KINGS OF OVERGROVE: A Review and what you can learn from what they’re doing!

I found Kings of Overgrove through twitter (@KingsOvergrove) while looking for other independent comic book creators.  Kings of Overgrove caught my attention because the creator is giving away half his graphic novel for free.  He also created a motion comic he published on YouTube.

The Website

http://kingsofovergrove.com/

What I love

From the first look at the website, we can tell that Kings of Overgrove is special.  The site has a great design that reflects the story, is easy to navigate, promotes the viewer to share the site, and allows for comments.  You can’t ask for anything more from a website.  It looks great and it does its job!

For those of you who read this blog for my articles on Internet Marketing for Artists or are starting your own online comic book, you can probably learn a lot from this site.  If you’re putting together your online portfolio, promoting your project, or publishing an online series this is a great website to explore before creating your own.

Reading the Comic

Madman of Magic Kickstarter Update 10

For those backers that are suppose to get a .pdf copy of the comic, they were sent out last week. If you are suppose to get one and you didn’t please email me. No new news on the printer and the timeline on distribution, but I will have all that figured out by Monday.

“Thank you” section

For those backers of $5, $10, and $25 or above please check the last update to make sure your name is on the list, is spelled correctly, and is how you want it to appear in the comic book.

I will need any changes and/or corrections by January 1st.

Reviewers are in on the digital comic book (.pdf version) and people are digging the comic.
Here are the reaction I have received from backers so far.

Madman of Magic #1 update #9

At the bottom of this update is the list of all of those who are in the “Thank You” section.  If you are supposed to be on the list (backers of $10 or more and $5 backers), please check that your name is on the list and spelled correctly.

We are still doing changes to the comic book, but we are very close!

The entire family is helping

Down to 3 printers

More Madman of Magic Questions

I got some more questions via facebook message and YouTube Comments that I felt others might find interesting.  You can see my Last Q&A Session at

jasonloveslife.com/kickstarter-madman-of-magic

Question

How much would it cost to make the comic book in total.

Answer

It is a hard question to answer.
Easily $2,000. According to my research. A starting comic book writer would get paid $1800 and the artist around $2500 (I can find my references on this, but that is what I found online). So for a company hiring people to make the comic book it would be $4,300 (not including a colorist) plus publishing costs, marketing, fixed costs, etc. etc. For us to do it, the biggest cost is our time. For those using kickstarter you have to include Kickstarters 5%, Amazon’s 5%, cost to create rewards, postage, and other costs that pop up.

Not sure if this is what you meant, but I hope it helps.

Question

I love the project, but I am broke and can’t afford to back it.

Kickstarter Madman of Magic Q&A

I have received a lot of questions surrounding my choices with Kickstarter and the Madman of Magic Comic Book project. I figure instead of answering the same questions over and over again, I will share them here for everyone to read.
If you have a question of your own, leave it in the comment section and I will answer them too.

Question

What do you think of Kickstarter?

Answer

Kickstarter is ideal for projects like mine.  My wife and I don’t have any way to raise funding for investing in this project or, at least in our case, not to cover all of it.  With Kickstarter we can pre-sell and see if people are interested in our work.  It turns out they are interested in our project and in a big way.

Question

Isn’t Kickstarter a scam?

Answer

I guess it depends on how you define scam or who’s projects you fund.  I am not sure what happens if a user doesn’t fulfill his backer’s rewards.  Maybe someone could have a project, collect the money, and run.  I am not sure, but the 3 projects I have funded all seem to be fulfilling their rewards

DC Comics Now Available on Kindle, iTunes, Nook and What it means for Independent Publishers

I am excited to see DC comic in Kindle, iTunes, and Nook market.  So much so that I have decided to do a post and a video.  I cover the same material in the video and the post, however,I get a little long winded and the editing gets a little weird, but if you would rather watch that I figure you can choose.

Are you ready to stop going to the comic book shop every Wednesday for your fix of  Justice League, Bat Girl, Green Lantern. Besides the fact no one reads Bat Girl, you will soon be able to pick them up without leaving the house… Sweet, that means I never have take off my pajamas or put on real shoes.

DC Entertainment (the mother ship of DC Comics, Vertigo, and MAD) announced today it will be launching their entire line of comic books for download from the Kindle Store, iBookstore and NOOK.

DC Entertainment is the top comic book publisher in the United States and now the only comic book publisher to bring their full line up of comic book properties to the major e-book store platforms.

Why is DC Comics Now Available on Kindle, iTunes, Nook?

It ‘s a Boy

A Halloween Trick.

My wife is due on November 24th (less than a month away) so I posted these photos on facebook as a joke.

As you can imagine it caused a little confusion but I found it entertaining if anything else.  I guess this is what happens when I spend too much time in the office alone.

I assume some of you would enjoy the Halloween joke.

The image on the left was originally from me holding my niece while visiting family several years ago.  The big baby body was from an image of one of the biggest baby’s ever born (I found it on the internet).  The face is my best friend Jeff Lang.

I used photoshop to create it.  The image at the bottom of the page I animated once for a video about myself I created for my youtube channel several years ago.  You can see it here.

What I should have done was put a caption in the image like all those memes people are using on facebook with my website at the bottom. Since I already posted it, I probably will not do that.  Also, because it is so personal and created for my friends that know who I am and what Jeff looks like it might not be as funny to those that don’t know Jeff or me personally.

At the very least I hope you enjoy it.

You can see the facebook image and comments HERE