Comiket April 2012

I did my second comic show of the year yesterday – the Comiket! I did a Comiket con in November too, and really enjoyed it (mainly because it took place shortly after my first MCM Expo which I didn’t enjoy at all!). So yesterday was an okay day, but a little bit of a struggle – the hall seemed a lot more crammed-in than the last one (I’m not sure if they added more tables?). Every time you tried to move around it seemed impossible, and the people behind me had banners so it was even harder to move behind the table. It was a good crowd though, and nice to meet my regular punters, meet new ones, and chat to new people.

One thing did annoy me a little bit though – some of the prices. Too much! I went over to buy a beautifully drawn small press comic – A5 colour, not a huge pagecount – and it was £6! £6?! And there were a couple of black and white books I liked the look of – Paris and Depresso – but at £15 and £13 that’s just too much. Some of Nobrow’s stuff seems a bit over-priced too. Even normal black and white A5 indie comics seem to be going up – with some at £4. I don’t know why this is? Are people attempting to make a living out of this (that's a very hard thing to do) or just being greedy? Print prices really aren’t that much these days, so if that’s the problem they should get a cheaper printer. The punter shouldn’t suffer!

It wasn’t all bad though! 9th Art were giving away a stunning looking indie anthology for FREE! (9thartmagazine.com). Lloyd and the Bear (.com) is a lovely little comic and is only £2.50 (I chatted to the creator who is nice, and was drinking a bottle of wine at his table lol). I bought a couple of new Andi Watson books (Gum Girl and Glister) off Walker Books, and their prices are really reasonable – well done to them!

I have to mention one interesting find – ‘The Zoom’ comic! It’s a fun, Beano-style comic, and here’s the twist – it’s created by a 10 year old boy! It’s pretty impressive. I mean, you can tell it’s done by a kid, but it also has this strangely compelling quality about it – I think he could develop into a Jeffrey Brown type of creator. And I think it’s funny that it really does feel reminiscent of a lot of autobio indie comics done by adult indie creators (some of whom have 'young' styles). Anyway, check it out, it’s at zoomrockman.com

I did have one horrible experience though (it’s been ages since I had a horrible experience at a con!). It was with a French lady who seemed friendly, but I think she was a little bit weird. Let me relive it in dialogue form:
Strange French Girl: Can I have a badge? (Badges cost 20p!)
Me: Er, okay, go on then.
Girl: I bought Spandex 1 last year. I didn’t like it.
Me: Oh…
Girl: Yeah, it wasn’t very good. Not much fun.
Me: (Seething, thinking: I want to say, give me that badge back, bitch!) Okay…
Girl: Were you at the last Comiket?
Me: Yes.
Girl: Do you remember me?
Me: No.
Girl: I think we spoke?
Me: I spoke to a lot of people…
Girl: So who writes and draws Spandex?
Me: I do.
Girl: Oh… I didn’t realise…
Me: Yes.
(She then tries to backtrack and is confused and thinks she bought it off someone else, and I am still seething…)