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[David Bird]

June 7:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

So here's an insight into the process
you never wanted.

I struck a deal with Avatar Press to
do the Apparat books, but there
were conditions. Because these were
clearly pretty non-commercial as
the market understands
commercialism, and because they
were being done without variant
covers (and you can say what you
like about variants, but I can
guarantee that if people stopped
buying them publishers would stop
doing them, and they contribute
significantly to Avatar's numbers)...
There were budget restrictions. I
do the books for next to nothing, and
in return I get the sole rights. So
the artists come on as work-for-hire.
Which, for me, is ethically grey, I'll
admit. And the artist's rates are
very low. Very low.

So I sit here trying to come up with
ideas for the planned line of Apparat
novellas. And I've thrown out four
or five concepts. See, it's often
much easier for me to generate an
idea if I can picture how it'll look. I
wrote FRANK IRONWINE for Carla
Speed McNeil, and I knew exactly
how it'd look. Same with Laurenn
and QUIT CITY, Jacen and SIMON
SPECTOR, Ryp and ANGEL STOMP
FUTURE.

Now, these novellas are 48 pages.
Unless you're a page-a-day artist,
the payment involved is going to
make it difficult for a lot of artists
to actually do it. But the budget is
fixed. And please let's not forget
that no indie is made of money and
very few are going to pay any
money up front at all for this kind
of project, if they didn't laugh me
out of the room straight away. This
represents a risk for Avatar, and
I love them for even considering the
Apparat project.

But I'm actually in a kind of
paralysis right now. Because I know
I can't go to the artists I know with
this kind of budget -- not only
because I know they couldn't do it
for the money, but also because I
know some of them would try to do
it and get themselves into trouble.

It's driving me slightly mental. The
format is perfect for this point in
time, and for comics stores. And
I'm stuck. I'll admit to being slightly
wired today -- four Red Bulls and
some ephedrine tablets to offset
the effect of six hours' sleep -- but
it's nagging at me.

Doing comics drives me bloody mad
sometimes.

[David Bird]

June 8:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Some of you will get this and some of you won't.

I've been taking Sida Cordifolia to stay productive
over the last few days. I'm being careful with it.
Or at least I thought I was.

I just caught myself grinding my teeth.

Ha ha. OOOPS.

-- W

[L Independant]

June 8:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

Some of you will get this and some of you won't.

I've been taking Sida Cordifolia to stay productive
over the last few days. I'm being careful with it.
Or at least I thought I was.

I just caught myself grinding my teeth.

Ha ha. OOOPS.

-- W

LOL!

[David Bird]

Have you seen Requiem for a Dream?

[L Independant]

Have you seen Requiem for a Dream?

Sadly, yes.

[David Bird]

June 12:

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

It's always the same. A week ago,
we considered putting the heating
back on. I went out for a cigarette
and my breath was steaming in
the evening air. We had a light
frost two weeks ago. And then,
bang, eighty-degree heat and 100%
humidity, out of nowhere. Don't
believe in climate change? Spend
a couple of years in Essex.

I got contacted off Friends Reunited
today. Someone I haven't seen
since I was eleven years old. We
went to different schools after we
finished our junior years. Now, it
appears, she's a cardiologist in
London. Which, let's face it, may
prove useful to me in years to come.

I don't think she knows that one of
our crowd from those years is dead.
Almost twenty years ago, now, he
drank a bottle of paint-stripper,
put a bag over his head, and lay
down in the woods to die. Some kids
found him a day later with his gut
burned out. I remember sitting down
in the pub one evening, finding a
copy of the local paper there, and
unfolding it to see him on the front
page.

He remember seeing him on the
day he left sixth-form college, a
year early. "I don't behave how I
ought to when I'm here," he said.
He worshipped his dad, and didn't
handle it well when his parents split
up. He drank a lot, and turned out
to be crap at it. I remember we
shook hands, which still felt like a
peculiarly adult thing at 17. Never
saw him again. He was dead two
years later.

A month later, I bumped into a
mutual friend in the record store.
"Did you hear about him?" I said.

"Yeah. Bonus!" he said, giving me
the thumbs-up.

Didn't make much of an effort to
say hello to "old schoolfriends" in
the street after that.

There's a line in Alan Moore's THE
BIRTH CAUL, where he says of
school friends, in a comically
depressive descent of tone, "Imagine,
you'll know these people all your
lives." By accident and design, I
haven't seen anyone I was in
education with in years. And now
I'm nearly 40, and I get an oddly
sweet, nervous note from a girl I
kissed when I was eleven years old,
accomplished doctor and married
with a baby, saying, "I always
thought you'd be a scientist..."

I almost don't have the heart to
tell her I can't programme the video
recorder.

-- W

I haven't talked with anyone from my childhood in years. Met a couple (three?) when I entered university. Since I'd taken a four year break from school, they were on their way out as I started. Took a class with one, but I could remember his name and was too embarassed to ask.

Haven't been back to the town I spent my first 18 years in since 1982. That would be when I was 19. I'm 43 on Thursday.

[Keb]

Hate to rub it in, but you're almost old enough to be my father

Of course, you're nowhere near as old as my father, so don't feel too bad.

[David Bird]

Mind yourself, kid, I am old enough to be your father! My kids are 22 and 18. You're what? The same age as my oldest?

[Keb]

22 yeah

Then again, my dad is old enough to be your father! He's got a daughter who's almost 40.

[Lord Simian]

Sadly, yes.

But have you seen Requiem for a Dream... as performed by TOYS?!

[David Bird]

But have you seen Requiem for a Dream... as performed by TOYS?!

Hysterical!!

[Lord Simian]

I know!

[David Bird]

June 13:

BS
meeee


http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=2677




-- W

[L Independant]

But have you seen Requiem for a Dream... as performed by TOYS?!

That brings back horrible memories of the movie.

[David Bird]

I think the man's had a double post (or e-mail, in this case):

BS
meeee


http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=2677




-- W