Hey, all. Happy New Year — I can still say that, yeah? We’re only three weeks in. [Wait… We’re only three weeks in!?] This installment’s kicking off with a few things we want to highlight from our friends.
Just so we’re clear, we have no financial interest in any of it*—and in all cases, we either reached out to them, or they don’t know we’re doing this at all. Nobody put us up to this, is all I’m saying.
Okay, off we go—
Kelly Sue
*Kenny frequently uses our books in his Bindings sample images, which I suppose is a kind of perk/financial interest? FWIW, we didn’t ask him to do that, but we do love it. So… okay, now I think you know everything and you can evaluate our objectivity as you see fit.
Onward.
LA Fires
Here’s a directory of GoFundMe campaigns to help displaced Black Families in Altadena.
I was meant to be in Pasadena for the Next Stage Summit, which was cancelled due to the fires. The good folks at No Proscenium somehow managed—while dealing with their own safety concerns and everything that comes with cancelling your biggest event of the year—somehow managed to put together this Google Doc listing resources and ways you can help. It’s by no mean exhaustive, but it’s a great place to start.
You’ve been wanting one of these “No Notes” hats anyway. Get one for you and one for every professional creative on your holiday gift list and contribute to California Fire Foundation & Direct Relief all at the same time.
Sweet Shop!
Kenny and the team at Sweet! have been celebrating their recent milestones & the year ahead with their Sweet Road Map & a week of updates about their tools, including a Bindings update and the launch of FYCS (Find Your Comic Store). We invited him to tell you about it directly — you can read that below—but on the FYCS note, I had a thing to add:
Here’s a thing you can do to help — check and see if your shop is listed and let them know if any of the info is incorrect. If you’re a retailer, claim your shop!
Handing it over to Kenny now…
—
Hi, Kenny here. It’s likely very FEW of you know me but I run a company called Sweet and we’re building software for comic folk. Kelly Sue has graciously invited me here today to talk about our product Bindings.
You’ve probably seen Kelly Sue’s recent guide to Final Order Cutoff, shared with Bindings. It’s a tool for comic book marketing. Part fancier Linktree, part digital comic reader, Bindings is built for all the various ways that comic and Webtoon authors need to share and market their books.
With entire social networks playing with their light switch to curry favor for a strange orange man, it’s super important to have a place everyone can consistently go to find you and your work. Bindings lets you upload your comics and create unique shareable links. You can add what we call actions to them, our little widgets, for displaying all the different places your audience needs to go.
Here’s an example share that encourages users to find their local store and has final order cutoff date on it.
Here you can encourage people to sign up for your newsletter.
When people click on your link they can preview your comic or read the whole thing (however much you want to share!). You can even password protect it for special folks, and we’ve had some creators use it to share works-in-progress. There are many, many ways to customize your shares. AND you get analytics, so you can learn where your audience is (down to the city) and which social networks drive the most traffic to your book.
The best parts is, it’s $5 for 100 pages/slices. No subscription required. We’ll keep your comic up as long as you let us. We work with vertical formats, manga (right-to-left) AND western-style comics. You can upload multiple JPGs, PDFs, PNGs, or TIFFs.
So please, sign up or email us if you have any questions! We’ll get right back to ya, and thanks for reading. Rock on. 🤘
P.S. We’re also building a new digital comic store.
Geek Girl Strong
It’s that time of year where we all recommit to our health — I’m trying to eat more whole foods, particularly fresh veggies, and I signed up for a powerlifting meet in April — only my second ever and my first since before the pandemic.
If you’re feeling some kinda way too, and you want some support on that journey, our friend Robyn Warren of Geek Girl Strong, has a Patreon, here’s a little bit about her offerings:
Wellness Worksheets + Live Sessions: Tools and supportive community discussions to help you level up.
Geeky Workout Playlists: Themed monthly playlists for workouts, dance parties, or even chores.
Digital Workout Cards: Printable, equipment-free exercise cards with movement demo videos.
HP/MP Postcards: Recipes and journaling prompts delivered to your mailbox!
And since you’re our friend, which in turn make you Robyns friend, you get a discount! Use code MILKFED to get 50% off your first month of Patreon-ship!
All Aces
It’s not news to anyone that social media platforms are reaching tipping points where the benefits no longer outweigh the harms. We’re all rethinking our digital lives and strategies, weighing legitimate concern against legitimate concern, and it’s interesting to see the beginnings of a shift back to toward tools like forums (sometimes reborn as Discords, like the FML one), personal sites, web-rings, and newsletters. Most of what’s appealing is either private or semi-private and/or allows for more thoughtful expression/interaction than what you get in 240 characters or a quick pic.
Carson Ellis sums up a lot of our feelings on the matter here. Click through to read the whole thing:
Clayton Cowles speaks for a lot of us when he says
Though I recognize the benefits of having a social media presence
(especially if I want to do something besides lettering one day),
I was happiest last year when I wasn’t reading my feeds,
and I want more of that in 2025.
Great letterers, like great translators, are easy to overlook because when they do their job well, their hand is invisible. Clayton Cowles is one of the best. More than that, he’s an ace professional and an ace human. And he’s started a free newsletter.
Here’s what each edition will include:
A sound effect of the month!
A list of the month’s releases with my name in them!
Q&A! I’ll answer some questions from you lovely followers. Ask whatever questions you like* in the comments section! Here’s where we can interact!
Lettering tips! I’ll share some tips and tricks I’ve picked up over the years--ranging from the craft of lettering itself to time management to staying alive in this whackadoodle industry. I have a few months’ worth of topics lined up already, but if you’re curious about any particular subject, feel free to ask about it in the Q&A link above, and I’ll gladly answer it here!
Shoutouts! If friends of mine are doing something cool or have received a well-deserved lauding, I’ll shout it out here.
Recommendations! I’ll recommend one comics thing (current or vintage), and one non-comics thing (a book, show, album, podcast--whatever it is I’m enjoying).
And, finally, a cat photo!
You know you want that cat photo.
And finally —
Adventureman Returns!
‘Adventureman’ Returns From Image Comics With ‘Family Tree’ in stores March 19th, with covers by Dodson and Rion Chow, which you can check out below.
FML Issue 3!
Dropped January 15th and it’s not too late to pick it up. If you need a little encouragement, the League of Comic Geeks have a bunch of their thoughts up here and it’s on GoodReads here.
Toledo Library Book Club Zoom
Do you love comics and graphic novels (or looking to get into them)? Join us as we discuss some of the most thought-provoking and artistically striking comics from across a variety of genres.
Meetings take place via Zoom. Registered participants will be emailed meeting information prior to the event. Author events will feature a moderated discussion followed by participant Q&A.
Thursday, March 20th - Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons by Kelly Sue Deconnick, Phil Jimenez, Gene Ha, and Nicola Scott. Details in link.
You read all the way to the end! Thank you. Here’s a treat—wait, here’s TWO treats. No! THREE:
And One Day We Will Die: Strange Stories Inspired by the Music of Neutral Milk Hotel. I had no idea this existed and I’m delighted.
This t-shirt is in bad taste and I am definitely considering buying it. I know. I’m sorry. I’m on my path but I have growing to do yet.
The pink Party Witch shirts have landed!
xo
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