ComixLaunch: Crowdfunding for Writers, Artists & Self-Publishers on Kickstarter... and Beyond!

Anthology projects draw on the creativity and talent of many different creators contributing to one shared project. With a long-gestating anthology finally launched, ComixLaunch host Tyler James is on the hotseat for a change, as a roundtable of creators brainstorm ideas for ways to encourage and empower the contributing creators to promote the project during the Kickstarter. Note, this episode is a clip from "Of Mice and Wolves: A Comics Workshop Show" hosted by JD Calderon and Rob Multari on JD's YouTube Channel. Watch the full workshop episode and more of JD's streams at https://www.youtube.com/@JDCalderon

In this month's ComixLaunch Pro spotlight, two-time Harvey Award Nominated cartoonist Craig Taillerfer, shares insight from his creative journey. An early member of ComixLaunch Pro, Craig took a long five year hiatus after his first successful launch... but that didn't stop him from having his best launch ever!

Comic book collector's are a major part of the crowdfunding and direct market ecosystem. In this session, Tyler chats with Josh Eggebeen, a life long collector and one of the authors of After Action Report: An Unofficial Collector Guide Book for G.I. Joe & Transformers Comics. They'll discuss the current state of the comic collecting, how crowdfunding changed the game for collectors and creators alike, and what creators can do to make their offerings more attractive to the collector class!

Creator Matthew Schofield is in the ComixLaunch Pro spotlight this month. Matt is an animator, storyboard artist and director who has worked on films such as Cats Don't Dance, Prince of Egypt and The Iron Giant. In this interview with Clay Adams, Matt shares his creator owned journey bringing his superhero comedy webcomic, Steamroller Man to Kickstarter.

A ComixLaunch listener alerted Tyler to a sudden and suspicious proliferation of seemingly AI-Generated Comic Book Kickstarter projects that have appeared on the platform recently. After taking a look, it does indeed seem like something fishy is going on, and one or more actors have been able to get obviously soulless, fraudulent projects past the Kickstarter project screeners. In this session, Tyler shares signs of obviously fraudulent comic book Kickstarter projects, discuss the ramifications should projects like this proliferate on Kickstarter, and offer advice on what legitimate creators should do now.

Commonwealth Comix co-founders Ryan Kroboth and John Endingfield II join Tyler for a discussion about their new partnership and collaboration on Wurst & Mayhem, a D&D style adventure comic. We'll talk about the evolution from friendship to creative partnership, the challenges and best practices for getting a new joint venture off the ground, and how much fun they're having on the new project!

Join us for a special panel on ComicTopia, the inaugural crowdfunding event hosted on BackerKit this month. The discussion features Lafayette Morrow from BackerKit, as well as creators including James Mascia of Dren Productions, writer Frank Martin, Joel Rodriguez of Metal Ninja Studios, and Eric Erdek, known for Espresso Detective. Lafayette provides an overview of BackerKit’s evolution from a crowdfunding support tool to a full-featured platform, emphasizing community engagement tools and their successful transition to hosting events like Pintopia and ComicTopia. Creators involved share insights on their current projects, their experiences with BackerKit’s platform, and unique event features such as cross-collaborations and the backer train feature. The discussion also touches on issues like handling mature content and strategies for successful crowdfunding.

In this episode of ComixLaunch, Tyler James interviews Christian Douglas, a Dublin-based writer and founder of Unpopular Comics. They discuss Christian's creative journey, his new Kickstarter campaign for 'Unpopular Tales 2: Pinochia, a cyberpunk retelling of the classic fairy tale, and the broader mission of Unpopular Comics to revitalize classic stories with modern twists.

For the past decade, illustrator Dave Swartz has moved from self-publishing, to pencil-for-hire, and back again. His current project, Confederate Monster is back on Kickstarter. In this conversation, he and Tyler will discuss the challenges and opportunities for comic book illustrators working in comics today.

In this session, Tyler will share his top insights from attending a presentation by Andrew Marks, director of Kickstarter's new Kickstarter Performance team, outlining what this new crowdfunding marketing service can do for creators, and answering questions from Kickstarter users.