So it’s time again for that secular Mecca like trek for geeks of all color, size & shape & level of profession – The San Diego Comic Con. TomatoTV and it’s staff will be there with all out fellow pilgrims. We are sharing a booth with out sister company Geekdom Wear at Exhibitor tables B02 in the very back corner of Hall A. Come by and meet the staff (when they’re not running around doing other stuff) and follow our twitters on the links on the home page.

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We’ll probably have quite a few new visitors at from San Diego Comic Con, and as TomatoTV.net is a somewhat unique model in webcomics a quick 101 might help.

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For the second year in a row the planners of San Diego Comic Con thought Tomato TV’s co-operative work model was interesting enough to award panel time for us to share how we are able to end up with a singularly branded product, even though it’s made up of a mix of separate individuals and stories. I’ve always said our model and how we work together is unique. It’s a kind of fun wonderful to have that validated by the fact that they want us to share they way we work together. The panel will be Sunday, July 25, 3:00PM - 4:00 PM “Full Time Creative Work on Part Time” Room 24ABC. The panel gist is simple. The creative industries demand full time output, even if it’s not your full time job and thus you don’t have time for full time output (if for example you’re a hobbiest or breaking into the business). We’ll show you how to work with others to have a product that’s singularly branded but made form a group effort.

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This is the post I’ve been trying to put off as long as I could. For anyone that’s dropped by after San Diego Comic Con or Long Beach Comic Con you’ve noticed unfortunately a diminishing amount of publishing. It’s because I’ve learned that freelance is a good thing and so is web comics, but the two don’t mix well at all. Trying to both freelance as well as a be a web comics illustrator, writer AND editor for TomatoTV.net has not worked out as evidence of our terrible publishing “schedule”. I’ve been evaluating and some things gatta go. Now, you’ve read several posts that start with a similar prompt of “not enough time. Too much life” then they usually end with “it’s been great. Bye bye webcomic.” Well not here, for me it’s “Freelancing has been great, but bye bye Freelance. Hello TomatoTV.net” I’ll be returning to regular work for a company for a variety of reasons, but amongst those so I can donate the proper time to TomatoTV.net and really take it where I know it can go.

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As with San Diego I am going to break Long Beach Comic Con down to a few posts as there was too much fun for one post. This post will focus on the coolest part of the convention for me, which was meeting Berkeley Breathead creator of the comic strips Bloom County, Outland and Opus. I can count on one hand the amount of people that were the most influential creators that helped me either want to do what I do or whose work helped me get there once I wanted to do. Berkeley is one of them. I wrote recently of Jack Kirby who taught me personally that no one is small enough to be treated less than another and his art showed me how to move a character around a page in away that it’s hard to believe the illustration is really a static image. With Berkeley I read Opus when I was kid and enjoyed it more than the others for reason that I didn’t know at the time. Now I can look back and see that it was unique on the comic strips page in a way that also made Peanuts, For Better or For Worse in a category all their own. Bloom County though struck a cord in me where now I can see where what I love doing now started reading Bloom County as a kid. The absolute best thing about meeting Berkeley is that he turned out be rather a nice guy actually, something you always should be concerned about when meeting those whose only exposure you’ve had is their work. Thank you Berkeley for being so cool

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