking them over.
The were actually very few points in the day when we had nobody in front of the stall. It would be interesting to know how the percentage of 'idle' time at this show compared with the MCMs, I think favourably would be the answer.
One young lad picked up a copy of Stephenson's Robot only to come dashing back less than 10 minutes later for issue 2. He admitted that he hadn't finished reading issue 1 yet but said that he loved the artwork and didn't want to miss getting the next comic, which is all you can ask really in terms of feedback.
WesterNoir continues to sell really well. The sketchpacks of 'Season 1' flew off the table but we also had a number of customers returning for more after picking up some issues last year.
We'd almost hit last years total by lunch time and sales continued into the afternoon.
I also caught up with someone who had been so inspired by our discussion over my customized Lego figures last year, and his superpower that enables him to tell which figure is in which MiniFig bag, that he had his own stall and now sell Lego MiniFigs. I picked up a couple for future modification.
I had time to catch up with Dean Beattie who does a great comic called Random Trials (and the Con poster above) and share views on the comic book convention scene, and then it was time to stop.
We had a really great day.
We sold a good number of books.
We talked about our books with a lot of the people of Kent.
We talked Lego and had fun with families trying to link figure with comic book.
We talked SteamPunk (and the new conventions in Kent (find out more by emailing GreatKentSpectations@hotmail.co.uk)).
We even had time for Earl Grey Tea and a toasted sandwich.
See you all again next year.

DemonCon 9.

It's the start of a new year of Comic Cons.
We now have an ongoing series on its 5th issue and another just starting out.
We've listened to the advice of our friends, both competitors, customers and our printer (Stuart Gould) and have decided to heed their advice and change the look of our table.
We've decided to move away from having a table full of all sorts of comics to having one that focuses on displaying the ongoing series, and whatever we might have that's new.
This meant putting all of the old books into a box on the table, making them harder for potential customers to spot when passing the stall.
DemonCon 9, being our first Con of the year, was where we tried it all out.
We had some new WesterNoir Standees.
We took my little Accent UK modified Lego figures.
We had Gary's great sketches.
We had to try it.

Gary awaits the first customer.

It was a long drive down, and we met Graham owner of the Grinning Demon comic shop and DemonCon event organizer as we were setting up. He was worried that the event wouldn't have as many customers as last year, there had been a problem with printing the fliers in time, and he wanted to apologize up front. We were pretty relaxed about it though, we were here and we were going to enjoy ourselves.
We were happy with how much less cluttered the table looked, and in fact I'm not sure we could have fitted everything on if we set it up as we had in the past.
The standees were great...

...giving a nice third dimension to the table. We will certainly be getting more of them made for future Cons.
The whole WesterNoir side of the table was a pleasure to look at. It's amazing having 5 issues of a title on sale, and interest in them was pretty constant throughout the day. A good number of customers bought all 6 titles (they picked up Tales of WesterNoir as well), and it was great to have customers from last year pick up the latest issues with a contented smile on their faces.
It did seem a little quieter than last year, but the customers that we did have more than made up for it and by the end of the day we'd increased our sales by 10%.

WesterNoir 5 ... can't wait for Issue 6 now :o)

The box of back issues also seemed to work, with a good number of customer looking through it and some pulling out and buying our older stock.
So, all in all I think the new layout is pretty successful. We'll no doubt play with it over time and modify it here and there, but on the whole it'll stay pretty much as is.
My little modified Lego Figures were also a success and drew a lot of people to the stall. The kids had great fun matching the figures to the comics, and also demonstrating their knowledge by telling me which bits of which figures I'd used in their construction. I also got a top tip from a father who was often trying to find that illusive final figure without spending a fortune and amassing hundreds of doubles.
A great day. A great little Con.
We'll be back next year for certain.

The First Comic Con of the year.

Tomorrow see us (that's me and Gary Crutchley) set off pretty early for DemonCon 9 in Maidstone, although it starts at 11am it's a long drive down from Stoke. Well worth the trip though as last year we had a great time and found the event to be really well managed and well attended.
This time around we will be launching WesterNoir Issue 5, which is a pivotal issue as it really starts to explain some of the events that Josiah Black finds himself in the middle of.

We'll also have the first issues of Tales Of WesterNoir and Stephenson's Robot (which has been reviewed over on DownTheTubes), both of which are new to the event.
Hope to see you there.

January activity.

WesterNoir #5 is very nearly completed, and we're looking to launch it at the DemonCon event in Maidstone on the 15th February.

This is the issue that really turns things around I think, and leads deeper into the bigger story that is taking place around Josiah. You can see a page or two over on Gary's blog.
INDIO! has been busy as well, and has now completed all artwork on the main story pages of Issue 4 of Stephenson's Robot, I just need to colour them now. Fabulous as always. I'll need to give issue 1 a bit more of time to sell at Cons this year before printing Issue 2, but am looking to print it over the summer at latest, ready in plenty of time for the year's autumn and winter conventions.

A page from Issue 2 sees Stephenson and Brunel hard at work.

Apart from these, Mal Earl is sending some great pages to me on our collaboration for issue 2 of Tales Of WesterNoir and I'm busy greyscaling pages of From SuperZeroes To SuperHeroes.
So, a pretty busy start to the year.

The Start Of A New Chapter.

It's been a very busy month.
I've started my new role at Lloyds, sorted out a new car, worked out how to get to Wythenshawe, kept in touch with a good friend from the Co-op and met up with some old ones from Barclays.
In the background I've also managed to do some more grey-scaling on the From Super Zeroes To Super Heroes book, sort out the printing of Issue 4 of WesterNoir and go to our first Comic Con of the year.
So, starting off with my new role, I'm happy to say it's a pretty good fit for who I am, what I know and how I operate. I'm part of a great team of people and really like where the company is going. I've been out and about already with trips to London and Halifax (thanks mainly to Tom Tom).
As I promised myself at the back end of last year, this time I'm not going to allow all of the friends I've made at the Co-op just fade away.
I spent a very enjoyable evening catching up with Claire, I can't believe that so much has happened in just a month. Claire's daughter Olivia, amused by my attempt at a beard, has supplied me with another, updated, portrait with some great use of colour. Thanks Olivia.

A bearded Dave West by Olivia Smith.

I've also met up with three co-founding members of my old Barclay's Sci-Fi group, The Undiscovered Country Club. I'd not seen Sandy, Roger or Rod for about 3 years but it was as if we'd spoken only last week (well, OK, we had on Facebook but you know what I mean). We shared a geeky chat over food and beer, reminiscing over old times and bringing each other up to date with things. We've all been pretty busy.

A grey-scaled sample of Seba's artwork on the
Polara story in From Super Zeroes to Super Heroes.

From a comic book perspective, I've been too tired to do too much creative work on Strange Times Book 2, as I've had plenty of reading to do for my new role, but have managed to fit in some grey-scaling on From Super Zeroes To Super Heroes. Artist Seba Velez's artwork gets better with each story and whilst it is a time consuming process I'm really happy with how the finished story pages are looking.

WesterNoir Book 4 has been printed, and looks fabulous. A great cliff-hanging end to the first mini-series this book was launched at our first Con of the year, DemonCon7 in Maidstone. Pop over to www.accentukcomics.blogspot for a report on the Con day and also pop over to curiosityofasocialmisfit.blogspot.co.uk for Pat Challis's very early review of the comic itself.

So, all in all a pretty busy and productive month. Next month will see us at the Birmingham MCM event on the 22nd and 23rd. Should be fun.

WesterNoir Issue 4.

Well, it's a great way to start the year, Issue 4 of our on going Western Horror title is complete. OK, there may be a little tidying up left to do but the story pages are done and the cover...

well, the cover looks awesome.
Gary has produced another striking cover, beautifully coloured by the very talented Matt Soffe (and do pop over and check out Matt's work on his blog, you'll thank me), on top of which Andy Bloor has worked his magical design fingers to add the logo he designed for the book, the title(s) and that aged effect that works so well.
Peeling back the layers we can see the coloured artwork without the design elements...

and taking away the colour we're left with Gary's great penmanship...

If you study the picture you'll spot a certain Colin Mathieson and also Andy Bloor on their own WANTED posters. You'll only get $100 for turning in Colin it seems, but Mr Bloor is worth a not inconsiderable $1500, I'll go get my sidearm.
We intend to launch this issue at the upcoming DemonCon7 event in Maidstone, which will be our first Con of the year and also our first time at DemonCon.
For those who don't know, DemonCon is a ''family friendly comic convention in the centre of Maidstone, Kent. With the new venue, Royal Star Arcade, proving to be a massive hit, this Demoncon promises to be the best yet, with more artists & writers and a number of big names. Amazingly talented guests, vendors, bar, cafe, traditional sweet shop, gaming and cosplay, what more could you ask for. An after show party I hear you ask....done''.
See you all there on Sunday 16th February.