Hurricane Sandy: Aftermath

Hurricane Sandy update:  There is supposed to be partial subway service restored tomorrow, but nothing below 42nd street in Manhattan (read: very little).  I wonder if the G will be running, because it doesn't even GO to Manhattan (just in Brooklyn), but we'll see.  People are working around the clock to get all the water pumped out of the tunnels.  The L tunnel (the one I use) is completely flooded, as well as many others.  This is the craziest thing that's ever happened to the NYC transit system.  Partial bus service is going today, but from what I've seen on the news, all the roads are grid-locked.

I was supposed to do a small convention in New Jersey this Sunday, but it's been postponed.  The people there are ok, so no worries, but everything is too crazy in NJ right now.  I AM going to be at King Con this weekend, though!  I'm going to try to take buses to the other side of Brooklyn, which will not be fun.  Not sure how many people will make it out there to buy comics though.  I'm sure buying cool stuff at conventions is the last thing on people's minds right now, but it's a return to normalcy.  Most of Brooklyn seems to be OK from Sandy, though, except Coney Island.  Everyone please be safe!

Hurricane Sandy Part 2

Hurricane Sandy update:  I amazingly have power!  Last night I lost internet/tv for a long time, but it's back today.  I've just been in the apartment getting busywork done, so I've been productive.  It's pretty freaky that the subways are flooded though.  NYC is on hiatus and NJ is a total disaster.  My heart goes out to everyone that has experienced devastation during this time.  Hang in there.

Hurricane Sandy

But in all seriousness, if you do need to get to work during hurricane Sandy, please be safe!  When I moved to New York I never thought I'd have to deal with hurricanes.  What the heck?!  This is the second one I've weathered through.  Hopefully it won't be an annual thing.

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Misfortune Cookie Animation!

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This is the animation from my book "Mindy Indy's Daily Misfortune and Flip Book!"  I realized I hadn't posted it yet.  It's also on the mindy indy YouTube channel :)  There, that's 3 ways to watch the animation!  Although it's even better when you can flip it yourself in the book :)  Yeah I need to get that online store going :P

Mailing List Success!

I finally got around to inputting all the emails on my mailing list from New York Comic Con.  I got 70 emails!  Thanks everyone for signing up!  Also thanks for printing very clearly!  Out of those 70, there was only one I couldn't decipher at all (vs like 6 out of 40). Also, I noticed that the last mindy indy email didn't have the video, which is weird, because it shows up in the blog itself just fine.  It's either a feedburner bug or a gmail bug.  Or in the WAY I embedded the video, which opens a whole other can of worms.  Techie stuff.  I plan to do more videos in the future, so I gotta fix that.  In the meantime, here's a link to the little vid on the new mindy indy channel on youtube.

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Still recovering from the craziness that was New York Comic Con!  It was a HUGE success for me!  I'll post more about it later this week :)

NYCC Day 1 recap

I'm writing this post Thursday night, but people on the email list will get it Friday.  Today was Day 1 of New York Comic Con, open only to Professionals.  It was pretty slow, and is mostly a time where professionals can meet new professionals and reconnect with old friends.  In the pic above, you'll see some new items on the table - my drawing sign and my friend Ellen Stedfeld's comics (she's helping promote my work by handing out fliers and sitting in for me at the table :)

I'm next to a really cool guy, Scott Zambelli, who's also from Michigan!  He was really encouraging today and had lots of helpful advice on exhibiting at large conventions.  He suggested drawing mainstream characters interacting with the misfortune cookie, because fans are drawn to more well known characters first.  He even drew Batman looking scared of a misfortune cookie!  Such a nice surprise!

I'll try drawing Deadpool with the misfortune cookie, because I've done Deadpool work before.  I did draw a little bit of my own stuff:

It's the pomeranian from the first Misfortune Cookie comic:

Since it was so cute, Scott suggested I draw My Little Ponies to sell.  Going to be drawing a lot tomorrow!

Luckily, I was smart enough (and allowed enough time) to use the elevators this time, for the stations that HAD them.

NYCC begins today!

New York Comic Con begins today for comics professionals!  (It opens to the public tomorrow).  I'm super prepared and super excited!  This is a momentous point in my career :)  Not much time to blog now, but if you're going to the con, please visit my table in Artist Alley table Z19!

New mindy indy Sign!

It's time for a new mindy indy sign!  My old one was getting pretty shabby, and was a make-shift one to begin with.  Now it's time to get more professional, especially for New York Comic Con!  I was thinking of printing a banner, but wanted to go the cheaper and more fun way of hand painting it!  I thought it would save time too, but it ended up taking longer than expected.

I thought I could do it in one night, but it took 3 (working for about an hour each).  I'm a muralist too, and love painting big, bright pictures!  I started painting multiple coats of the letters, then outlined with a black paint pen.  If only I'd discovered the paint pens sooner!  I painted about 3 murals of cartoon characters in the past and had painstakingly used a regular small brush for the outlines, and it was hard to keep the line weight consistent.  I guess working at art supply stores has paid off in interesting ways - I discover cool new supplies I didn't know about before.

I used "artist's tape" to tape off the radiating lines.  Artist's tape is gentler than painter's tape so it doesn't damage the artwork.  I used a hair dryer to dry where the black triangles intersected in the middle, because I couldn't put tape on top of wet paint to do the next triangle.  It was more complicated than I anticipated, but the end result looks great!

Hope this helps attract attention to my table!  Not sure if it's the most legible from afar, after adding the lines for the background, but we'll see.  I'm happy about my cool sign!!

mindy indy is on official NYCC site!

Awesome news!  New York Comic Con added me to their official site!  You can find me by 2 ways:  When you go to the NYCC site, click on the tab "Who's Coming" and hover over to Artist's Alley on the right, where you'll see "Artist Alley List" and "Artist Alley Gallery."  The pic above is my image in the "M" zone (where it should be, not with the "I"s like Baltimore Comic Con listed).  You'll see a larger image and description of me when you click on the mindy indy thumbnail:

It's pretty freaking cool to be on the official site.  This way, I'll get even more exposure!  Hope it works to draw more people to my table :)

Here I am in the "Artist Alley List" section.  I wonder why they didn't combine the list with the gallery, but whatever, I can't complain.  I'm up there!

And NYCC is officially SOLD OUT!  I'm excited to be part of such an enormous event!

REAL Misfortune Cookies!!

THEY'RE HERE!!  The REAL Misfortune Cookies have been delivered to me!  Super excited and can't wait to see people's reactions to them.  Since I only printed 150, I've decided to mix them in with the normal fortune cookies, so it will be even more of a surprise.  Cookies are free with purchase of any mindy indy product :)  Also, everyone that brings a flyer I printed (see last blog post) to my table (Z19 in Artist's Alley) gets a free cookie.

I made the custom fortune cookies from a site called www.tankinz.com, and their prices were pretty good.  I got 4 different custom fortunes for ordering 150 cookies for $30.  It seems like a lot, considering I'm giving them away for free, but it's New York Comic Con so I want to do something special :)  Oh and the picture above was on a little thank you card that came with the cookie box.  Apparently their motto is "So fresh you'll want to slap us!"  Wow :P

Misfortune Cookie Flyers!

I can't believe the New York Comic Con is NEXT WEEK!  I planned ahead and was able to order some flyers for really cheap!  500 flyers for $20 at Clubflyers, which is pretty good!  I ended up paying extra to make sure they got delivered on time though.  I'm teaming up with a friend who will distribute these flyers with the real misfortune cookies at NYCC to draw people to the table :)  There are still some tickets to the con for Friday left if you still want to experience the craziness that is NYCC!

Oh and last night I went to this awesome event:  "Pronto Comics NY Comic Con Survival Show."  Pronto Comics is an awesome group of comic creators, writers, editors, comedians, and all-around cool people that self publish their comics.  They have monthly stand-up nights, and last night was a combo stand-up comedy show/interview with comic creators like Simon Fraser and other great people.  A good time!  It's great to live in NYC and be able to go to events like that.

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Table Z19A

I found out my table number for the New York Comic Con!  Table Z19A.  The Artist's Alley aisles are labeled alphabetically, so yeah.....aisle Z.... I'll pretty much be in the corner.  But the corner of NYCC is better than not exhibiting at NYCC at all!  Artist's Alley is in the North Pavilion, as shown on the map above.  It's separated from the main show floor by a corridor thing, but I think it will still get lots of traffic.  You can see the NYCC interactive map here.

So from the next picture above, you'll see that at least I'm not in the corner of corners, but slightly inward, so that's good.  I have half of a table, so that's why it's Z19A instead of just Z19.  I think I'll do just fine with the half, because I usually double my comics up to fill a big table space anyway.

If you were on the fence about buying a ticket to NYCC, better get it ASAP before they're all gone!  There are still some day passes for Friday October 12 for $35.  Buy them here.  Ask for a day off work and go!  Comic con is a total blast and it's totally worth it :)  The whole show was sold out for the past 2 years online (no tickets sold onsite even).

More news:  the new "real" misfortune cookies are going to be shipped this Tuesday!  I have big plans for them :)

SUPER PUMPED!

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A semi-true story.  On my Baltimore Comic Con trip, my huge suitcase was SO heavy from all the books I printed.  I was going up an escalator, and the suitcase didn't quite catch the next step right, so it fell and almost took me with it!  It was actually more of a slump than a fall.  No undies were flown, however.  That same trip, it broke a wheel under the sheer weight of the books (like 50 pounds).

New York Comic Con and REAL Misfortune Cookies!

Exciting news!  Not sure if I mentioned before, but I'm definitely going to be in Artist's Alley at the New York Comic Con in 2 weeks!  Single day tickets for Fri & Sat are still available, but buy them online before the show, because they didn't have door tickets left last year.  Anyway, this is a super exciting momentous event for mindy indy!  And I'm getting the REAL Misfortune Cookies ready in time for the show!  So many people requested real misfortune cookies that I had to do it!  I'm curious to see how people react :)  I'll see if I can pull a few more tricks from my sleeve in time too.

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Written in a coffee shop :P

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