LOOKING BACK AT 24 HOUR COMICS DAY

[MattBrady]

by Benjamin Ong Pang Kean

24 hours and it’s all over.

Imagine drawing 24 pages of story within that time frame and most people would cringe at the thought. After all, how many artists are drawing a complete comic book in a month these days?

The idea for a 24 hour comic came from the mind of Scott McCloud, who had come up with the challenge for himself and Steve Bissette.

Popular word-of-mouth through the grapevines, a few collections and some well-known industry professionals such as Dave Sim, Erik Larsen, and Chris Eliopoulos, getting into the game later, the inaugural 24 Hour Comics Day was successfully organized by Nat Gertler in April of 2004.

To date, over 2,000 individuals have done it in the span of 24 hours. Last year alone, over 1,200 cartoonists from around the globe took up the challenge on October 7th with another group of 20 taking part in the first-ever Malaysian challenge late last year.

With the 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2006 scheduled to hit in March, Newsarama.com caught up with founder Nat Gertler to talk about this whole initiative.

As an added bonus, we also caught up with two of Malaysia’s runner-ups for a chat. Look for it (and check out their stories) at the end of the interview.

Newsarama: Last year’s event was another round of success. And it was recently announced that some of the success stories would be collected in the upcoming 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2006. Overall, how did you feel of the whole effort and last year's event in general?

Nat Gertler: That there are so many people - this year, more than 1000 - who are so willing to pour themselves into such a dedicated effort, to try to do months worth of comics work in 24 straight hours, that leaves me stunned. And then I get to see all of the stories that get sent in, and it's astonishing. I'm not saying that all the stories are great - I've read more 24 hour comics than anyone, and many are more amazing in their dedication than their execution, to put it kindly. (Although that makes them endearing, since it shows someone who is not a polished comics creator, but is willing to try and learn.) But almost every story has something of value, and then you get these gems that are just astounding works, where the artist has used the energy and the momentum of the day to create something that they couldn't have done if they spent a month considering and rethinking what they're doing.

Doing the main editing effort on 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2006 (which will come out in March of 2007), the tough part wasn't finding stories to fill the book, it was having to say "no" to so many good pieces. Every year that's been a problem, but with more stories than ever and with the book being cut down to 256 pages (to see if we can sell more copies at $11.99 than at the previous volumes price of more than twice that), I had to say "no" to worthy work many more times.

NRAMA: That said, did 24 Hour Comics Day meet its objective? Did you achieve what you set out to achieve when you first introduced this concept and this challenge back in 2004?

NG: I feel like a robin who didn't realize that the egg it was hatching was a pterodactyl egg, because what's come out of this is so much bigger and powerful than anything I'd planned and expected. Let me make it clear here that I didn't conceive of the 24 hour comic – that was the invention of Scott McCloud more than a decade back. I just set up 24 Hour Comics Day, to get everyone to do them on the same day. When I first started down that road, I thought there would be one-time events in literally two or three locations, and I was doing it to promote a book (the one simply entitled 24 Hour Comics, where McCloud presents nine of his favorite existing 24 hour comics.) And it was only so-so as a publicity event (I'm not very good at leveraging publicity), but as a pure artistic event it was astounding. Now that it's become an annual event, growing about 50% per year and getting ever more international... I'm not even sure how to measure this, but it may be the biggest international arts creation event.

NRAMA: Did you ever think that the 24 Hour Comics Day could go beyond just 24 hours? Perhaps a weekly, monthly, quarterly, half yearly Comics Day event segregated by continents, say a North American 24 Hour Comics Day, an European Comics Day, an Asian Comics Day, etc?

NG: I hadn't even expected it to be annual at first, nor international. But now that it is – we had official events in 17 countries on five continents. But I think once a year is about right; more often, and it would stop being special and start being ignored. Those people who want to do more than one 24 hour comic a year can do one whenever they like. More than one attempt at a big day each year and you lose that kick-in-the-butt effect that tells the folks who wanted to do it some day that this is the day. If they can say they'll just wait a few months until the next one, "some day" never comes.

And I think it's best that there's one big international 24 Hour Comics Day. It's part of why we've been adding so many locations – new places want to join in on the Day, to be part of this international celebration. That certainly hasn't stopped other individual events like the Malaysian event, particularly where there were problems setting up on the Day. But with event locations in 17 countries on five continents this year, having the one 24 Hour Comic Day seems to be working... and I don't think we'll ever get 24 Hour Comic Day going in Antarctica no matter how we schedule it!

I've tried to reflect the international nature of the event in the book. The ten full stories in 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2006 were drawn in the US, Canada, The Netherlands, Australia, and Indonesia - five different countries on four continents. Not only that, but the creators of those stories include people born in South Korea, England, and Chile. Of course, I also try to mix up the content in other ways, putting pros like Fraser Irving (artist on Marvel's new Inhumans miniseries) or graphic novelist Rob Osborne in there with students like Ju Hui Judy Han' and Tita Larasati. Or throwing action, comedy, and even documentary all together, with art styles that are all over the spectrum. Except for the 24 Hour Comics Day link, this is a very diverse book.

NRAMA: What've you planned for 2007?

NG: I'm still working out the date... likely again in the fall, but there is reasonable pressure to avoid the Columbus Day/Canadian Thanksgiving weekend which was chosen for 2006. If we do end up doing another 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights book for 2007 - and that is not definite, these books aren't exactly huge money makers - I'll find someone else to edit it. That's for a couple reasons. One is that we shouldn't keep getting just my vision of what makes an interesting 24 hour comic. So far I've edited three 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights books and 24 Hour Comics All-Stars, the all-commercial-comics-creators volume. That's enough from me!

The other reason is that I'm looking to pass on more of the 24 Hour Comics Day responsibility in general. A committee or perhaps some existing comics or arts organization should take on the planning and the organization. My personal goal is that in two years, I'll be free enough that I can actually participate in 24 Hour Comics Day, getting to do my second 24 hour comic. As much as the event has been growing, there's clearly room for more growth if people who are good at publicity, arts funding, and other things that I'm weak at become involved.

And there's so much good that comes from 24 Hour Comics Day... I'm always hearing from people who've discovered or rediscovered the joy of making comics, who learn things about what they can do. Again and again I've heard about places where there wasn't really a comics-making scene until after 24 Hour Comics Day -- stick a bunch of creative people in a room together for 24 hours, and suddenly their planning bimonthly meetings to share tips, collaborate, and commiserate.

For more info and updates, goto http://24hourcomics.com/

As promised, we present to you Sheldon Goh and Sarah Joan Mokhtar, finalists of the Malaysian 24 Hour Comics Challenge.

NRAMA: How did you first come to know about 24 Hour Comics Day?

Sarah Joan Mokhtar: On Scott McClouds website. I read Understanding Comics a good while back and since then have periodically visited his website to read on updates. It was there I first came across the concept and his attempts at creating a 24 hour comic.

Sheldon Goh: I've known about 24 Hour Comics Day for a couple of years now. I've heard it mentioned at http://penciljack.com, an online community for comic book artists and writers where I've been a member for about 4 years now.

Members would sometime post their 24 Hour Comics in the forum and through their postings, I learned about this nutso crazy event where comic book artists the world over would subject themselves to this ordeal where they're supposed to write and illustrate a full 24 page comic book in 24 straight hours with no prior preparation. Sounded completely nuts to me!

NRAMA: What made you decide to take up the challenge and participate for the first ever Malaysian 24 Hour Comics Challenge?

SG: It was partly because I'd always wondered if I'd have the chops to pull it off. As an aspiring pro penciller, I know that the average speed in the business is to *pencil* a comic book page in one working day. That works out to be about 8 hours to pencil a single page, working from a script that a writer provides you. So as you can imagine, to write, pencil, ink and letter 24 pages by yourself in one day sounded like madness. But at the same time, it sounded like incredible fun!

Earlier this year, I picked up the 24 Hour Comics Day Highlights 2005 book and checked out the work that was being done. I didn't know what to expect. The stories were a crazy mix of funny and sad, depressing and uplifting, insightful and confusing but always heartfelt, if not downright poignant. The artwork was at once sometimes wonderful to look at, sometimes difficult to make out and at times (usually be the end of a story) nearly indecipherable. But the point was that their authors had done it. They had taken on this insane challenge and emerged the other end, 24 hours later, with this body of work. And I really wanted to give it a go too!

We missed the international event in October, but luckily the wonderful, hardworking guys and gals at Cedko scrambled to put together the Malaysian event and put the word out. At first, I was afraid it would clash with end-of-year holiday plans, what with it being held just a week before Christmas. But thankfully, the stars aligned and it was green for go!

SJM: Knowing a lot of the great people who would be participating and having the chance to work by their side for 24 hours was a big draw factor (no pun intended). The organizers did a great job in making sure that the participants could work as comfortably as possible. These kinds of opportunities to mix freely with a talented and varied group of comic artists are few and far between.

Not to say I wasn’t initially hesitant. I was already an invited guest speaker with three scheduled talks and an artist booth to manage. In addition to that, being five months pregnant made me wonder if I was taking on too much and if participating was what a responsible first-time mum would do.

Having a supportive husband who made sure I was prepared to spend the night at the mall was the most encouraging factor.

NRAMA: Sarah, I understand that you're expecting your first baby, right? And Don, it's obvious that Lia, your wife and three kids were supporting you all the way but really, Sarah and Don, how did you prepare yourself, mentally, spiritually, physically and artistically, for the Challenge?

SG: I would love to tell you that I was dedicated in my preparation and woke up every morning at 5a.m. and meditated while standing on one foot under a waterfall, but the truth is, I was swamped with work at my day job for a couple of weeks running up to the Challenge. I mulled the story over in my mind, of course, but even up to the last minute, I wasn't quite sure how it would all come together.

In the weeks running up to the event, I'd ping-pong between one approach and another. I wanted to draw a superhero story with big action sequences (I love the superhero genre) and I figured full page fight scenes might make the going easier (strategy! but after having read the 2005 Highlights book, I also felt compelled to do something deep and profound and meaningful. So I'd toss and turn and hem and haw between the approach I should take. My wife, Angelia Ong and I collaborate sometimes (she is the writer in the family and we sometimes collaborate on comics projects) and I'd discuss things with her, moaning about how I just couldn't make up my mind. It was my wife who eventually reminded me to "just tell a story!" -- good advice indeed.

On the morning of the Challenge (the Malaysian 24 Hour Comics Day started at 3p.m.), I happened to check out the 24 Hour Comics website and came across the Random Title Generator, a lovely part of the site that spits out random story titles, the idea being the titles would spark ideas for stories. I found quite a few that I liked and eventually settled on "The Zeppelin Of Fate", which conjured up all sorts of cool story ideas. By the time I took my seat at the Challenge, however, I still had no idea what course the story should take. I had sequences in my mind and points I wanted to hit and I sort of had an idea about where it should end up, but was clueless about how it should all be tied together.

One of the rules of the 24 Hour Comics Challenge is that you should come to the table clean, without any prior preparation. So no character sketches, no written plots or scripts, no set designs, nothing. I ended up spending the first hour or so plotting and planning out the first half of the story. And when I finished those pages, I spent another hour at the halfway point plotting and planning out the second half. The pressure was on throughout the 24 hours, also partly because of who I sat next to. I was privileged enough to sit next to Alan Quah, the super-talented artist who eventually won the first prize, and seeing him work spurred me on. Over the next 24 hours, we would end up supporting each other, chatting, laughing and encouraging each other through this experience.

A quick word about lessons learned. Prior to the Challenge, I had been going through a bit of a difficult time artistically lately, over-analyzing and over-rendering my art, sometimes to the point where I would draw and redraw panels to get things "perfect", then get frustrated when it wasn't. For this challenge, I was unable to draw in my usual detailed style, simply because there wasn't time for that. I would have to learn to get a bit rougher with the art and learn to let go when the page was "good enough". The point was to finish the challenge and tell the story. It was an interesting way to learn this lesson.

SJM: Making sure I had enough sleep the night before and bringing some medicated oil for any aches or pains was as far as I went in terms of forward planning.

Otherwise, I just mentally prepared myself to have a good time ,enjoy the whole experience and see what I was capable of creating within 24 hours.

NRAMA: Can you tell the readers what your respective story's about? Don?

SJM: I think what the story is about depends on the person who is reading it. I've heard some readers say its a humorous autobiography on the issue of nationality, others describe it as an ode to my soon to be born child.

To be honest I was a blank slate when the 24 hour clock started ticking. So I just started drawing shapes on the paper and what gradually appeared in my minds eye was a little girl... sitting by the drain. Then all these memories from my childhood started flooding back and I structured them around the theme of growing up with mixed racial/cultural background.

To answer your question, for me its a story about how its okay to be different and do your own thing. I like to think everyone can relate a little to that.

SG: As I said, I went into it with a laundry list of things I wanted this story to be. I wanted it to be a tribute to the superheroes I love, I wanted it to be a coming of age tale because I love that kind of story, I wanted it to have a bit of social commentary and I wanted it to be deep and profound. In the end, it was a mixed up mish-mash of all these things and not quite any of these things at all.

It's the story of 3 young boys who experience this one crazy day where they discover a much loved superhero comic book that's missing the last climactic page. They eventually do get to see the last page of the comic, and the events that lead up to that make up the story. I guess the point I was trying to make was that sometimes things are fated to happen in a certain way. You may wish and wish for something to happen, but when it does happen, how you end up getting to the result is another thing altogether. I'm not sure that's entirely clear in the story, but I'm pretty sure that's what I was getting at.

The story is structured as a straight comic book story intercut with the pages from this superhero story. In the process, I managed to work in a tribute to Fantastic Four #1 and I managed to do a couple of fight pages and a couple of nice storytelling pages, so I was pretty happy about that. The art is waaaaay rough by my normal standards, but hopefully it was good enough to tell the story.

NRAMA: Sarah, what about yours?

SJM: I find that a lot of comics in the international scene seem to be trying to cash in on the craze for all things anime and manga, resulting in some pretty rehashed and uninspiring stories. Style seems to triumphing over substance. On a positive note, I'm glad to see a lot more variety in subject matter and comics aimed at wider audiences such as the young female readership

From what I can observe, the comic art scene in Malaysia is at a crossroads. Having to compete with the attraction for popular foreign imports has resulted in a lot of experienced and talented local artists feeling alienated and wondering how to regain the interest of readers. One path to take is to emulate and duplicate both style and substance of the foreign imports, which I personally don’t think is the best way to go.

Another is to develop a style whose form appeals to readers with international tastes, but to retain a unique local flavor in subject matter and storytelling. Yet another path to take is to cast a wider net in terms of readership instead of relying on the youth entertainment/humor segment, and market accordingly.

Overall, I think readers are getting more sophisticated and exposed and its the task of the artist to discover where his or her unique work 'fits' in a growing global market.

NRAMA: What're your views on the current comics landscape, as a whole, and in the Malaysian context?

SG: I reckon that it's an exciting time for comics. I grew up very much a child of the late 70's and 80's and the American superhero comics that were so prevalent at the time. While on the one hand, I mope a bit because I'd love to see the US comics back in force at the news agents and corner newsstands in the large quantities and affordable prices that they used to be, on the other hand, it's gratifying to see the explosion in popularity of the graphic novel and trade paperback sections in the major bookstores. Unfortunately, pricing is a major barrier to entry for most kids, which is one of the reasons why the more affordable manga reprints have gained popularity over the US superhero stuff.

The emergence of some top quality webcomics is encouraging too. The web has allowed probably the most affordable channel of self publishing that there has ever been and it's very cool to see the breadth and quality of comics material on the web.

In the Malaysian context, I think we're perched right now at the start of a new golden age for comics in Malaysia. We have exported talent for years now to the US and Hong Kong publishers in people like Baba Chuah, Tan Eng Huat, Billy Tan, Sunder Raj, Kinsun and Milx and I think there is now a wave of new talent just waiting to make it onto the scene both locally and internationally. With the recognition of comics as a valid medium of entertainment by MDeC here in Malaysia, things are definitely looking up. Using the grants MDeC is generously awarding to get local comics and cartooning talent up and running, we should hopefully soon see more and more Malaysian cartoonists (both comics artists and comics writers) reclaim the newsstands here at home and stake a claim on newsstands and bookstore shelves the world over.

NRAMA: Sarah, you're one of the proud recipients of MDeC's grant to further develop and publish/digitize your comic creation so I guess you'll be busy with getting this up and running. And not forgetting, the baby on the way...

Don, I read that you're interested in expanding your writing horizons.

So, really, what next for the both of you?

SJM: In the short term, I have a commitment to work together with other dedicated individuals to deliver a entertaining, good-looking and well-written story to the public. Receiving the MDeC grant will go a long way into making sure that happens.

Plans to collaborate and publish a compilation of Malaysia’s 24 Hour Comics are underway, and there's going to be a flurry of activity in 2007 ranging from conventions, exhibitions and even more opportunities to create competitively.

Creatively, trying new avenues of artistic expression keeps me fresh and enthusiastic. So tending to pet projects outside the field of comics such as in the fine arts, writing and directing allows me to grow and share more of myself with others.

Long term, I really look forward to collaborating with other passionately dedicated individuals and organizations on visionary projects and initiatives.

Last but not least, to do all this independently while raising a healthy bouncing baby girl with my husband and family.

SG: Not sure about the writing horizons. Although I've done some writing for some small press stories that have been published in the UK, I'm a penciller at heart and this year, I'll be seriously building up my portfolio to make a push to get some superhero work with one of the US publishers. Aside from that, I do have a project I'm currently working on for the Awesome Storm Justice 41 webcomic (that's at http://www.awesomestormjustice.com/ ), which should be finished soon. I may also be doing a story for a fantasy-based comic in the States hopefully sometime soon. Until then, there's always the collaborative activities and drawoff challenges at penciljack.com to keep me occupied and on my toes.

One of my new year's resolutions will also be to get more involved in the local comic scene here at home in Malaysia. Malaysian comics have kind of drifted away from "serious" superhero stuff in the last twenty years or so and things have gravitated more towards humor, fantasy and horror. Because of that, I haven't kept up as much as I should have with developments in the local industry. Luckily, this year, I've been reintroduced to the local talent pool and next year, I look forward to hopefully being an active part of this community and working with these newfound friends and potential collaborators.

Check out the creators’ websites at:

http://www.sheldongoh.com/blog/

http://sarah-joan.blogspot.com

[fish1000]

The UK event at the ICA was a lot of fun, it was great to mingle with the other participants and see the different working methods.

My results are here:
http://fish1000.blogspot.com/2006/12...omic-4321.html

[Scott King]

It was interesting working under the pressure of such a close deadline.

My finished comic is here.

[Stormking]

How did that work? Did you start at say... Midnight and pull an all day thing?

[EmeraldGuy32]

I had a ton of fun at The Comic Bug with this event. I'm a two year veteran.

[CodeGuy]

I can't believe the quality of some of this work. How the heck can someone put out pages like this in an hour each?

[BanMan]

Originally Posted by Scott King

It was interesting working under the pressure of such a close deadline.

My finished comic is here.

I liked that one.

[BanMan]

I really wanna do this this year, but I am as slow as they come.

[cedkogan]

Dear all,

For more pics & write-ups of the inaugural Malaysian 24 Hour Comics Challenge, please visit

http://cedko.com/article.php?story=20061017130741843

[CitC]

I plan on putting a lot more thought into the concept, but the whole idea made me think of this:

http://comicsintheclassroom.net/oo20..._comic_day.htm

I think kids would have a lot of fun with it.

[Nat Gertler]

Looks like some nice stuff came out of the Malaysian event -- not that there's anything surprising about that!

[Jeremy Bear]

Great interview and, man, I really enjoyed the 24HCs from the contributors at the Malaysian event. Worth checking out by digging into their blogs.

And, for anyone else, I'd highly recommend picking up the highlights book. I've snapped up each volume of 24HC collections so far and they're always a fascinating read. Weird, funny, personal, always interesting.

Having completed two 24HCs myself, I'd highly recommend participating to anyone who hasn't already. A gut-wrenching experience, to be sure, and a truly wild ride.

[Nat Gertler]

Originally Posted by BanMan

I really wanna do this this year, but I am as slow as they come.

Some of the best 24 hour comics come from those who are as slow as they come.. and really, they're the ones who have the most to gain from it!