D.J. Coffman - Sequential Artist, Thinker

Just getting around to the net today. Was up most of the night with my dog who was scared shitless over the storm we had. It was pretty loud, maybe the loudest thunder and lightning I’ve ever heard in recent memory. Sounded like bombs going off in my yard. Oddly though, I found the sound soothing and could have just slept through it. My kids did. The dog didn’t… so…. late start.

I’ve been the topic of conversation between my friend Al Nickerson and Dave Sim over creator rights issues, something both are passionate about and write about extensively. Dave refers to me as “The DJ Coffmans of the world”, in regard to just selling my work away to companies, or as if to infer that that’s all I have an interest in doing. I know he meant it generally and I don’t take offense to that, I think the world knows that Dave Sim is an opinionated fellow. I’ve been an admirer of his work for some time, and sometimes I scratch my head when I hear some of the quotes about mysogeny or religious views… but other times he’s brilliant. He did the self publishing world a great service in publishing his guide to self publishing in the back of Cerebus comics way back… when? Jesus, I’m getting old? Nah! Anyways, I wanted to clear something up about my view on “creator rights”, because I’m surely not against it at all.

Creator rights to me, use to be about, well OWNING your work, complete control. But there’s more to it than that as well. A code of ethics, the ways creators should be paid, and how creators should also be professional towards their publishers, back and forth. Most of which, I’ve broken into a million pieces by just telling the truth or my honest opinion. All many people know of me is Hero By Night, and the fact I sold it away, but I did so willingly because well, I wanted to make money. Some people still argue that when you do that, it’s a one time thing and you’re done, and years from now they’ll make zillions and you get nothing . Some cases that’s true in the past, but it’s not the case with my deal, and that’s why I went toe to toe with so many people criticizing my deal. Even though Platinum probably HATES me now, i’m still connected to Hero By Night and I’ll benefit from anything they do with it in the future. Sure, maybe they’ll shelve it for good, but I reckon if the chance to do anything in tv/film came along, they’d jump at it because, well, it’s business and they’d want to recoup some of their investment on it, and turn a profit. And when or if they do anything with it, I get a cut. That’s why I always felt like this was a MUCH better deal than Jack Kirby or other godfathers of comics got. They got NOTHING but headaches and heartbreaks. So at least it’s SOMETHING.. it’s one thing that’s out there somewhere, for better or worse.

And to any of my detractors who despise me, or ramble on about how bad it was for me to do, I’ve not ignored the things you’ve said. It’s actually got my brain itching to do full on creator owned stuff again, and you’re partly right. And luckily, I’m not a one trick pony, and I have plenty of concepts I’d like to explore that I’m being way more cautious with in the future. Even though this ended rough, it was a good experience for me, I learned a lot.  For now, unless it’s drawing other peoples characters for like Marvel or DC or some other writer’s project, I’m pretty much leaving Work-For-Hire alone. I won’t work work for hire on things I created and that other people own.  I don’t regret doing it, I just won’t do it again any time soon.

So, Mr. Sim doesn’t have to worry about the “DJ Coffmans” of the world making his job harder, because I think they might actually make it easier… and well, to my knowledge, there’s only ONE me. And I’ll be off somewhere creating fun comics.