Events - Hi-Ex Spotlight, Talk Shows
It wasn't the first time I had been asked to be on a panel, but this was the first time I didn't say 'no'. Being people I knew and liked I didn't feel I should turn them down, they were obviously desperate if they'd come to me! I didn't say yes either, and hoped they'd just forget about me. Oh no, Rich and Vicky were too well organised for that.
I was down for three panels, Indie Comics, Girls in Comics and The Future of the British Comics Industry. I knew I had something to say about the first, even if I didn't know what it was. I could only see disaster in the second and thought I could perhaps wing the third.
Not having done any formal speaking since a disastrous university presentation some 15 years earlier (luckily I was hidden amongst several other disastrous presentations, so it has gone unrecorded by history) I can't say it was the bit of the weekend I was most looking forward to. But I'd had a long and at times scary ride up to Inverness the previous night. I was about to start panicking before the first talk when I realised I was too tired, and couldn't be bothered to panic.
Indie Comics - Luckily artist Graeme Neil Read was also doing the talk, so I had an ally. We arrived in the theatre, it had a stage, table, chairs, spotlights, microphones, bottles of water, an audience of about 30 people and us with no obvious idea what was supposed to happen next. Artist Declan Shalvey arrived and it was soon obvious that nobody was going to tell us where to stand and what to say, so we got on with it. We needn't have worried, Declan knows how to talk, and me and Grame worked around him. We did our best to warn people of the perils of self-publishing, while still trying to get across that it was worth the effort. It went pretty well, we survived. Result!
Girls in Comics - Knowing I was potentially onto a hiding with this, I'm not a girl, not planning to become one, but had once edited a comic called Sunny for Girls. That was enough for the conscription panel. I asked Jeremy Dennis (who is a girl, called Jeremy, who writes comics) for some advice, and she warned me about the perils of these panels, but did her best to help all the same. I even had some comics by female comic creators to take along. In the end I turned up, and was half way onto the stage, when I realised that there was three chairs on stage, all occupied, by girls, and they were looking at me with mild alarm. They'd obviously started their talk and I wasn't needed, so I ran away. Result!
The Future of Comics - I turned up for this one, boyed by my two successes so far, only to find an empty table and nobody at all. Er... this wasn't good. I was just going out of the theatre to look for someone to ask (or run away) when Michael Carroll turned up. Hurrah! The two of us ran through where comics had ended up (the drugged water took effect as Michael started calling me a genius) and we were looking where comics were going when Rufus Dayglo (not from the Buckinghamshire Dayglo's I should add) turned up twenty minutes late in true rock'n'roll fashion and disagreed with everying we said, which really livened up the talk! We answered a few questions before Rufus dashed off to get his plane (probably a private jet) and we were forcibly turfed out of the theatre. Result!
Would I do it again? Well, if I can't get out of it!
That's not enough humiliation for you? Well, the scandalous video of me taken at Inverness involving some socks and a Village People song should just about do the trick... I'm the one at the end, on the right. I signed no consent forms.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezh6ajYx-p4
I was down for three panels, Indie Comics, Girls in Comics and The Future of the British Comics Industry. I knew I had something to say about the first, even if I didn't know what it was. I could only see disaster in the second and thought I could perhaps wing the third.
Not having done any formal speaking since a disastrous university presentation some 15 years earlier (luckily I was hidden amongst several other disastrous presentations, so it has gone unrecorded by history) I can't say it was the bit of the weekend I was most looking forward to. But I'd had a long and at times scary ride up to Inverness the previous night. I was about to start panicking before the first talk when I realised I was too tired, and couldn't be bothered to panic.
Indie Comics - Luckily artist Graeme Neil Read was also doing the talk, so I had an ally. We arrived in the theatre, it had a stage, table, chairs, spotlights, microphones, bottles of water, an audience of about 30 people and us with no obvious idea what was supposed to happen next. Artist Declan Shalvey arrived and it was soon obvious that nobody was going to tell us where to stand and what to say, so we got on with it. We needn't have worried, Declan knows how to talk, and me and Grame worked around him. We did our best to warn people of the perils of self-publishing, while still trying to get across that it was worth the effort. It went pretty well, we survived. Result!
Girls in Comics - Knowing I was potentially onto a hiding with this, I'm not a girl, not planning to become one, but had once edited a comic called Sunny for Girls. That was enough for the conscription panel. I asked Jeremy Dennis (who is a girl, called Jeremy, who writes comics) for some advice, and she warned me about the perils of these panels, but did her best to help all the same. I even had some comics by female comic creators to take along. In the end I turned up, and was half way onto the stage, when I realised that there was three chairs on stage, all occupied, by girls, and they were looking at me with mild alarm. They'd obviously started their talk and I wasn't needed, so I ran away. Result!
The Future of Comics - I turned up for this one, boyed by my two successes so far, only to find an empty table and nobody at all. Er... this wasn't good. I was just going out of the theatre to look for someone to ask (or run away) when Michael Carroll turned up. Hurrah! The two of us ran through where comics had ended up (the drugged water took effect as Michael started calling me a genius) and we were looking where comics were going when Rufus Dayglo (not from the Buckinghamshire Dayglo's I should add) turned up twenty minutes late in true rock'n'roll fashion and disagreed with everying we said, which really livened up the talk! We answered a few questions before Rufus dashed off to get his plane (probably a private jet) and we were forcibly turfed out of the theatre. Result!
Would I do it again? Well, if I can't get out of it!
That's not enough humiliation for you? Well, the scandalous video of me taken at Inverness involving some socks and a Village People song should just about do the trick... I'm the one at the end, on the right. I signed no consent forms.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezh6ajYx-p4
posted by paulvonscott at 9:10 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home