Freelance Artists in Comic Festivals #1 | Erlangen (Germany): The preparation

in #life6 years ago (edited)

How we prepare our booth for comic and art events.

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In around a month, me and my pal Ash Pure are going to participate in the biennal "Erlangen comic salon" in the south of Germany. Taking place in a small town close to Nuremberg, it is known as the „German Angoulême“. (If you don't know, French's Angoulême is the reference in matter of festival for comics in Europe).

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So long nobody is doing it for you, comic/art festivals, cons, fairs etc... are a tough part of the independant comic artist job. Tough because it's stressful as it takes a lot of time to prepare and for freelancers the participation fees can be rather prohibitive, without ever knowing if it will go good or not. Not to mention the costs of material, the fuel, accomodation and of course the time being there where you can't work on your art. But until now I found it necessary to be present. Especially since I do not have a permanent place where my work is properly displayed at its advantage (Yes, my books are in various shops, but probably hidden in some dark corners).

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Ok well, here at Neurotitan in Berlin, it is pretty much well displayed.

So, for this time, Ash wanted to get a proper booth (not a ridiculous 2sqm), which is great! One thing I must say is that I find quite horrible how clients (we) of this type of events are treaten. For instance, the organisation is not confirming if our booth is 3m wide and 2m deep (our wish) or the otherwise, a 2m wide and 3m booth. How is this possible that we pay so much (600€ for 6sqm!) and not even being told when we ask, how that space will exactly be? How can we then decently prepare anything?

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Ash craving for clients in our 6sqm booth in F.A.C.T.S. Comic Con in Ghent. Nov. 2016. (Yes, only when arriving there we discovered that it was 2m WIDE and 3m DEEP,... seriously?)

Anyway, we have no choice. All we can do is to have a plan B, which means to have more things to display than what we actually planned, so we can still arrange on the spot. Shame for the hours spent in preparing a plan.

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Still, this is not a definitive plan.

„Funny“ fact is that they propose „amateur/student/small artists“ tables, which are a 1,2m wide for 120€, basically it is not even a cheaper price but simply a smaller space! This doesn't leave you any chance of looking professional. If you actually compare, it is even a more expensive price per SQM than booking a booth (difference is that booth start from 400€ on). A good thing is that they at least list properly all the artists on their website and through different promotional initiatives.

The preparation.

Enough complains. The way your booth/stall looks is damn important, just to have a nice table cloth can change so much. That's why we opted for the professional booth and why we plan this so long in advance (We're on it since months).

As books are sadly not the best-selling goods I propose (the posters are), we are planning to decorate the booth mainly with big (A1 - 33x23,6 in) aluminium art prints, attempting to catch eyes. At first we tought about big frames with glass. But big framed glass is fragile especially during and setup, so we thought about canvas but then we'd have to frame them, which is another time eating step. That's why we choose Aluminium, it's solid, easy to attach with sticking material, and it looks absolutely slick!

Along with a wall of original works, I think it help to make bypassers interested.

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Here, in Berlin Graphic days, I made a mix of big framed art prints and some originals. I also have that huge synthetic panel.

The material

Packaging! Tubes, plastic sleeves, tape, bubble wrap, rubber bands. Very important, as if people think they can't carry their precious art home, it gives them cold feet buying. Actually I'd like to find a more ecologic way, all this plastic annoys me.

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Poster display! (I always have huge posters with me but they are often just to big to be exhibited, so they stay in a tube and I get to show them only when people start discussing with me), That's why this time I invested in a proper one. I was looking for a while for a model that can hold A1 format art, not too expensive, not in metal, that is foldable and ideally with little wheels. Found my happiness with this one from "Mabef" for 110€.

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I still couln't invest in professional poster (A1) sleeves. They are great but quite expensive (5 for 56€). And we need at least 15 or 20.

So at the moment we'll stay with folder sleeves, less solid and rigid (we add some thick craft card inside) but a bit cheaper.

Even if I know we'll have those Forex Type booth walls where we cannot drill or nail, I always take all kind of means to attach art. Better to have more than missing something, so I always have my toolbox with everything like hammer, nails, screws, screwdrivers, metal strings, colson rings, hooks, ... This time I also got all these handy "glue instead of drill", power strips, patafix etc...

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Promotion: Stickers, flyers, folder, visit cards ….
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Portable fridge (yeah!) Always good to have fresh drinks and food.
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Of course the goods: Books and prints of various formats.

The car. I am lucky I have a combo family/utilitary VW caddy that you can load like a mule. It can drive on both Benzine and liquid gas so travel costs are a bit reduced. We also build a foldable bed inside so it's possible to sleep in, which reduces accomodation costs :D. Last year when I participated in München Comic Festival, I camped next to a lake and I could swim at the end of each of those hard days, a must.
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Also this time I have ordered a mobile card reader. After recommendations, I opted for SUMUP, which seems the best in Germany. And also works in the rest of Europe. I'll propose payment with bitcoins aswell!!
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I have been quite bitching a lot and you might wonder why I am still going there! Well, first I am just very curious of the „German Angoûlème“ and I am always enthusiastic about those festivals as I am obviously a huge comic fan. Second, I count on job opportunities. Third, like said upper, we somehow need to be there or no one will represent us. Fourth, I am always eager to travel somewhere and together with my British friend is always a blast! And fifth, it is Bayern! The best (giant) bretzels and some good beer (As a Belgian national, I stand for Belgian beers but they do have delicious "Weisen" there!).

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I do various kind of fairs, sometimes only dedicated to art and sometimes it's more about comics, but there's actually now a type of events where I definitely don't go anymore, the "cons". I don't know how this is in the USA or elsewhere but the ones I did were simply NOT about comics (anymore), in the sense that comic authors there felf really scammed. I knew before that today it was mainly about cosplay, video games and other pseudo-techy stuff but I didn't know that it was at that point BAD for comics themselves. Events like F.A.C.T.S. Comic con have a huge "artist alley" with "famous" artists but on 20 of them, maybe 3 or 4 had a little of a queue of visitors paying for a signature or a dedication on their book or prints while 40000 people are visiting, not telling how it is when you have your obscure booth :D. Also no publisher is present (I believe they know how useless it is for them), so you can't even have a chat there and meet a potential future job giver. I am lucky I paint spaceships and I sell posters, which saved my ass several times :D

So, to summarize a bit, doing art/comics festivals/cons can be interesting but it is risky for semi-pros and amateurs. Sometimes you might make consistent profit but I guess it is also an activity that, in order to have it really working, needs quite a lot of upfront expenses and made regularly. It takes a bit trials and error to learn but if you plan to do it, there are also plenty of tutorials out on the internet. My tips would be: get recommendations and reviews of the event, try to know how exactly how your space is, make sure to have a neat stall/booth and of course produce some dopish eye candies to present!

Once back from the festival, if I am not depressed, I'll make a report about it :D. Also I'll probably post pictures during on my facebook and [Instagram](http://www.instagram.com/hadre.art pages.



Hey I hope you enjoyed this post! For more art and info, visit my official website http://www.haedre.com

If you are interested in my book(s), this is where you should head http://www.haedre.bigcartel.com

Committing to comics is hardcore job, consider supporting me and my family through http://www.patreon.com/haedre

Or directly with cryptos!

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ETH: 0xa7B61e88d8ce1aBD543f80924F5f6D9f33E85648

Thanks again!

Please
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wow you're really prepared! Best of luck to you! And now I want a pretzel and beer!

It looked pretty miserable the first times I participated in such events but the last ones started to look pretty :D . If the event focuses on art from creators and if there's enough visitors, it usually works really well.
Haha, would love to send you one of these Bretzel, they're dope ;)

Lots of great insights here about comic convention. Very interesting! I enjoyed reading it, and waiting for the next part. Hopefully lots of fun and success? :)

-upvoted-

Thank you for the nice words @scrawly! Indeed it has to work!! ;)

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you excellent i have followed you !

This looks awesome! Your prep is going well :) can’t wait to see how it turns out!

Thanks for the comment @vgc5000! Indeed, it has to!!! ;)

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