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Baz at BICS 2008

Had this missive turn up at the Yahoo Independent Comics Group so thought it might be of interest to those CBOers out there.  Take it way,Baz:

“Hi all

Thought I’d throw this idea out there to the groups, see what people think.

Back in one glorious month of August 2005, a group of comic creators across the UK took part in a simultaneous event over the bank holiday weekend. The “Comics Nation- 365 days and counting” event included workshops, signings in creators local comic stores, libraries, and bookshops. The results can be seen here: http://comicsnation .blogspot. com/

I’ve been think its probably time to do another Comics Nation event next year, but this time bigger better and leading into a major comics convention.

Looking at the schedule of 2009 on Paul Gravett’s site, we have a few to choose from:

February 14 to 15, 2009: Hi Ex ‘09, Inverness.

March 14, 2009: UK Webcomixthing, London

May 8 to 10, 2009: Bristol International Comic Expo, Bristol.

June 4 to 6, 2009: 2D Festival 2009, Derry, Northern Ireland.

July 18 to 19, 2009: London Film and Comic Con, London.

And more than likely, later in the year, another BICS and ComICA events to be added to the list.

With all this going on you’re probably wondering why bother doing another Comics Nation. Well, rather than wait for the people to come to you at these events, we’re saying go to THEM, in the places where you know they’ll be: galleries, libraries, comic shops, cafes, bookshops, schools, universities. By you engaging with them, opening their eyes to what is going on around them will encourage them to be more involved and more creative themselves. If this event happens just before a major con, they’ll probably want to go and check out other peoples work too. At the very least, as creators, you will sell more copies of your book.

Last time I created a questionaire for people to complete and provide their chosen venue with any relevant info on what they would be planning to do and sell; a press contacts list which can be added to by individuals; and a standard press release which people could alter to fit with their event, and a general FAQ. The results were added to the blog.

I’ll be doing the same this time round, and of course with the benefits of facebook, youtube, podcasts and numerous other sites, we can get greater coverage than ever before.

So if you fancy organising an event, if you already have an event that you’d like to include under the banner of Comics Nation and benefit from the cross publicity, if you have any ideas or queries, let us know. At the moment I’m looking again at the august bank holiday 2009, but I’m open to suggestions.

Email us offlist at editor@enginecomics .co.uk.

cheers

Baz
www.enginecomics. co.uk”