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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133571
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 9:30am | IP Logged | 1
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Last time I was under exclusive contract at Marvel they tried paying incentives to get people to turn in their work on time. I was getting DOUBLE page rate on XHY just for hitting the deadlines! (In fact, I was way ahead of schedule, but there was no incentive for that.) Insanity went further, in that even turning in work late still guaranteed a bonus. I did the math, and estimated that I would have to turn in my work 10 weeks late to hit my regular page rate!The whole idea was skewed anyway. Whether or not work came in on time was determined by the editor, so there were instances of books being reported as coming in on deadline when they were actually terminally late. A favor to artists, so they could still collect the big buck bonuses! Sanity would suggest flipping this system on its head. Get the work in on time, get your page rate. Penalties of, say, 10% per week for late work.*
* Why it was late would be a factor. Artists would not be penalized if the
writer is late. Inkers would not be punished for tardy pencilers.
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Jim Campbell
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 October 2006
Posts: 380
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 9:50am | IP Logged | 2
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QUOTE:
| Sanity would suggest flipping this system on its head |
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Indeed. Some ten years ago, I developed a business plan for a monthly
magazine that would have had a significant amount of strip in it.
The idea was to try and lure in some reasonably large creators with an OK
page rate, but a cracking rights deal and full creator ownership.
Of course, creator-owned series are notoriously hard to keep on-
schedule, so I had penalty clauses built into the proposed contracts. X
number of episodes are agreed at the time of commission, to be delivered
at Date1, Date2, Date3. I think I had a figure of 10% deduction per week
for overruns as well, as it happened.
I explained this idea to a few people and they looked at me like I'd grown
a second head!
Cheers
Jim
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Erik Larsen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 February 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 344
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:12am | IP Logged | 3
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The law prevents it from being flipped on its head. Legally, you can't cut
somebody's pay because of a missed deadline, which is why they instituted
an incentive program for making your deadlines instead. This same sort of
thing goes on in the real world all the time--often in construction there will
be bonuses for meeting or beating a deadline.
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Donald Miller
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 February 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 3601
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:26am | IP Logged | 4
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How about meet the deadline or not be asked for more art, writing , whatever.
It seems to me that meeting the deadline is part of the job.
Where I work, there is a little leeway given, but only a little and it certainly shouldn't be made a habit.
If you are continually hiring writers that are known offenders, then you are part of the problem. If you are allowing this to become the industry standard, then you are part of the problem. If you market a book as monthly, then you owe it to the public to produce a monthly product. It does not get more simple than that.
If you have a hot artist that you would like to use to sell books, but their speed is a known issue, then you need to quantify that up front with the artist...either modify the publication schedule(and advertise appropriately) or get the work in the can and then publish...
The choice to use artists that can't keep a monthly schedule should have no repercussions on the readers.
Don
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Kevin Brown
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 31 May 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 9006
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:29am | IP Logged | 5
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Todd's is a success story of the highest order.
*************************
Except when it comes to purchasing baseballs. ;)
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Geoff Gibson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5741
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:31am | IP Logged | 6
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The law prevents it from being flipped on its head. Legally, you can't cut
somebody's pay because of a missed deadline, which is why they instituted
an incentive program for making your deadlines instead. This same sort of
thing goes on in the real world all the time--often in construction there will
be bonuses for meeting or beating a deadline.
Really? Thats news to me. If its in a contractual agreement between Marvel and the artist why would that be (short of extenuating circumstances)?
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Frank S Balkin
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 06 May 2009
Location: United States
Posts: 31
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:42am | IP Logged | 7
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This makes me wonder how the ----holes who turn in work late on a regular basis would feel if they had a horrible accident and showed up at the Emergency Room of the local hospital, and there was no one there to tend to their wounds or injuries because all of the staff were running four hours late for their shifts
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Matt Reed
Byrne Robotics Security
Robotmod
Joined: 16 April 2004
Posts: 36087
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:42am | IP Logged | 8
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Erik Larsen wrote:
Legally, you can't cut
somebody's pay because of a missed deadline, which is why they instituted
an incentive program for making your deadlines instead. |
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You can fire them for continually missing deadlines, however, which would be the ultimate in flipping it on it's head. Become known as the company that won't put up with repeat offenders. I like that.
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Sean Blythe
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 July 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 342
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 10:59am | IP Logged | 9
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Where are the advertisers in all of this? Shouldn't they be raising hell with
every missed issue?
Also, it strikes me that comics would be well served by adopting TV's
"showrunner" concept. A writer/artist/editor team could set the direction
and tone of a book by creating a bible -- this is what this year of Batman,
say, is going to look like, these are the major arcs for the characters, this
is the underlying plot for the whole "season". The main team could write
the first few issues of the year, then hand off to another team who would
still be working from the bible, keeping everything consistent with the
overall creative vision set forth by the lead team. The lead team would be
empowered to tweak scripts and art as they saw fit, and would come back
to actually write and draw key issues and arcs. I think Joss Whedon is
doing this with his Buffy Season 8 books.
An ancillary benefit to this system would be the nurturing of young
talent, under the supervision of established writers and artists. No?
Edited by Sean Blythe on 09 June 2009 at 11:01am
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Jim Campbell
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 October 2006
Posts: 380
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 11:00am | IP Logged | 10
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QUOTE:
The law prevents it from being flipped on its head. Legally, you
can't cut somebody's pay because of a missed deadline, which is why they
instituted an incentive program for making your deadlines
instead. |
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I can't speak to US law, but you sort of can in the UK, as long as you don't
call it a penalty clause! You can pre-specify "liquidated damages" as part
of the terms of a contract to deliver work or goods in the event of late
delivery.
As long as you can demonstrate that you have a sound basis for the
calculated value of not-penalty, it should stand up to a legal
challenge.
Please note: I am not a lawyer, but that was my understanding of the
legal advice I was given on this issue.
Cheers!
Jim
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Erik Larsen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 February 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 344
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 11:08am | IP Logged | 11
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Knut Robert Knutsen wrote:
The central issue between Neil and Todd, as
reported, was not money but ownership of the Angela character. The
money issues are derived from that ownership issue. |
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Angela could not have existed without Spawn. She was not created in a
vacuum-- she was an evil twin--an angel to Spawn's devil. Conceptually,
she was a Spawn rip-off and she was designed by Todd-- yet this was a
Neil Gaiman "creation?" Alan Moore established the concept of there
having been Spawns throughout the ages--Neil uses that concept and
writes a story about a Spawn in medieval times, which, again, Todd
designs and suddenly Neil is the creator of "Medieval Spawn" even
though he never called him "Medieval Spawn" and that strikes you as fair?
Would you think it was fair for Alan Moore to sue Neil for mining his
script to come up with the concept of "Medieval Spawn?"
I never had guest writers on Savage Dragon--and it wasn't just because I
wanted to write every issue--a big part of that is that I didn't want some
clown coming along and doing the bloody obvious ("he's a dragon, right?
What if he fought a knight? Bet you couldn't come up with that on your
own--no sir, it takes a real writer to dream up something like that")
and then have to contend with them for the rest of my life as they
followed me around with their hand out.
I thought it was pretty shortsighted for Todd to let somebody else write a
story in which an evil twin of his creation appeared. Neil created nothing
that was wholly original for the Spawn series. It was all based on the
existing mythology of the title and all of the characters were designed by
Todd. How some fans can look at this situation and see Neil as an
innocent duped out of his creations is beyond me. Todd has spent
millions defending himself against a guy who, at best, co-created a
couple characters.
Where would Neil use "his" angelic Spawn slayer with her Spawn earrings
and her Spawn-hunting agenda outside of a Spawn comic book? If Neil
was able to wrestle control of this character away--wouldn't Todd be
justified in suing him for ripping off his creation? She is, at the end of the
day, a cypher. A character based on another character.
This is not analogous to the Joker and Batman--it's akin to the Wrath
from BATMAN SPECIAL #1 “...The Player on the Other Side!” (a one-shot
from 1984, story by Mike W. Barr, art by Michael Golden and Mike
DeCarlo)-- anybody remember that one? In an amazing coincidence
James Gordon kills the criminal parents of this kid on the same night Joe
Chill killed the Waynes and the kid grows up to be a criminal who wears a
costume reminiscent of Batman’s (albeit with a purple cloak and cowl
trimmed with red). Like Gaiman's Spawn story, Barr's Batman yarn is
pretty much a by-the-numbers tale--the only big difference is that the
Wrath appeared late in the Batman's history and has not appeared since
and Angela was introduced early in Spawn's history and therefor has had
more on an impact.
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Erik Larsen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 February 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 344
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| Posted: 09 June 2009 at 11:14am | IP Logged | 12
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Kevin Brown wrote:
Todd's is a success story of the highest order.
*************************
Except when it comes to purchasing baseballs. ;) |
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Best money he ever spent.
Folks tend to laugh at that one but those balls led to him producing
action figures based on baseball players and that paid off handsomely. If
Todd hadn't invested in those balls he may very well have never been able
to strike that deal. as it was Todd got his name out to a huge crowd of
people who would never have heard of him and it allowed him to take his
business to the next level.
We should all be so "foolish."
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Topic Closed)
