Mark Millar looking for 'undiscovered' artists

[pauljholden]

And by Undiscovered he means by DC or Marvel.

http://forums.millarworld.tv/index.php?showtopic=91905&st=0

Say what you like about Millar's 2000AD work, he's VERY good at promotion, and propelling artists / work out there - 2 major movies from 2 creator owned projects? That's an incredible result.

Anyways, take time to read the thread and then post work (3 images max, with a link to a good selection of your work, and a potted - two/three line bio), EVEN if you don't think you're suitable/have a chance in hell, that thread is going to get an AWFUL lot of traffic and it'd be good exposure for anyone wanting to work in comics.


-pj

[Jim_Campbell]

Blimey. Yeah, some of the talented bastards who frequent this forum should definitely get on there. I've been right through the thread and there's some very good stuff, some very interesting stuff, and an awful lot of stuff that demonstrates a certain ... umm, lack of a self-critical faculty, shall we say?

FWIW, the most obvious reason I can think of for MM wanting an "undiscovered" artist is because he's got something in the pipeline that he thinks is solid gold is looking to get a quality artist who isn't going to be pushy over issues of control and/or ownership. Note that I think the opportunity presented here -- even if is attached to my entirely hypothetical supposition about a shitty contract -- is one that any aspiring artist would be stark, staring mad to pass up.

If anyone from here gets the gig, don't forget that you'll need a letterer!

Cheers

Jim

[Colin_YNWA]

Arh the number of people who can't count to three!

Some very nice stuff there. PJ I see you know Warwick J Cadwell. He once expressed an interest in a comic I was planning to self publish and I'd done a badly drawn demo of in an attempt to attract arts. Like a slavering dog I tried to get him involved with something but I think he'd come to his senses and realised I was a no hope hack! I love his stuff and drop by his Blog whenever I think on.

[mygrimmbrother]

I'm desperate enough to be exploited by Mark Millar, s I reckon I'll stick some stuff up when I get home from work.

[pauljholden]

Blimey, you're not wrong about people being unable to count. Three - it's easy... ONE TWO THREE...


-pj

[IAMTHESYSTEM]

Might be a 'promotional' comic for a film idea.

[GordonR]

I always think stuff like this - clear, simple written instructions on how to submit, what to do and not to do in putting yourself up for consideration for a job- is the first point of Fail, and I know editors who think likewise.  

It's an audition step - just follow the written-down instructions, dummy, and prove you're not a total fucking idiot - and its amazing how many people just can't/don't do it.

How I still treasure the memory of the time, as a favour to a colleague, I put a message up on the artdroids group, asking if anyone was interested in doing some freelance work on a game, and requesting that anyone with the relevant experience email me in private for more details.

And everyone who replied did so on the public group.  Exactly as they were asked not to do.  Special mention must go to the little treasure who just wanted me to tell him how much he was liable to get paid.

Fail, fail, fail.

[Jim_Campbell]

It's an audition step - just follow the written-down instructions, dummy, and prove you're not a total fucking idiot - and its amazing how many people just can't/don't do it.

On another forum I ended up in a really stupid debate with some guys intent on proving to me what a stupid thing it was for editors and agents to insist that novel submissions should be formatted in 12-pt Courier, double-spaced and printed single-side on plain white paper.

For every objection that they raised, all I could answer was: but that's the standard format. Send your submission in on pink A5 set in Zapf Chancery and all it does is prove to the editor's or agent's assistant tasked with tackling the slush pile that you couldn't be fucking arsed to spend five minutes on Google looking up the standard manuscript format.

Cheers

Jim

[Emperor]

FWIW, the most obvious reason I can think of for MM wanting an "undiscovered" artist is because he's got something in the pipeline that he thinks is solid gold is looking to get a quality artist who isn't going to be pushy over issues of control and/or ownership. Note that I think the opportunity presented here -- even if is attached to my entirely hypothetical supposition about a shitty contract -- is one that any aspiring artist would be stark, staring mad to pass up.

A slightly cynical take but then again it pays to be cynical sometimes

Looking at this there are some interesting aspects:

• He is asking for artists with no specified style but he is looking for as broad a range as possible - it can be tricky finding artists with their own individual style (especially when you are now so embedded in the US comic book system, especially noticeable since they've been farming out work to South America and elsewhere as things start to look awfully samey), which is one of the reasons the art droids get head hunted (because this is exactly the kind of thing Tharg is on the look out for, as he is prepared to take risks)
• He seems to be looking for more than one artist - if it was just one then a skim through some portfolios at a conference or (if he is looking for more child-friendly work) picking up a copy of The DFC

If I had to guess I'd suspect this might be for his idea of creating a 2000AD-style anthology as an IP farm. He suddenly realised that he has very little creator-owned work and he has been producing more of this (and often not finishing it, yet) to open up his offerings and the anthology would allow him to hammer out a range of ideas. If the artists are prepared to be... flexible (even work-for-hire?) then all the better.

Anyway if he did pick you up then it'd be impressive exposure, in fact given the attention the thread has been getting just posting there is likely to get a few people more work (while the quality is... variable there is some serios impressive work there), so I recommend all out talented folks here go for it - I see PJ is already in. Just show them we British can count to 3 Good luck.

[pauljholden]

Yeah, I took away from it some sort of anthology title idea, and yes, I CAN count to three. It fairly winds me up when some people post 10/12 pages and apologise.

-pj

[Colin_YNWA]

Mind even if I can count to three (you'll have to trust me) I still typed arts instead of artists so I'm hardly one to talk.

I've heard Millar muse about creating an anthology before. If so could be interesting.

[WoD]

Yeah, I took away from it some sort of anthology title idea, and yes, I CAN count to three. It fairly winds me up when some people post 10/12 pages and apologise.

-pj

He actually mentioned the UK being ready for a new anthology WAY back at the Brighton Comic Convention when he came over to the FQP table to say hello...

[Kev Levell]

Submitted!
Great tip, ta PJ!

[Emperor]

Good luck Kev - I thought of you as one of our artists to lead the charge. I also had my fingers crossed you'd use the FF and Spider-Man pages, as they are some of your best work in this field.

Now where is radiator? Seriously I'll cry if he doesn't throw some work in and no wants to make me sad, you won't like me when I'm sad.

Yeah, I took away from it some sort of anthology title idea, and yes, I CAN count to three. It fairly winds me up when some people post 10/12 pages and apologise.

And a lovely three they are - all top notch but showing a good range. I'm sure I've seen some people submit even more than 12 - I might understand if you had more than 3 styles you could offer and you might sneak a fourth in (although if anyone is that worried they aren't able to show their range, the they should have their own blog/gallery and link to it) but posting nearly a comic books-worth of the same style. They just aren't showing yourself off to your best.

Also folks should remember image size, at the start of the seventh page are some Hooooooj images that eventually get resized but with some many images not making sure they are a reasonable size is poor netiquette. Also don't forget to throw some links in to other work.

Also anyone else going along should remember to follow the forum rules about registering with your own name or you're registration is liable to be rejected:

http://forums.millarworld.tv/index.php?showtopic=91905&view=findpost&p=2118536

[Peter Wolf]

Is this anthology comic what is being hinted at as creator owned rather than what i presumed to be a character ?

It must be and i think just the same that this is why MM is asking for a wide variety of styles and its interesting that MM is requesting artists that are "non-sequential".The majority of artists probably do sequential or non-sequential but its a good window of opportunity if you only do non-sequential artwork.