Seattle - Day #4

Bob didn't want to make an early exit form the convention on Sunday in order to make Virgin America's final evening flight to Los Angeles, so he booked a flight out of Seattle on Monday afternoon. In hindsight, an morning flight would have been better. Without much to do before his 3:10 departure, Bob found himself sitting in front of the Sea-Tac Airport food court's enormous panoramic window where he could watch planes take off and taxi from a remarkably impressive vantage point. If you ever have the chance to fly out of Seattle, Bob recommends you give yourself an extra half-hour or so to sit and and enjoy this fascinating view.

Seattle - Day #3 (Emerald City ComiCon Day #2)

The day moves a lot slower when you have run out of items to sell. The Emerald City crowd was much lighter today, but Baby Tattoo's problem was not a lack of customers; it was a lack of merchandise. While it would have been nice to sell a few more books to fans who had to be turned away empty-handed, Baby Tattoo's available inventory for the event was reasonably on-target relative to demand. Perhaps the topic Taking Too Much Inventory vs. Taking Too Little Inventory is a good topic for a future Little Business Day post about the challenges of selling at conventions. For now, suffice it to say that Baby Tattoo was very pleased with the Emerald City ComiCon, and looks forward to returning for next year's event in early April.

John hit the road back to Portland right after the show, so Bob did dinner solo at the sort-of national Daily Grill. After eating his salad at the bar, Bob asked for his burger to be packaged to go as an in-room main course. (The same restaurant provides room service to the Sheraton where Bob was staying, but carrying it himself rather than ordering it to the room was a significant money saver. And, on the topic of money-saving tips, Daily Grill's dinner menu is devoid of almost all of the reasonably priced lunch items like burgers and sandwiches, but the Cheeseburger is available at night on the bar menu.) Bob's ratings (on a scale of 1 to 10) were as follows: Food 7 (but he gives breakfast a 9, and the thin fried onions a 10), Atmosphere 9, Service 7, Value 6.

Seattle - Day #2 (Emerald City ComiCon Day #1)

Emerald City ComiCon drew a great crowd today. Hundreds of attendees were lined up in advance. The aisles were crowded from opening to closing. Baby Tattoo sold out of several of the company's most popular titles before the day ended. Customers and vendors seemed generally and genuinely pleased. All good news, but Baby Tattoo's two-man crew was definitely more worn out than anticipated.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day. It should be interesting to see how the date affects attendance.

Dinner was at the sort-of national chain Rock Bottom Restaurant and Brewery. Bob and John's ratings (on a scale of 1 to 10) were as follows:
Bob: Food 7, Atmosphere 5, Service 7, Value 6.
John: Food 8, Atmosphere 6, Service 7, Value 7.

Seattle - Day #1

Bob flew Virgin America from Los Angeles to Seattle. Bob likes Virgin America, and will post about it another day.

John "Special Needs" Simone drove to Seattle from Portland. This is John's first shift on the Baby Tattoo crew since Fangoria Austin back in January.

Load in was easy. The locals seem nice. Come by Emerald City ComicCon this weekend and say, "Hi." What better way to celebrate Mom's special day than by bringing her to a comic book convention?

Dinner was at Noodle Ranch. Bob and John's ratings (on a scale of 1 to 10) were as follows:

Bob: Food 6, Atmosphere 4, Service 9, Value 7.

John: Food 6, Atmosphere 7, Service 8, Value 7.

The photo (above) of a downtown Seattle vacant lot was snapped by John on our walk back from tonight's opening at Roq La Rue Gallery.

This Is Only a Test

It is possible to type in the Edit Html pane, but not in the Compose pane. Shooting and posting a photo does not look promising. Today's test is part of tomorrow's "Little Friday is Little Business Day" post.

Event Appreciation Day

Wow! How much is there to do in the weeks ahead? Come to one of the listed events to meet the Baby Tattoo crew, Baby Tattoo published artists and/or Baby Tattooville Featured Artists (past and future).

May 10-11 - Baby Tattoo at Emerald City ComiCon - Seattle, Washington

May 10 - Gris Grimly signing at Lewis Gallery - Simi Valley, California

May 10 - Luke Chueh Solo Show at Copro Nason - Los Angeles

May 10 - Elizabeth McGrath Solo Show at Billy Shire Fine Arts - Los Angeles

May 17-18 - Baby Tattoo Books and Jeffery Scott (1019) at Glamourcon - Los Angeles

May 17 - Tim Biskup Solo Show at Jonathan LeVine Gallery - New York

May 17 - Grimly, Pigors, Ragnar and Visell at the Animation Book Look - Los Angeles

May 30 - June 1 - Baby Tattoo at Book Expo America (Professionals Only) - Los Angeles

June 6-8 - Baby Tattoo and multiple artists at Ink-n-Iron - Long Beach, California

June 7 - Gris Grimly Limited Edition Book Release at Halloweentown - Burbank, California

Event Appreciation Day

There are two big events in Los Angeles this weekend. Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors runs Friday through Sunday at the LA Convention Center, and the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books is Saturday and Sunday on the UCLA campus. The real Baby Tattoo will be at the Festival of Books while Baby Tattoo's Evil Twin will be at Fangoria.

By the way, does anyone else think the "When Books Attack" art for the LA Times show is much more horrific than Fangoria's "Does Anyone Have a Napkin" image?

April 25-27 - Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors, Los Angeles

April 26-27 - Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, Los Angeles

May 10-11 - Emerald City ComiCon - Seattle, Washington

May 17-18 - Glamourcon - Los Angeles

Shameless Plug Sunday #16

Ragnar's debut collection of pinup art, Chromaphile, is sold out at Baby Tattoo, and is officially out of print. His follow-up collection, Vernaculis, is destined for the same fate. Don't miss out; pick up a copy of Vernaculis now.

A third and final book in Ragnar's pinup series will be released this summer. Symptomatica will be the same size as the two previous titles, so if you want to collect a complete set, and you don't have Chromaphile yet, keep an eye out on abebooks.com for a secondary market copy.

New York Comic Con - Day #3

Kids day boasted plenty of kids. Good deals and good times were plentiful on this final day of the show. A number of exhibitors with past New York Comic Con experience, praised the show's growth. Here's to the next one. Baby Tattoo will be at a lot more conventions, fairs and trade shows in the year between now and then, so check back on Event Appreciation Day (aka Tuesday) to learn where you can find us next.

New York Comic Con - Day #2

Crowds seemed big from Baby Tattoo's 100 square foot vantage point. After the usual and understandable lack of early sales that results from consumers wanting to check out their options before spending their money, people started buying. Sales were brisk and moods were good.

Baby Tattoo is already looking forward to next year. Tomorrow is being touted as Kid's Day, and it will be interesting to see if the super-young marketing hook pulls in a meaningful number of families. In preparation for the posibility of a room filled with the under-twelve set and their parents, Baby Tattoo is segregating our family friendly books from our more mature titles. Sometimes naughty needs to be separated from nice even though Baby Tattoo likes to see the two intermingle.

New York Comic Con - Day #1

Sales were good, but networking opportunities were even better. The professional-only hours from 10:00AM - 3:00PM genuinely provided some solid time for doing business with all sorts of folks from the book trade, the comics business and the art world.

New York Comic Con Opens Tomorrow - Woo!

Visit the Baby Tattoo Booth (#1851) at New York Comic Con. Bob Self will be on hand as will Baby Tattoo associate (and model) Cristina Maxwell. In addition to Baby Tattoo's entire line of books, the booth will also feature books by extraordinary east coast artists Viktor Koen and Michael Whelan. Viktor will be signing at the booth on Saturday from 12:00 - 1:00, and Michael will be signing on both Friday and Saturday.

Missing Blogger Found in New York City

Wow. Things went silent there for two weeks. I'm sorry about that. I got overwhelmed and the whole daily posting thing went poof. I arrived in Midtown Manhattan today, and I'll be loading 17 cartons plus one giant suitcase of merchandise and marketing materials into the Javits Center tomorrow. That's right, New York Comic Con opens this Friday and the daily posts are back... hopefully. I will retroactively upload all of the missed posts so that future Baby Tattoo Blog visitors might be fooled into thinking I am more on top of things than I really am. But we'll know the truth, won't we?

- Bob Self

By the way, the image of the city is a properly purchased royalty free stock photo. I will post some thoughts on royalty free images at a future date.

Change Has Come (Sort Of)

Back in February, there was a post titled "Change is Coming; Change is Good". The post promised imminent relocation of this blog to a redesigned Baby Tattooville web site. Well, the Baby Tattooville site has been redesigned, but the blog is staying right here for now. So, change has come, but it changed.

In case you missed the two links above, click here to visit the redesigned (but still changing) Baby Tattooville site.

Things Bob Likes

I've been a fan of Darren Waterston's art ever since I discovered his book Darren Waterston. Maybe one of these days I'll email him and introduce myself. Maybe this post is a good excuse to email him introduce myself right now. Maybe I'll just keep procrastinating.

Check out his work via the link above. The image is, of course, copyright Darren Waterston.

-Bob Self

Little Friday is Little Business Day

It might be fun. It should be rewarding. But it's not going to be easy.

Whatever the industry, whatever your plan, regardless of all your best efforts, in spite of your experience (or lack thereof); it's not going to be easy to run your own business. It might be easy to start your own business, but starting it and keeping it going are two different things.

Running your own business can certainly be a positive journey - empowering, creatively stimulating, life-changing, life-affirming... you know the buzz words. But it's a difficult journey; that's its nature.

Don't be discouraged, but don't be foolish either. If you are considering entrepreneurship, ask yourself, "Is it going to be easy?" If your answer is, "Yes," keep your day job.

Thanks to Michael Whelan for use of his copyrighted image "Edgedancer". Michael would probably be the first to tell you that being a professional artist is the same as running your own business. Once again, not easy.

Subscriber Surprise

Many current subscribers to Hi-Fructose magazine received a gift from Baby Tattoo along with volume 7 of the magazine. The gift was a copy of Ragnar's Kings of the Road aka "The Strangest Book Baby Tattoo Has Published". The magazine is fantastic and is well worth the cover price without a bonus book, but who doesn't dig an occasional freebie? If you haven't already, you should subscribe to Hi-Fructose right now by clicking here.

The photo of the magazine and book combo is from Brad Colbow's Design blog.

Event Appreciation Day

April 5 - Eric Pigors Art Show and Book Signing at Hyaena - Burbank, California

April 18-20 - New York Comic Con - New York

April 25-27 - Fangoria's Weekend of Horrors - Los Angeles

April 26-27 - Los Angeles Times Festival of Books - Los Angeles

May 10-11 - Emerald City ComiCon - Seattle, Washington

May 17-18 - Glamourcon - Los Angeles

Marketing Monday

Perhaps Marketing Monday was too ambitious an idea. Maybe there is not really that much to say. How does Marketing Every-Other-Monday sound? Oh, right... it sounds sucky. So, Marketing Monday it is; not only because it sounds good, but because there really is that much to say. And then some.

The force-feeding image above is a detail from a painting by Baby Tattoo friend and visual wild man Jonathan Wayshak (adult content).

Shameless Plug Sunday #13

Sturdy enough for little kids, yet sophisticated enough for discerning adults... it's Popping Through Pictures, a collection of paintings by Amanda Visell presented in a rigid yet fun board-book format.