Blood Moon is a independent comic book from the creative minds of Marty Birthelmer and Casey Parsons. Marty and Casey have turned to Kickstarter to crowd source the funds necessary to produce the comic book and will be appearing at Fan Expo Canada this weekend to help them achieve their goal. I recently had a chance to connect with Marty to learn more about Blood Moon and the Kickstarter campaign.
1. Tell us a little bit about Blood Moon.
Blood Moon is a 6 issue action-adventure series that follows an elite team of werewolf hunters in 1730’s England. They race against time to track and kill the first ever werewolf before he can create a new army and unleash hell on earth.
The first issue is set in England but then shifts to the colonial Massachusetts area for the remainder, except for flashbacks that bounce around various locations in Europe. I really wanted to try and include a wide range of locations and characters to the mix. That being said, I also tried to write the story with as much historical accuracy as possible for locations, dates, and events. It didn’t have to be that way, but I just know that I appreciate stories and movies that touch upon historically accurate themes and wanted to do my best in that regard. You know, aside from the werewolf part!
2. How did you come up with the idea?
Oddly enough I first got the idea when I decided to start concentrating on writing a screenplay. It was just before Christmas in 2014 when I was tossing some ideas around and I had a dream. Today I can’t exactly remember what scene it was but I wrote it out and liked it, then started building around that scene in both directions until I had the first third done and felt it was the one.
By the fall it was done and I stepped back to realize not only would I love to see it as a movie, but that it would also be an awesome visual as a comic series. It also helps to know that as a spec script writer having a visual aid with the entire story drawn out is a fantastic pitching tool to try and sell your script/story.
From that point it was only a matter of months of trying to find the right artist to team up with. Mostly meaning one that works for coffee and high fives. I mean, we of course have our own agreement set for the project, but I’m thinking the coffees sealed the deal!
3. What was it like collaborating with the artist, Casey Parsons on Blood Moon?
Casey is great, both as an artist and as a guy to partner up with. He’s pretty creative and isn’t afraid to throw out some ridiculous concepts which I love to see and most of which I tell him to run with. His comic art style is a bit reminiscent of some of the older EC books and it just felt like a great fit for the period based story. Casey studied fine arts and is more of a traditional artist so I knew right away that I was going to like what he could produce and it wasn’t going to look “cartoony”. I was trying to go for a realistic approach as the story is meant to parallel real life and he does it in a stylish way. Looking at his examples online or at comic book size really doesn’t hold a flame to holding an inked 11×17 page from the book.
4. You’ve decided to use Kickstarter to get Blood Moon funded. What has that experience been like?
For the most part Kickstarter has been an exciting experience. A few months ago when Casey and I started the project I tossed the idea of a Kickstarter so we could fund our first batch of books and so that his booth at Fan Expo would be covered. Keep the goal low, just for what we need. As we launched the Kickstarter I felt we both went into overdrive (laughs). All of a sudden now while trying to prep for Fan Expo and trying to get the book finished we are now adding in prints that need to be drawn and made, T-Shirts, updating the Kickstarter, doing social media all the time (which I am NOT great at) and just the questions Casey and I keep asking ourselves every day, “What else can I do to promote this?”. It’s been non-stop in the best of ways!
Aside from the grinding, we of course found out that we have a bunch of friends and family that love us and threw in their support. We also got the attention from outside the local areas which is really the main goal of crowdfunding and social media – to gain the interest of those that don’t know you. I mean, someone in Baton Rouge, LA donated, so we’re already pretty much an international sensation, right?
5. Aside from Blood Moon what other projects have you worked on?
Truth be told for comics I haven’t worked on anything other than a small 6 page back story that I wrote up for a Captain Canuck story that may still be published depending on Chapter House Comics’ schedule.
Outside of the comic world my most recent entertainment work was when I produced the theatrical play George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead Live in Toronto twice back in 2013. That was so much fun, mixing traditional zombies with contemporary humor. It was basically tons of Second City alumni and up and coming comedians with black and white makeup reimagining the cult classic film. I feel producing that over the course of a year has led to gaining a good deal of production knowledge for taking a project from the idea stage to the finished product stage. That experience has helped with creating Blood Moon.
Beyond that, most (if any) in the comic convention circles know me for being attached to Big B Comics from Hamilton, Ontario’s hip at all events and conventions. I’ve worked with them for over half my life now.
6. After Blood Moon is published do you have any other projects planned?
It is definitely to keep writing. Fortunately during this month I finished the 6th issue in the Blood Moon series, so that is all finished up. Yes, I realize it takes way more work to produce the art and therefore takes much longer, but issue 2 – 6 are the next priority and I wanted to have them done. If I stopped I feel I would have lost momentum so it was best to get it out of the way. There won’t be a Kickstarter for beyond issue 1, so this also gives me time to continue to shop around for a publisher. We have a few in mind and will start to solicit sometime in September and keep our fingers crossed.
Outside of Blood Moon 1 – 6 I have toyed with going back to writing another screenplay. It would likely be the sequel to Blood Moon (spoiler alert!). When Blood Moon ends you kind of get the notion of more going on, but then in the sequel you realize that the world is far bigger. In addition, I also already wrote out an episode breakdown and season synopsis for a potential 10-14 episode series that follows the main character from Blood Moon 20 years earlier. I really have a bit of excitement for this since it puts the golden age of piracy smack into the timeframe and would really broaden the action.
At the end of the day I envisioned Blood Moon as having more to offer and almost have its own world with this just being the starting point. While I have all these whimsical ideas, let’s just see how issue 1 does and then talk to me again (laughs).
7. Do you have any advice for writers or artists who are interested in getting their indie projects into the marketplace?
I would at this point say that writers can write whenever and however they like. If you have something in mind, then write it, no matter the style. I think the only thing is to know your goal. A film was mine, and then turning it into a 6 issue comic series. That helped me then approach an artist to come on board stating exactly what the plot, characters, period etc. of the book was, and the length of the project. It would be difficult for you to try and find an artist when you yourself don’t know if you’re writing an ongoing series, a one-shot or a graphic novel, and then have no character analysis of everyone you are trying to write about. If you haven’t already got the story arc and character development mapped out, not only would that be a tough sell in finding an artist, but you’ll only have to work extra hard later on.
A final technical detail is please know how to write a comic script. This was the first time I did, and I had to research old scripts and proper formatting to learn it. If you write screenplays, it is similar. The only reason I stress this is because you write it this way to help your artist, and they will appreciate it.
Artists on the other hand must have it worse. Look around at the artist alleys these days at conventions. I find most if not all have a ton of nice prints and pin-ups but nothing sequential. Plenty of artists do very well with commissions and prints and there’s nothing wrong with that, but if you want to do a project and get picked up as an artist, they will want to see examples to know you can layout pages and carry motion. I don’t have too much else to pick on for artists because I’m not one and I’d probably only be insulting real artists out there.
8. For those who are interested can you give us some information about how to contribute to your Kickstarter campaign?
Our campaign is easily found at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1044817795/blood-moon-issue-1 and it is active until this Sunday, September 4th. We timed it to end with the Toronto Fan Expo because as I mentioned, Casey will have a booth and plenty of Blood Moon merch with him as well as his normal arsenal.
As everyone knows, crowdfunding is as reliant on people pledging as well as just sharing the word. Casey and I both thank everyone who has been with us on this journey and all of those who choose to stop by and give us a look. Thanks for all your support!
The Kickstarter campaign for Blood Moon ends .
