b3ta.com board

Home » Messageboard » XXX » Message 10676475 (Thread)

Selling stories? Fair game ^^

If the graphic novel I'm writing ever gets completed, I'm thinking of selling it somehow; I know JollyJack uses a site called LuLu to sell his stuff.

(

Bourbon Fox Bourbon is a moron, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 0:30, archived)

Depends what you're selling it for and how

but Lulu can be a good thing. (Check what you upload, and then buy a copy to check what they're printing, though. I got a copy of one of JJ's Sequential Art books and the page order is totally fucked up, and he swears that Lulu buggered it up after upload.) On the other hand, print quality is nice and the cover is lovely. I've also published other books through Lulu and had no problems at all.

For me right now though Lulu is worthless because I'm bound by contract to sell stories for $0.99 or more, and Lulu charge $1 a pop for digital downloads. Me, I can live without paying Lulu a cent every time someone buys one of my stories... Depends what you're wanting it for really.

Also if you put anything on Lulu you may as well whack it on Amazon as well. Amazon have "CreateSpace" which is more or less their version of Lulu. Upload the same PDF and cover, and it hits Amazon US faster than anything from Lulu will, and increases your market surface area. Probably not to any appreciable level if my execrable sales record is anything to go by, but then again I've done as much marketing as I have hang-gliding, and I'm terrified of heights.

(

boris the spider, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 0:59, archived)

Ahh right

well as it stands now, I imagine the final product would be long. Really, REALLY long. We're talking about 18 chapters worth of content.

The main reason I'm doing this graphic novel is because, by and large, I enjoy it. If it's an opportunity to make money whilst doing something I like, then cool. It's just a case of where I could sell it, how, etc. To print it would cost a fucking bomb. I guess my best bet is to take it to a publisher once it's done and ask them.

I doubt it'll be done for another year or thirty, so I've got plenty of time to weigh out my options.

(

Bourbon Fox Bourbon is a moron, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:05, archived)

I'd say contact the Hedgehog from Hell and go roughly his route

Self-publish while you hawk it to agents and publishers - any legal ramifications can be dealt with afterwards when you sign away your soul. Of those, since it's a graphic novel eBooks are a waste of time, so flog it on Lulu and Amazon, and you'll be able to hit most people you'll care about. Both of them take a large but totally bearable cut of the profits to cover printing costs, and the quality coming out of both is actually generally very nice.

(Also it's just occurred to me, if you're colouring your pictures, I don't know what they insist on having uploaded but if you *can* upload everything in CMYK I'd suggest doing so - I've only published print, but I have had cover images come through from the two companies in rather different colours, and for me as a colour-blind moron to notice that is quite impressive. At least if you do your own remapping you've got control over what comes out of it.)

(

boris the spider, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:13, archived)

That's kind of what will be a problem to me once I leave uni.

Whether I should sign on with a design agency or go freelance. Most post-graduate lecturers say they went freelance for a bit and then got picked up by an agent. Sounds like a good angle.

I think the pages will be in greyscale, I'm not too sure yet. JollyJack seems to get by without using colour, but I think a splash of colour would help quite a lot.

(

Bourbon Fox Bourbon is a moron, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:26, archived)

the problem's only really with converting from rgb to cmyk

so the differences won't be *that* major, or shouldn't be. if it's only a splash of colour here or there on each picture it's not even going to be noticeable. if it's full-colour spreads all the way through it may not be noticeable until you compare the two printouts - then it may or may not concern you. i'm probably just anal :)

also, my alarm is going off in five hours. joy.

(

boris the spider, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:30, archived)

Yeah, my tutors have been grilling us about CMYK for a while now.

I do get it, it's just not too much of a problem for me, being able to instantly switch modes in Photoshop, etc.

I better go to bed now, gotta be up SO early D: thanks for the advice, and see you later! :D

(

Bourbon Fox Bourbon is a moron, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:34, archived)

haha

yeah photoshop can help, but even photoshop's just using one or another mapping - no idea what, since i don't have photoshop. i'm using whatever it is epson put on my computer along with the printer drivers, since i work with gimp (which is *STILL* motherfucking rgb only, which is obviously why it's "professional standard" yes, fat linux nerds, it's *totally* professional so long as you don't care about, you know, usability, or features, or semi-professional colour-spaces, or useability, or a non-shitty UI, or useability, or..... ahem) but there a quite a few journals insist i provide them with figures in cmyk, most likely so that i'm liable for any colour problems.

as for advice, i don't know how helpful any is but anything i can offer i'm happy to :)

(

boris the spider, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:41, archived)

I used to do the in-house design work at a printers. Honest. I know I only post junk here.

When it comes to offset lithographic printing, it's REALLY important to understand the difference between CMYK and RGB.
One small example - when you convert from RGB to CMYK, the 'black' will be made up of all 4 colours, which can lead to all sorts of nightmares with registration.
And switching back and forth will make your colours all mushy and inaccurate.
Beware.

(

4Q just lurking, Tue 31 Jan 2012, 1:44, archived)