Comic formats & pricing

[arrakur]

I don't know every DoF comic ever released, but afaict Fernando's "Total Control" was the first attempt at telling a story about successful business lady being blackmailed into submission. That must be one of the oldest BDSM fantasies and it took 350 comics to arrive? Compare that to about 250 comics about a officer/agent/reporter/celebrity kidnapped by some really ugly hispanic/black/russian guys. Nothing wrong with the latter, of course - but it's been a *decade* now.

It is true that many of the plotlines a very similiar and rehashing the basic BDSM-fantasies over and over. But to be fair it must be pointed out that this is due to business consideration. These comics have to be sold in order for dofantasy to survive. By publishing stories with familiar BDSM-scenarios dofantasy makes sure to reach a large audience who find the product attractive and buy it. The audience, in form of some outspoken people like you, criticise the lack of innovation but when the supplier strays too much from the tried and true formula the larger audience has come to expect, he risks a decrease in sales.

[Thon]

Now as we don't get to see the exact numbers it's hard to be certain, but my impression is that Erenisch and Fernando are two of the best sellers, and they have both moved away from the 'trusted old formula' of keeping hottie chained up in a dungeon.

However I still believe the best results come when the artist understands or buys in to the story or the concept. For example, I would really love to see Ferres do a contemporary comic, similar to Fernando's total control, with slave girls being put through their paces in an everyday modern city somewhere in europe or the states. Preferably a workplace setting like a restaurant or office, with sexy shoes and clothes. But I don't believe that is Ferres 'thing'. And to put that many hours in making the amount of high detailed drawings he/she does without having the spark for it, would probably end up not being done. Better to stick to werewolfs, mages and knights in shiny armour then. Artist need inspiration. So do your thing. Unless there's no market at all of course. Like for badly drawn bodybuilder girls.

[comicglutton]

Give me a good old-fashioned bdsm comic any day. I like the old tried and tested formula. For that matter, I much preferred Fernando's earlier works.

[Naj]

As one of the "writers" for comics, I can't really say much regarding originality. I too would like to see something different, but generally my experience has been "here's a bunch of pictures, make a coherent storyline out of it" which, while professionally challenging, does have its limits.

Generally, what little pleasure I can get comes from exploring the depth of the archetypes that most of these comics present, usually with the villains simply because the victims can only really come in two flavors: innocent and naive or a bitch who deserves what's coming to her. It is quite interesting what can be done to make characters more nuanced if some effort is put into it. On the note of villains, hillbilly types are actually one of my favorite archetypes to play around with simply because there's a great deal of play in how the stereotypes are perceived, though I've been told by Nuria, rest her soul, that having particularly thick accents makes it difficult for translators, so I try to be mindful of that. Still, I've never been under the impression that readers of this genre want anything more than broad brushstrokes anyway, but that's mostly just speculation on my part. I'm sure the nuance is lost on all but a handful, but it helps keep me going when a deadline looms.

Really, the creators who are capable of doing both art and storyline have the most flexibility in this regard. Us writers at the shallow end of the pool kind of have to make do with what we have, which really isn't a lot. Like it or not, the artists are the ones that run the show as far as material (near as I can tell, anyway), and as aforementioned, the readership is kind of held hostage to those artists' own personal tastes and preferences.

Oh, and hi everyone.

[STeve]

Well, from my point of view the writer, Geoff Merrick, "runs the show".

I'm not complaining about that, his writing is fantastic, I never have any "artistic block" about what to draw and still have a lot of leeway creatively.

Perhaps if you wrote the kind of thing you wanted to see and then offered that to an artist?

Not me, I have more than enough work, Geoff is very prolific. He keeps several of us drawing his stories, but I'm sure others would be very interested in working with a script, even if only as a try-out.

[Naj]

Well, I guess we all have different experiences, but that's just what Bego sends me - a bunch of images and an outline and turn that into something. Never had any complaints about my work but neither have I had much approval either - Roberts' kudos regarding sales copy notwithstanding. I'm still convinced that nobody reads the storylines that closely, so I'm not sure how important my job is in all honesty, but I wouldn't know.

Never really gave much thought about offering my own ideas. Had some things simmering on the back burner but never really got around to turning them into anything coherent. It would be interesting to see what happens.

[Thon]

I have more than enough work, Geoff is very prolific. He keeps several of us drawing his stories

Are those published somewhere else? I'm asking because I like Geoff's writing, and, well .. it's not exactly raining such comics here...

[Thon]

I'm still convinced that nobody reads the storylines that closely, so I'm not sure how important my job is in all honesty,

The customer base seem to consist of a both. Which is of course natural. To me it looks like the more story driven comics are growing in appeal, but I've got no real numbers to back that. I'm basing it on feedback from various artists and how the comics them selfs have evolved. But as I prefer that kind of comic my self, I might well be a little biased.

And I sure do hope Dof sell a lot more copies than there's active posters voicing their opinions here...

[Naj]

Personally, I'm more a fan of the long epics than one shot deals in general which I suppose would extend to this genre as well. That said, Dofantasy has a long history of loose ends and "to be continueds" that never quite pan out, possibly due to sales or lack of artist interest. I've contributed to a few of the ongoing storylines in the comics that have come through here, but I don't think I've ever been part of a serial from beginning to end, and typically if it does happen, it's still at the artist's direction which can result in some jarring shifts in character development that I personally don't agree with, but whatever works I guess.

The more coherent storylines involve creators that can do their own art/writing which isn't necessarily every comic on the site. I've edited/touched up Fernando's Sex Wars and Dark Vengeance comics and Erenisch's Slave World series which has been a nice change of pace - I typically don't do editing that often. Those comics are by nature more coherent and coordinated because it's a single mind driving the boat. I'm not going to name names, but there's a few series here that have had multiple writers assigned to them (like Marvel/DC I suppose) of which I've been a part, but again, near as I can tell, no one seems to notice as the artist seems to be giving most of the direction regarding the storyline, so it stays on track, but the writing style can and has changed.

As far as Merrick/Steve goes, I would hazard a speculation that their works are at the sister BDSMArtwork site which does devote itself more toward ongoing storylines than one shot deals. Confessions of Guilt has been part of my workload for quite a while now, and I did work a bit on Roman Decadence. It's been interesting to see the direction Tryten takes in CofG, and I've mostly been along for the ride.

I'm pretty sure there are more people buying comics than posting on the forum, especially if the bulk of the market comes from the United States where porn in general is not highly regarded, never mind something as "esoteric" as BDSM. The silent majority, as Nixon coined it.

Though it probably doesn't help that the forums are tucked away in a tiny corner.

[STeve]

Thon try http://bdsmartwork.com as Naj suggests search for Geoff Merrick and you will find a lot of stuff there.