Welcome back to part 3 of our celebration of Free Comic Book Day 2010! In part 1 we traveled across North America, showing off a handful of comic shops from across the country and what their store was up to during FCBD. In part 2 we stopped by Collector’s Paradise in Los Angeles, and today we’ll meet the special guests they had signing comics and doing sketches all day long!
The artists in attendance included Marc Silvestri (Top Cow founder, artist extraordinairre), Joe Benitez (The Magdalena, The Darkness, Titans), Michael Broussard (Artifacts), Bill Morrison (co-creator of Bongo Comics), Ray Friesen (Pirate Penguin vs Ninja Chicken, kids graphic novelist), and Peter Steigerwald (Fathom, Soulfire). These guys were putting their pencils to paper for hours, doing sketches for whomever donated money to The Hero Initiative charity, which helps support retired comic book creators. Also signing books for fans was the legendary Marv Wolfman (creator of the Teen Titans, Tim Drake, Deathstroke, Nightwing, etc) and Rick Loverd (writer of Top Cow’s Berserker), so it’s easy to see why the house was packed! Artist Denys Cowan (Captain America/Black Panther: Flags of Our Fathers) also popped in towards the end of the day to chat. So kick back and enjoy Free Comic Book Day all over again with your favorite creators!
Edward Greenberg, the owner of Collector’s Paradise, wrote a recent column about how comic book stores need to respond to the digital age, and developments like digital comics in the coming years. He makes a very valid point: Comic book shops across the country need to step it up, because with things like digital comics now out there in the hands of the public, the potential is there for the comic book medium to reach a whole new fan base; thousands upon thousands of new fans in fact. People who would ordinarily never think about setting foot into a comic book shop now have comics accessible literally at their fingertips 24/7! Comic book stores everywhere need to respond to this technology boost by welcoming the new fan base the digital age is presenting. Step #1 would be to change the look of their stores to be more newcomer friendly. Just read the article linked above, it will open your mind to new ideas about how a retail store should evolve for the better with the changing times.
I hope after looking at these photos from Free Comic Book Day 2010 at Collector’s Paradise, some LCS owners will rise to the challenege for the better of our industry!
Until next year!
Andy Liegl
andy@comicattack.net
Son of a… I wish I had an LCS like yours Andy.
I wish I had an LCS period.
You had Broussard, Cowan, AND THE ELUSIVE SILVESTRI at your store?!! I’m crashin’ on your couch next year for FCBD! Oh and I might have a thing for balloon characters too lol
Thanks guys!! It was pretty awesome!!
Side note: This is the 1,000th article published to ComicAttack.net!
I’m so jealous of your Iceman sketches 🙁 I wish I worked at a comic shop
Are we sure he does any actual “work”?
Dood! Your comic shop looks so awesome! I’m coming for a visit!
All hail Marv Wolfman!
Thanks for a great write up Andy!! Oh, and in case some of you are not happy with your local shops, we do MAIL ORDER!!! Our subscription service is 100% do-it-yourself online, and we mail 10-20 packages daily from our online businesses, so we are pretty good at it. Here are some details and a preview of our service.
http://comicsandcards.net/wordpress/the-store/subscriptions/
It’s like a mini convention! Must be nice to have all that space.
Also, at first I thought they were drawing with sharpie markers, and I was like “woah, that’s crazy.” But it appears they were merely outlining/inking with them.
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