kickstarter – Nerdcenaries

ERAS Fung – Building A New Story Via Kickstarter

April 4, 2013April 4, 2013 Luke Herr

I am doing another Minicomic Kickstarter with artist Brian Wolf and then former Nerdcenaries contributor Ziah Grace and Nick Rockel are doing a comic as well. I wanted to make a post about it to go more into what the story I am writing, ERAS: Fung is going to be about.

The first ERAS story, ERAS Parrish is something I’ll totally regard as a failure on my part. I didn’t get a second opinion till it was done and that opinion hated it. Parrish ended up focusing too much on a dramatic story with issues of masculinity and white knighting that suddenly changed into a horror story with monsters in it in the last 2 pages. Not very good on my part – the balance was off like a seesaw with a boulder on one side.

With ERAS Fung I realized I needed an actual story to wrap the issues around, instead of issues to base a story on. I needed to lay the bricks before pouring the paint. Luckily the story came more easily since the artist wanted to do the drug/murder mystery based on Dr. Fung and my loose pitch of that.

Operation Minicomic Kickstarter

February 18, 2013February 18, 2013 Luke Herr

Minicomics on Kickstarter?

I’ve done a few comics fundraisers on Kickstarter now. The first one – I lost money on it in the end. The second one – still in sort of limbo but was only barely – financially speaking successful. But with ERAS: Parrish, while it didn’t pull in as much money as I’d have liked – it got the formula down for The Tomb of Naomi which has been a success so far and that is an important thing!

To a degree all it takes to run a successful Kickstarter minicomic are three things; the ability to do math, the ability to make quality products and the ability to call in an audience who supports you. After the jump I’ll go into each part and talk about what worked for me.

Real Interviews: Kyle Starks

February 6, 2013February 6, 2013 Luke Herr

This week Nerdcenaries sat down with Kyle Starks to talk about Ricky Thunder, the comic he is Kickstarting.

Real Interviews- Kickstarter Runner and My Boss, Luke Herr

October 1, 2012October 1, 2012 Ziah Grace

This week, I interviewed my boss, and perennial success story, Luke Herr, about his ongoing Kickstarter project. Hit the jump to see more.

No Enemy But Peace Launches Kickstarter

July 19, 2012July 19, 2012 Ziah Grace

Professional animator and cartoonist, Richard C. Meyer, is currently running a Kickstarter campaign for his upcoming graphic novel “No Enemy, But Peace” about the heroics he witnessed in Iraq from other Marines. His plans for the Kickstarter include adding digital coloring and paying the original artist for additional pages, including redrawing Meyer’s original pages.

Find out more and see some art below.

The Penny Arcade Kickstarter

July 10, 2012July 10, 2012 Luke Herr

I had a weird flashback this morning to choir back in high school. A friend and I were discussing webcomics and I was like “oh cool!” and he suggested Penny Arcade. I went to the site, checked out the page and couldn’t work my way around the navigation. They had small buttons and archive issues and after 20 minutes of trying to get into a grove I went back to reading Dominic Deegan (and holy crap was that years ago).
A few years later once I had working wireless and a laptop I went through, read through the archives and was like “Ok, this isn’t amazing but they improved over time.” I bought their first two games for my Mac two years later when I was sunk down with depression and they were okay. I ended up watching Penny Arcade TV which was okay again.
Penny Arcade has been this always there, but nothing really special force for me. I’d had other favorite video game comics come up and when I stopped caring about games I’d still read it.
But Penny Arcade has done good things with it’s money that I like. The Child’s Play Charity is something that I can get behind. Hosting the Extra Credits video series is pretty fantastic because the series is really well done. I have a group of friends who go to at least one PAX every year and they rave about it. And despite some of the stuff tied to Scott Kurtz, I’ve enjoyed other videos on the Penny Arcade TV thing.
So you get where I am coming from – I don’t hate the Penny Arcade guys. I wish I had their success and money so I could do something but I don’t actively oppose them – but I really hate their Kickstarter – not because of them, but because it is a poorly run Kickstarter.
I’ve run a few Kickstarters, I’ve paid into a few and I’ve had friends do the same so I support the work that I do. It is a great tool to try and get donations easily while also giving people something worthwhile for their hard earned money. It is a way to honestly show your appreciation for what people do. Penny Arcade has now infamously done this in the one of the worst possible fashions (though not as good as the Kickstarter about a bet who would go to hell and Osama Bin Laden who was a demon.)