Wednesdaily with a cold...

[ellenmillion]

I went to bed last night with a post-nasal drip and woke up at 4 with a sore throat and clogged head. After a half an hour of tossing and turning, I got up and took medicine, working on some artwork while I waited for it to take affect. It worked, and I went back to sleep for a few more hours. I am hoping it remains a MILD cold, because I have FAR too much to do to stop and be sick.

I found a few holes in my novella as I went back and read it, and have been slowly plugging those in - it's at a total of 22,500 words right now, and I think I have one snowball fight to write before this sucker is completely finished. It is the silliest thing I have ever written.

Kickstarter video is done and uploading!

I'd love your input, if you've got the time to take a peek at the project preview. I think it's ready to submit for approval, just getting nerves now. Any thoughts you'd have would be appreciated. The project is here.

One quick Guppy photo from our snow day a few weeks back, because I know there will be screaming otherwise...


She was bringing our snow bunny some cookies.

Comments

Suggestion

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

I notice you have no high-end rewards. What about adding a reward level that gets the backer the original cover art, as colored by you? (Would that technically be a hand-colored print? As an edition of 1, and the original for the printed cover, I'd think it would count as an original, but you can fix the phrasing.)

There would have to be a limit of 12 backers, of course. Or you could list 12 rewards, "The January Cover" and so on, so backers could pick the month. Other possibilities would be to list the covers that you already have that art for, even if those titles are not part of the subscription.

[sholio]

Re: the cold - oh dear. If this is the same one, Orion is having such a mild case that it barely seems like he's sick, but it came down on me like a ton of bricks. So, uh ... good luck? (For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure the reason why it's hitting me so hard is because I had a lot of trouble sleeping night before last - I only got a couple hours - and that's when it really fell on me. GET LOTS OF SLEEP!)

The kickstarter looks great! I think my main suggestion would be to offer a low donation level that has an actual reward -- like, instead of starting off at $1, maybe start off at $5 or 10 and offer their choice of a single free PDF coloring book PLUS an option on future subscriptions. With the donation levels starting so high otherwise (which is totally reasonable considering what they're getting, of course!) I wonder if you might get more and higher donations at the low level if you start higher, but offer something for it.

I also agree with wyld_dandelyon that it feels a bit truncated without a high-level reward. I like her suggestion! Another possibility for a higher-level reward would be some kind of 2-fer gift subscription: one for you, one for a friend.

[ellenmillion.livejournal.com]

I wondered about a lower-level reward. I think I will add a lower reward level as a stretch goal to allow people to purchase individual pdf copies... but I really want to get to the goal with subscriptions themselves, because it's really not worth doing if I have only two or three subscriptions and sell a whole bunch of single pdfs to get to the goal.

I am stewing about the higher-level rewards. I don't want to commit myself to doing new artwork, and originals make me balk because I don't want the hassle of coordinating that with other artists and worry that offering only my own work would be taking unfair advantage. I've got additional subscriptions offered as add-ons, so people can grab those - I wasn't sure what combinations people might want (2 print subscriptions and 1 digital? 1 of each? 5 print subscriptions?), so thought that add-ons would be better than listing 18 different rewards...

I'm toying with offering a few custom coloring book pages (with a comfortably far-off deadline) at a premium, but see above about promoting my own work and not everyone else's equally.

Re: Suggestion

[ellenmillion.livejournal.com]

I am toying with the idea of offering a high-end custom work tier... with a comfortably far-off deadline, of course. Color is a lot harder/slower for me, so I'd avoid that. My biggest foot-dragger there, though, is that I feel a little guilty using a collective Kickstarter like this to promote my own work personally. Maybe that's silly.

[sholio]

I really want to get to the goal with subscriptions themselves, because it's really not worth doing if I have only two or three subscriptions and sell a whole bunch of single pdfs to get to the goal.

ohhhhh ... that is a REALLY good point! Actually, in light of that, I think I'm backing off my suggestion to have that as a donation incentive at the lower level -- because I had forgotten this was one of the main reasons for doing it as a kickstarter rather than in some other way, and I agree that for this, you'd want to get to the goal via the actual subscriptions if at all possible. And having an incentive-driven goal below the first low-end subscription goal actually would confuse things quite badly.

[kelkyag]

<bounce bounce bounce> Novella!

Bringing snow cookies for the snowbunny is totally adorable!

If you want higher-level rewards ... do you have pictures in any/most/all of the coloring books? Would signed books or pages be an interesting option? (I realize that getting other artists to sign the books is a huge logistical headache.)

Re: Suggestion

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

Well, my suggestion was based on a couple of thoughts. One, the cover art is directly connected to the coloring books, making it a natural option in my mind. Two, that the cover art isn't something _extra_ you have to do, regardless of how far in the future the deadline is. By the time you have the coloring books, you will have the cover art done.

An alternative to a complex bit of commissioned art would be to offer a portrait based on a photograph, done in coloring-book style. You could probably quickly see if a couple of your regulars would be willing to do one such portrait so you could showcase more than just your own art, if you wanted to add several of that sort of reward to the list. By specifying that the portrait will be in coloring-book style, it fits the theme of the kickstarter, and would give the sponsor a bit of art that they and their family/kids/grandkids/whoever could color in.

That would be something extra in terms of art that has to be fit into your busy schedule, but I suspect the time investment would be quite manageable as compared to colored art or a painting.

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

What about a half-year or even-month only subscription at a little more than half the whole year subscription? Would that add too much extra work to be manageable?

Re: Suggestion

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

After reading below--I am imagining that the perk of the coloring-book-style portrait would be the personalization. You could specify the award is a PDF of the artwork, not the original.

[wyld-dandelyon.livejournal.com]

I suspect the whole signing thing, with Ellen in Alaska and other artists all over isn't a good option.

[pixiewildflower.livejournal.com]

I hope you feel better. Sweet picture of Guppy!

[kelkyag]

I was thinking just Ellen signing a page she had done, for books for which that applied. If she doesn't have pieces in most of the books, that's less applicable.

[scumpi.livejournal.com]

I miss high end rewards as well. I am always attracted by original art or alike. I would love to give my Fishpond Fantasies original away though I can understand the hardship of having items in very different locations.