WHAT'S THE DILLY, YO
Q.
When’s the deadline?
I must hand in my materials by end of
April, 2014. The earlier I can settle stuff the more likely it will be in the
book.
Q.
When will the book be published?
Provisional dates, as per contract:
UK publication: October 2014 (Robinson)
US publication: December
2014 (Running Press)
Q. What about copyright?
All creators retain copyright etc. in
their works, as they should.
You will need to sign a supplied copyright clearance form – this is to
establish that you are the rightful copyright owner, and that you grant
permission for the usage of your work. In this way we are both legally covered.
I will provide this form in due course.
Please note: this permission grants non-exclusive world all languages rights. This means that your work remains yours to do with as you
please. Meanwhile the publishers are free to negotiate any future foreign
language/electronic editions of the complete work – that is to say, the whole
book, including your work. More folks get to see it.
Q. How big is the book?
Pretty big.
Royal Format = 153mm
(w) x 234mm (h)
Extent = 448 pages, B+W,
colour covers
If you want an idea of how the final
book might look, you can check out other comics compilations in the Mammoth
book series:
The Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics
(ed: Paul Gravett)
The Mammoth Book of Best War Comics
(ed: David Kendall)
The Mammoth Book of Best Horror
Comics (ed: Peter Normanton)
Although, of course, ours will be better…
Q. What’s the spec for artwork?
In most instances the original art
dimensions / files/ previously printed sizes will need to be rescanned. The
following is VERY IMPORTANT
NB: Image resolution for scans MUST
BE at least 600dpi for black and white artwork (whether bitmap or greyscale)
Tiffs required, not jpegs.
The “live art” area within the total
printed page dimensions =
134mm (w) x 204mm (h)
(3165 x 4819 pixels @ 600 dpi)
- not including any bleed.
Please note that the total
page size (printed page dimensions) =
153mm (w) x 234mm (h)
(3614 x 5528 pixels @ 600dpi)
These measurements should not
be confused with the optimal size of your artwork on the page, given above.
If in doubt, see the supplied rough visual for optimal page layout –
MBOCC_live_art_in_total_page_area.tif
– it appears next at the end of this current series of
posts.
Basically: A little extra
white page at the bottom, but good clearance all round. In a big book like this
detail might otherwise disappear down the central margin.
Q. Can
I forward these details to my comics pals?
As editor for this first volume, I take
responsibility for the selection of content. I already have a list of people in
mind to approach for specific works. You can make a suggestion if you like, but
I will have to balance this against the choice of content overall – and practically
speaking will need to be most likely already familiar with the work. I read
widely – there’s a fair chance.
Our aims are, in the main, archival. We are not
looking for new material, nor – for the most part – very recent works.
Q.
Can I expect payment?
With a book of this size compared with its budget, we can
only afford to pay at best a nominal sum. Everyone will be offered the same
rate.
The
page rate is 5 dollars/3 GBP per page (doubled to 10/6 if you are able to
supply your own scans – see below*).
Please
don’t laugh, even bitterly. We don’t mean to insult anyone. My feeling on this
is that it is better to offer to pay at least something rather than accept that
– like almost always with comics – there’s nothing to be had. But it is what it
is.
To
offset the embarrassment of this, in almost every instance we plan to reprint
existing materials – presumably long out of print, that had only limited
circulation in the first place, and that might otherwise never see print again.
There
is potential here to reach a new and wider audience – a bookstore audience not
restricted to the comics trade. We feel it is better that the book exists, than
doesn’t. Hopefully you will feel it would be better for your work to appear here
than not.
Q. Will contributors get a comp
copies?
Yes.
To accompany the reprint we will list your copyright/web contacts/ and credits,
including mention of any current work, plus, every contributor will be mailed a
comp copy. (For this you will need to fill in the mailing address section on
your Contributors Agreement.)
There
will be a bunch of you so it will most likely be only the one copy, and US
contributors will need to wait on the US edition.
*DOUBLE YOUR PAGE RATE!
If
you can supply to us new scans of your comics pages, resized as necessary (and as
instructed – see spec and layout example elsewhere here), preferably taken wherever
possible from the original artwork – then we can instantly double your page
rate (to the right royal sum of 10 dollars/6 GBP per page).
If
for whatever reason we are the ones required to make the new scans of your
pages, we unfortunately have to absorb that little extra back into our costs.
These scans will come from our own file copies and can only reflect the quality
of the original print.
So
it is better all round if you are able to do it!
Q.Any fink else?
I
will have a 50-100 word caption to write to go with each entry, most likely, so
if there's anything that you want to say about background info to your strip(s),
artistic practice, style or methods/media/madness, prime influences, aim hopes
dreams, etc, then let me know that stuff, as little or large as you like, and I
can try to fold it in, quote marks where appropriate – tell me whatever you'd
like me to say on your behalf, really.
Do
it on the copyright
clearance form when it comes around.
Thank
you,
ILYA
Editor
– MBO CULT COMICS
