Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: It's your turn to be afraid.
[00:00:05] Speaker B: Are you a fan of things that go bump in the night? Chills up your spine? Paralyzed by fright? Thrilled by horror at the center of a chat? Then welcome to the Nerds from the Crip podcast.
[00:00:20] Speaker C: Welcome back to Nerds from the Crypt, the podcast where we talk to indie horror creators and discuss their current and upcoming horror projects. Before we dive into today's episode, I want to take a moment to acknowledge. Acknowledge the long silence. It's been nearly two years, might be even more than two years since we last recorded. Life did get very busy. I went back to school to finish my master's degree, and afterwards it took a little bit time to decompress and recharge. There are a couple of things that we need to get back in the rhythm of. Also, we need to acknowledge that there is a couple of quite a bit of episodes that went missing all of a sudden. So some podcast feeds might not have every single episode. We are working on getting that up to date. We want to make sure that we get every single episode that we have in the past back up and running for you all. But in the meantime, for those that are returning, thank you for sticking around. It really means a lot. And if you're new to the show, welcome to the Crypt. Be sure to follow and subscribe so you never miss the latest news about the episode. Well, now with the Crypt open, I want to go ahead and invite my co host to come back on. Greg, how are you doing? It's been a while since we've. We've actually talked.
[00:01:33] Speaker D: I'm doing. I'm doing pretty good. Doing pretty good. Getting over all the crud that I had been on, but, you know, so I sound a little sniffly and stuff, but I think I'm doing. I'm doing well. I'm back from the dead as it is, so.
[00:01:44] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:01:45] Speaker E: And the podcast is back from the dead.
[00:01:46] Speaker D: Oh, my God.
[00:01:48] Speaker E: The Crypt is opened again.
[00:01:50] Speaker D: Resurrection.
[00:01:53] Speaker E: I. I just want to go ahead and just thank anybody who has stuck around because it has been a while. It's been almost two years, I think.
[00:02:03] Speaker D: I know.
[00:02:03] Speaker E: I mean, I did go back to school and I did finish up my master's. It wasn't in last June, but had to give myself a good half year to. To read. Just relax and. And get going before. Before we started. Just jump back into this.
[00:02:22] Speaker D: Yeah, it was definitely not for slacking or anything like that. There was some real, real work being done. Super proud of you, Saul.
[00:02:29] Speaker E: Correct. Correct. Yeah, no, I was really, really busy, but in the last couple, six months, I was a little bit slacking, but that was, I think I felt like it was a.
I think that was deserved. I think that's all right.
[00:02:40] Speaker D: It gave me some time to, to do some stuff at the shop. So early mornings I needed.
[00:02:46] Speaker E: Well, we're not going to take too much time. We're going to go ahead and just jump right into it.
For our first recording Back in the Crypt, we're going to bring back one of our friends of the podcast, one of our early friends in the podcast, actually, Mr. Lyndon White. How are you doing today, sir?
[00:03:06] Speaker A: Hey, I'm good, thanks. Thanks for having me back and yeah, it's good to see it come back to life.
[00:03:13] Speaker E: Yeah. This is the, this is the, this is technically our second reboot, Reimagining, reanimation, I guess.
[00:03:23] Speaker A: Hey, there it is.
[00:03:25] Speaker E: Yeah.
Well, I mean, I think the first time was. I think we actually did really, really good. During the, during our lockdown, we recorded almost like, I think we did like 15 episodes like back to back, almost.
[00:03:39] Speaker D: Oh yeah.
[00:03:39] Speaker E: And then I went back to school and then kind of went, kind of went from there and kind of went asleep.
[00:03:47] Speaker D: Sleeping.
[00:03:49] Speaker E: But yeah, Lyndon, it's been, it's been a while. We've had you on quite a bit here on the podcast when I think you're, I think you hold the, the, the championship belt here for the amount of times that you've, you've, you've been on the podcast and so you definitely are one of the original and I guess best friends of the podcast.
[00:04:12] Speaker A: Oh, that's, I mean, that is also nice to hear, but also I feel like, oh no, I should have sent Andy instead this time. But yeah, it's really nice to hear.
[00:04:22] Speaker E: Oh, it's always, it's always a good time to talk to Lyndon about your works. I mean, you've, you've brought us quite a bit of, well, I'll say beautiful art work. Oh my gosh. And a beautiful, I guess, what's it called, graphic novels, which you've brought us as well.
[00:04:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I think that's kind of like my, well, my thing like, like 90% of my, my work as a freelancer is, is working on graphic novels generally like book size stuff rather than single issues most of the time.
But yeah, it's, it's just kind of like work on it and then disappear for a few months while work on the next one and then pop up again and here's a shiny new book kind of thing.
[00:05:05] Speaker E: Just go back into the dungeon and Then open the door.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: I feel like I'm coming out of winter hibernation, ready to sell my wares again.
[00:05:15] Speaker E: So the last time we talked, if I remember correctly, we talked about candles and then we talked about Reanimator ink number one.
[00:05:28] Speaker A: Okay, so did we miss number two? It's a blur at this point.
[00:05:33] Speaker E: We did. We did miss number two. Not for anything. Like I said, I believe that did come in right at the tail end of when we were about to go ahead and go off or I was going back to school really. So do we did miss number two. So I guess what we can go ahead and do is let's catch some of our listeners quickly up with what is going on with the, with the story. For those who do not know what Reanimator Inc. Is, do you want to give us just a quick elevator pitch for the first couple of issues?
[00:06:10] Speaker A: Yeah, the spiel. The spiel. Okay, so let me get this started. Reanimator Incorporated is a Lovecraftian graphic novel series by myself and Andy Perry. Andy Perry is the writer and the artist and it's a modern day interpretation of H.P. lovecraft's reanimator. So a guy who's obsessed with bringing things back from the dead, trying to cure, trying to make eternal life and essentially playing God. My short pitch is it's a. If you have no idea what Lovecraft is or any of that, it's about a modern day necromancer who's reanimating bodies and trying to bring his family member back from the dead.
[00:06:50] Speaker E: I feel like people who say they don't know what, what Lovecraft and Reanimator or anything that is, I think they know. They just don't know that they know.
[00:07:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, yeah, if you know Frankenstein, if you know Pet Sematary by Stephen King, like it's, it's so ingrained this, this, the visuals from it in like pop culture and horror that I feel like even if I familiar with the terminology, like it should be familiar to people now.
[00:07:21] Speaker E: What was it about Reanimator that kind of just drew you into, to start this, this series?
[00:07:29] Speaker A: So it's, it's all from the mind of Andy Perry. I did a small like concept art book, like a concertina book based on Lovecraft's the Call of Cthulhu.
And Andy was aware of my artwork from that before then and that book. And then he realized, oh, Linden likes Lovecraft. And so Andy had written an outline and this plan for this big long form story that would incorporate, start with Reanimator incorporate other Lovecraftian stories and things from the Necronomicon. Get it, say it right and then like mix it with Dante's Inferno. So I got an email randomly one day from Andy saying would you like to do a comic together? It's Lovecraft 3 anime, so meets Dante's Inferno. I'm like, yep, sign me up. I'm in.
Take my Soul. Like yeah.
And yeah, so it's, it started I think 2019 was when the first book came out and these are, these are graphic novel size books. You know, I think, I think book one's about eight pages just. And then book two is about 120. Book three is probably going to be I think about 128 by the time it's in print. So they keep getting slightly bigger.
And yeah, this, this has been, I mean these types of books because my artwork is painters and we're doing, you know, we're, we're self publishing at this point and chat to publishers but not quite got that deal yet.
But it's a self published, self publish. Yeah, self published project and we take each book to Kickstarter when it's finished. So I scroll away and hide away for a couple of months like painting the artwork and then when it's all finished that's when we start Kickstarter prep and you know, come chat to lovely people like you guys and promote the book and start spreading the good word of Lovecraft and raising the dead.
[00:09:23] Speaker E: And for those of you who are listening who have not seen Lyndon's work, you'll, you'll see it in the COVID art for the, for the episode.
Beautiful artwork. I've always said it from the very first time that we had you on that. I just love the way your, your, your, your image or your, I don't even know how to say the things that you bring out. It's just so different from everything that else that, that I see on a daily basis.
[00:09:49] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:09:50] Speaker D: Journey.
[00:09:51] Speaker A: Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. It's like I don't feel, I don't think I'll ever, I say this Touchwood. I don't think I'm the artist who will be drawing like Spider man or My Little Pony but like I feel like my wheelhouse is like monsters and magic, whether that's like fancy or horror. So. But yeah, thank you. It's always nice to hear.
[00:10:09] Speaker E: Well, there's this like once again I'm not, I'm not, I'm going to be the worst person to try to explain this but there's some sort of, like, magical feel to your. To your. The way you draw, because it's. It's more. It's like a. Like a painting. But you do everything digital, correct?
[00:10:26] Speaker A: Yeah. So I used to do it all by hand, but because I'm partly colorblind, I switched to digital a couple of years ago. So I'm trained. Like, I loved painting, like, all through, like, art school and starting freelance. So I've got all those. I've got all the traditional paint techniques, but I do paint digital now because it's faster and easier for me to change stuff.
[00:10:48] Speaker E: Yeah, you all should definitely take a look at the. At the samples that if you have said, if you're not seeing Lyndon's work, look at the samples because you're gonna love it.
Now, you said that Andy is really the. The one that came up with. With the project. It was that unfortunately, he's not going to be able to be here today. But did he bring up any. Any specific reason why he chose Reanimator as the. As the. I guess the vessel for the. For this project?
[00:11:16] Speaker A: So, I mean, Andy reads all sorts of stuff and he's a big horror fan and I think it was.
He's one of those people that.
He found Lovecraft quite late. Like, it's like you hear the name pop up again and again. He's like, okay, I'm actually gonna start reading some of his work because enough people are telling me to. And he was working his way through his material. I think Reanimator just stuck with him. Just that thought of. And there's, like, certain concepts in his work of, like, looking into the beyond and the realms beyond death and, like, what that could be. And it just. It just sent his brain spiraling and. Yeah, I think it's such a. Out of all of his work, I feel like it's clearly influenced by Frankenstein and Lovecraft's even said that it was influenced by Frankenstein.
But I think it's such a. I'd say, slightly more grounded story from all his work, which is why it's such a nice, like, jumping off point for the story. And it's like, no matter how weird we get throughout the series with some of the visuals or some of the, let's just say the monsters or the eldritch gods, we can always bring it back to this core concept of trying to bring things back from the dead. That's the thing for us, that links it all together.
We haven't got to giant space penguins yet, but we might get there. We'll See, because that's the other thing. I feel like some Lovecraft is not digestible or some people just think it's just tentacle monsters, but there's so many layers to it, and that. I think that whole thing that comes back to what is in the unknown. What is the thing beyond what. Beyond our comprehension? And then I have the joy of the artist of trying to visualize that. Well, how does that work?
And like you were saying earlier, like, about my work, it has, like, layers to it. So my textures and my painting and my lighting can, like, visualize some stuff that you're not meant to be able to comprehend or see. It's got a bit of dreamlike quality to it at times where it needs it.
[00:13:16] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:13:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
So.
[00:13:19] Speaker E: So how do you work with some of these, I guess, motifs that. That are in the story, like, when you're. When you're drawing?
[00:13:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:13:28] Speaker E: How do you, like. Well, even Cthulhu, right. We all have a. A, I guess, kind of imagining of what Cthulhu is supposed to look like, but technically, we. That's just what we as humans are able to perceive. Right?
[00:13:43] Speaker A: Yeah.
I think, for me, a lot of it is, like, particularly, like, playing in the scale. I mean, there's certain elements of Cthulhu. Like, it always have the tentacle face and the bat wings and, like, the sheer colossal size of it. Like, those are, like, staples. And I feel like it's then messing with lighting colors and, like, particularly, like, if you're putting in perspective of, like, someone really small standing up against him, it just. It feels, like, incomprehensible that something could be so worldly and, like, gigantic in comparison to, like, us.
So, yeah, a lot. A lot of textures, a lot of lighting stuff.
I think, as we're going on with the series, like, because we are merging Dante's Inferno with Reanimator, that's, like, the path for the series.
Every time I'm drawing a different layer of hell that's linked to a different Lovecraft deity, I make sure that that realm has its own visual identity. So that has its own environment, life environments. You know, plant life has its own color palette. And very. Like, for instance, in book three, we're covering Dagon, and we're currently covering Judge Minas, which is more from Minnesota, more from Dante's Inferno rather than Lovecraft. But each one, when they pop up and when you see pages, they've got their own look, their own feel, their own lighting. So, like, if you put. It's sort of like if you put two comic pages Side by side of these different realms that you can like. Okay, they work in the same universe, but very much have their own feel when you're reading them on the page.
[00:15:21] Speaker D: When you've gone to these realms of hell, Linden, when you've traveled and visited them, how much does it cost to get there?
[00:15:29] Speaker A: It's one soul per realm. You have to get a little boat and then you fall down into another realm at one point. But, you know, just have a couple of souls in your, in your bank and you'll be fine.
[00:15:40] Speaker D: And do they have to be new souls or they could be old souls like you just go to the cemetery and grab a couple.
[00:15:45] Speaker A: I think the crustier the better, really. I mean, they're not picky. You know, let it age a little bit more.
[00:15:51] Speaker D: Oh, that's nice. And I also, I'm very intrigued by the fact that, I mean, you say that this is just an imagining, but I, I got a message saying that this was more like a cookbook. And so it's almost like a how to step by step to reanimate. And I find it really interesting and kind of fun that this is what you guys are doing.
[00:16:12] Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah, step one, find the body.
[00:16:17] Speaker E: A fresh one.
[00:16:18] Speaker A: But yeah, fresh is better.
[00:16:19] Speaker D: You gotta have a freshie. Gotta have a freshie.
[00:16:21] Speaker A: Exactly.
I can hear people chuckling at the, in jokes and references. Not fresh enough.
Fresh. Yeah.
God, that's completely throw me now.
[00:16:35] Speaker D: I'm sorry.
[00:16:37] Speaker E: Greg tends to do that.
[00:16:38] Speaker D: That's my job.
No, no, I, I, I, I'm just, I'm just imagining because, like, I just knowing your work and stuff like that, it just, it always amazes me how you do bring that type of, that, that quality of every time you, you do something with your work. And as you're discussing about doing the different, the, the realms of hell, it's, it's, it. I can just, I'm visualizing it in my head as, you know, for anybody that's listening, that if you haven't seen Lyndon's work, it, he does bring that, that dreamlike, amazing quality of things. And I could just, I could see it all unfolding. And I'm like, oh, man, I just want.
How does he get there? How does he do it? That's why I gotta know. Because it's like, it's for someone like me. I, I, I, I can't, I can't draw. I can't paint. But to, to have somebody that, to know somebody that can just pull that out of their brain and put it onto, onto whatever it's just, it's. It's amazing. It's an amazing quality, man.
[00:17:39] Speaker A: Thank you. Yeah, I. I mean it's. It's a lot of hours, like. But I mean, yeah, it's painted. I think people can generally tell that. Well, I hope they can tell that I haven't just like slapped paint on the page of actually textured and thought about it. But yeah, it's. I feel like. I don't know about you guys, like, if you've read many other Lovecraft comics, but I feel if you're just doing like flat colors and it kind of like doesn't. I feel like Lovecraft needs like extra layers to it to get all like more to the artwork.
[00:18:10] Speaker E: Now you can definitely tell the difference in like. Well, you said it, I've said it now. The fantasy dreamlike state and you. You can see the different layers there.
So let's.
We've already talked about a little bit what the, what the lore is around here. It's Lovecraft, Dante, Inferno, not only just the reanimator, but different. Different, I guess, beings from the Lovecraft world coming in into one and talking about grief and talking about loss and trying to bring back. Bring back people from the dead. Before we jumped into episode or I guess chapter three or issue three. One thing that I really enjoyed from that, especially from the first one, is how even, even something like this, it's supposed to be like a gift for mankind, can easily get perverted into being more about. About money, about greed and keeping people who maybe would want to be able to use it and. And so forth. And it's. I don't want to say it's hidden in the background because it's. I feel like it's pretty forward.
[00:19:19] Speaker A: Yeah, I think so.
Over in the uk, like I do like a number of comic cons. I do the pop culture ones and I do the more art housey, like book fair type ones, which sometimes this type of book would not go up both. But I've been, I've been pleasantly surprised everyone who's read it as does pick up on the family dynamic. And it's not just, you know, it's not just 100 pages of me drawing monster pinups and Cthulhu Lou in different poses. Like, as lovely as that would be, like. Yeah, I think any book that is doing this kind of subject matter, you're not like getting into the weeds of it. Like, you know, everything does have a cost. Like, you know, I feel like once you. Once you put a strap and humanity finds a way to Bring back the dead. Like, you've gone past the step. You can't take it back.
I guess a topic is similar to what people say about AI we can't put it back in Pandora's box.
And I feel like that'd be the same with the animation. And then, yeah, the fun thing is the more we do in the series as well, people will see those tender moments and those moments where you see the consequences to it of how it could break up a family. How it can break a family, like back from something, you know, from tragedy, you know, can it. If someone. If a family member gets lost and then you bring them back, is it the same person? You know, do they still feel what that death.
You know, what happens when you see you've gone to the other side of the sim? What's there? Like, how does you bring things back with you? Because I think that's another thing of like, you know, someone who doesn't know the series. You might think, oh, if the character dies, does is the less consequence because you could just bring them back. And it's like, well, you know, not everyone will want to be brought back. Not everyone. Like, from a religious perspective, we've got. I mean, Kane in book two, he wrestled with that. I'm trying to dance around spoilers.
Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, it's, it's. It's nice. I think. I think this is one of those things, like, I think horror can sometimes get a bad rap of like, oh, it's just, you know, slashes is just, you know, blood porn kind of thing. But I feel like this is, you know, tried too long. We've really tried to push that dynamic.
[00:21:42] Speaker D: Of it putting that depth in the book.
[00:21:46] Speaker A: The depth in the book gonna paint all those textures. You know, you're gonna feel some things as well.
[00:21:50] Speaker D: It's death with depth. Yeah.
[00:21:53] Speaker A: Oh, that's good.
[00:21:53] Speaker E: That's slogan, I think. I think Horn has the. A really good medium or good genre to. To explore really that depth of not only, like I said before, like grief or grief and death, but also like, what are we willing to do to. To get what we really want? And then do we really think about what other people want at that time at that point, or are we just going to be more interested in what we want?
[00:22:22] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, you might want to bring someone back in a moment of grief, but that person might themselves not want that. Like, yeah, it's playing with all that kind of stuff.
But yeah, it's a lot of fun. Like, I mean, Andy planned this as a series so this is a long form story, I'd say as we're in book three now, we're kind of like approaching the halfway point for what we want to do. And we've got a very clear path which was there from the get go.
And parts of that is covering like the progression of where the characters travel, how the tech progresses.
The tech. I purposely made sure that the tech is different from book one to book three because it would change over time, it would get better.
But yeah, it's a lot of fun. I mean, as an artist, it's a joy to work on because I get to draw these different aspects and all these monsters and stuff. But also it's, it's nice to play around with the background stuff of like people changing over time and visual and emotional stuff as well. Yeah.
[00:23:25] Speaker E: And how, how does that collaboration work? Does he like just leave it up to you or do you. Is it more back and forth as. As far as not only the monsters, but as far as the, the overall world?
[00:23:36] Speaker A: Yeah. So, I mean, it is back and forth. So Andy's got this like blueprint for what the series is. And he, Andy will go away and he'll basically like to send me story notes and things as we go and then he'll go in, write the script. And then from the script it's very much a. Okay, what does this visual look like? And it is collaborative and like, Andy's thrilled a bit every time I send him something. And like anytime I've had an idea of how to push something or a visual look, he's been all for it. And I think particularly like, we've got both angels and demons in this world. And I had a very. I didn't want to do like robed angels. I didn't want to do like Christian Christianity, cliche angels, just because I feel like we've seen that a lot in pop culture. I've kind of watched too much Supernatural, so I was like, I need to do something different. So we are versions of angels that are like E for all, like giant ice knights, which, you know, play into different stuff. Like. And again, that's my fantasy background coming in. So it's again a lot of fun. And like anytime we've had conversations like that, it's sort of like, well, if they're that big, that means they. We had it really early on with angel wise because if we've got all these Lovecraftian gods at gigantic in scale, we need, when we get to those moments where, you know, there's a physical confrontation or A fight. Like, you don't want a tiny miniature angel fighting. I mean, you might, but I don't think it's going to last very long. You kind of need like the yin and yang, the balance. Yeah.
[00:25:16] Speaker E: The first time we see an angel, even one of the characters is like, what was that? Was, was that an angel? Or they had no idea what to, what to think about it because we have a perception of what an angel is supposed to look like. And of course then we, we don't even know what if, and, or you know, you know, when we finally see one.
[00:25:38] Speaker A: Yeah, there's, I think there's versions of, I can't remember the terminology. There's different tiers of angel. And in the Bible, one has like, I think like six sets of wings and is made up of like five eyeballs. And it's like that's apparently what they're really meant to look like. But pop culture has changed their perception of them.
So Andy has planned for a five eyed, six winged angel, like later in the series, which is gonna be really fun to get to, but also like, you know, I might have to draw like, I might have to draw like one rogue to angel somewhere in the background. Just so we've, we've hit our quota.
[00:26:16] Speaker D: Love it.
[00:26:17] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:26:18] Speaker E: So let's talk about. We're already 25 minutes ahead, but we haven't, we haven't specifically talked about, about issue three.
What can you give us about what to expect on this new issue?
[00:26:33] Speaker A: Okay, so book three follows pretty much. There's a little bit of a time jump in the mortal world and we see the consequences that happened at the end of book two. And Herbert west, the main character, the scientist who has brought the dead back to life, he's dealing with the consequences of loss and his family breaking up.
And meanwhile his son Mike, who is currently trapped in hell and navigating through hell with his version of Virgil, which is actually HP Lovecraft as a character in the story.
So Mike and Howard are trapped in hell and they're trying to work their way through the inferno so they can get back to the mortal realm. But going through hell is a journey. So yeah, it's a mixture of on the mortal realm, it's the consequences up from book two, and reanimation being used in a.
What's the best way to say it? Reanimation being used like in everyday sense. So if you're in an accident, you could get reanimated like that day. So the tech has improved like a lot since book two. And then on The, Yeah, the Hellscape. We've got the journey continuing through Lovecraftian hell.
[00:27:55] Speaker E: Now you said this is a, we're reaching the halfway point. So I'm assuming this is at least a six issue story.
[00:28:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So each book is very much like we have. Each book has a beginning, middle and end. So you've kind of like read a series or like one chapter. We purposely call them chapters because it's like a complete set of story. Then we do the next story. But yeah, Andy has planned for six books and I'm going to be, we're going to be fulfilling Kickstarter this year. So we're going on Kickstarter. I'm going live on the 23rd of April.
We'll be doing fulfillment in the late half of the year and then towards the end of the year, start next year, I'll probably start drawing the next book. So we're, we're well underway on what we're doing and like yeah, we're very much like in self published venture. We're kind of like in line with what you do with like image series. You have a little break between the trades and then pick it back up again.
[00:29:00] Speaker E: When this, this episode comes out. We're going to be already in the actual Kickstarter campaign.
What can you tell us about what we can expect from the Kickstarter?
[00:29:11] Speaker A: Okay, so for anyone who didn't know we did a Kickstarter for book one and two, this is for the third book, but you can get books one, two and three. You can get those little sets.
We originally were only going to do softback books but the Kickstart community really supported us and wanted it. So we printed both softcover and hardback. So take pick.
And we're, we're trying to streamline things at this time. So we're, we're doing like, we're doing books. I'm doing sketches and books. If you get slightly higher rewards here, I'm doing commissions. So you can get a character commission, whether that's like a Cthulhu monster you want or you know, D and D character or just some cool character you'd like me to draw. I've drawn venom and salmon characters and all kinds of stuff in the past.
Yeah. And it's very much like those are available and, or if you just want a digital copy, you can get digital PDFs. We're very much like trying to streamline it and not do it too complicated just because I don't know about if you guys feel this but like postage is an absolute nightmare at the moment. So we're, we're trying to be very sensible so we're not doing T shirts. There's a couple of add ons with prints and stuff. But that's very much if you want them, can't it.
[00:30:27] Speaker E: The Kickstarter normally is 30 days.
[00:30:30] Speaker A: Yeah, it'll be about 30 days. Okay.
[00:30:34] Speaker D: With the, the Kickstarter, 30 days are there. Do, do you guys have additional tiers planned afterwards for like after you hit certain goals? Stretch goals?
[00:30:47] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, we do. So the initial target is 5,000 pounds. Okay. Which, which will cover the print run and you know, if we do more than that, then we'll do a big print run and like. Yeah, we've got a couple of stretch goals in mind. Like some prints. We'd like to do some additional pages in the book so some like process stuff. But even adding eight pages to the book makes it more expensive and way more to post it. So we have to, we have to hit some targets before we can definitely say that.
But yeah, I think in the past we have slightly over complicated it. So this time we're very much like focus on the books. You know, that's the main reason we're doing Kickstarter. And then if you want things like giant posters, commissions, sketches in your book, that kind of thing, you can absolutely get that. But we're trying to streamline the Kickstarter process just because last, last time we did it for book two, I think we, we shipped out about 800 books which was, it was a, it was great. But on one of the rewards here it was I do a sketch in your book.
[00:31:59] Speaker D: Oh no.
[00:32:00] Speaker E: Busy guy.
[00:32:02] Speaker A: Yeah. So Andy has. I, I went to Andy's for a weekend. I, I pretty much spent two days just sketching in books to get them all and, and that's what people wanted. It was lovely. But yes, it all takes time.
[00:32:16] Speaker E: I do get a smiley face.
[00:32:18] Speaker D: I was going to say, Lyndon, what you should offer up is one of your best sketches that I think you've ever done. You did it for me a while back when we first started talking. And I think all the listeners would probably be so happy if they got this very special sketch from you. But listeners, Lyndon does a very amazing Invisible man sketch. You're going to be mind blown by. Yeah. By what he does by bringing this texture to the invisible man, this whimsicalness that you never thought you'd see. And a life to this invisible man sketch that it's only, only seen through the eyes and hands of Linden I think an additional thing that you could do and the Invisible man gets a lot of love in society, but Invisible Man's dog does not. What if you did Invisible Man's dog as well as an add in on those sketches? I think that people would be so overjoyed by the fact that you threw the invisible man's dog in there as well. So they would get this just this loving picture of the invisible man and his dog and it would just tie it all together, you know, like a very Tintin moment. It'd be so good.
[00:33:34] Speaker A: I love that you brought that back.
[00:33:37] Speaker E: Totally forgot about that.
[00:33:39] Speaker A: Yeah. I was like, go to that draw.
[00:33:45] Speaker E: He's going to bring it back every single time.
[00:33:48] Speaker D: It's my favorite thing you've done.
[00:33:51] Speaker E: I even have a decorative plate with the Invisible Man.
[00:33:55] Speaker A: Oh, there we go. The decorative plates. There we go. We've hit our hat trick.
[00:34:00] Speaker D: Decorative plates. And then we just throw it on the train.
[00:34:06] Speaker E: Well, you derailed the train a long time ago, Greg.
[00:34:09] Speaker D: Oh, my gosh. I'm so sorry.
[00:34:10] Speaker A: Yeah, I was really not going to mention plates this time, but here we are.
[00:34:14] Speaker D: So. So that's actually when you hit like the 20,000 pound mark is everybody gets a plate with Invisible Man.
[00:34:20] Speaker A: Okay, great. Yeah, I'll talk to Andy after this and we'll add it.
[00:34:24] Speaker E: I think it's invisible plate with Invisible man on there.
[00:34:28] Speaker D: Yeah. Everyone will get a digital copy of it.
[00:34:35] Speaker E: Any. Oh, I guess. I guess we kind of did already talk about that, but any other teachable or learned moments about Kickstarter? Running the Kickstarter.
[00:34:45] Speaker A: So I think I've mentioned it earlier. Post has just been a big one because it has just creeped up. I feel like it's creeping up in cost like nearly every month. So we have to be really careful with that. But I say it every time people ask me about crowdfunding. I'm like, for me, I think it's better to finish your book first because people want to see a finished thing. If you're busy or you know, you've got a lot on, just push it back a month if you need to. Like, you can always pick another launch date. And yeah, you don't have to overcomplicate it. Like, I'd love to do.
I'd love to do, you know, T shirts and all the merch and all that kind of stuff, but it just gets really expensive. So I think for me at the moment, the landscape of Kickstarter, it's like, finish your book first. If it's comic or whatever it is.
Yeah, contact people beforehand. Like we're recording this about a month before the launch date just because I think you just need to give people like plenty of time to just, you know, if, if people are going to be kind enough to like shout about your project for you, you know, don't pester them on the day of launch saying, I need your press now.
[00:35:54] Speaker E: Yeah, help. It's happened. It's happened.
[00:35:58] Speaker A: Yeah, it's happened. Yeah. And sorry, another thing, like I guarantee like all best laid plans no matter how, no how, no matter how good you think QR Kickstarters and crowdfunding, I guarantee something will come up, life will happen. You know, a force of nature and you know, there might be a delay or the shipping might turn up wrong and you have to reprint or just things like that happen. I think just, it's really important to just like do updates and just say, hey, so this is where we are, this has happened, but we're fixing it or you know, just keeping people updated.
But I absolutely love crowdfunding and Kickstarter. I think a number of my books wouldn't exist without it.
I definitely owe like a good portion of my career, which seems ridiculous to say like to it and yeah, it's great. I've not really done the other crowdfunding platforms. I think we commit to using Kickstart for Reanimator because that's where we started with it.
But I think it's great. Like, and I've spoken to like editors at publishers who are like about books that they go, you know, we would like this book but we have a full slate. Have you thought Kickstarter? I'm like, yes, I have. I am fully, fully aware of grappling Kickstarter. But I think it's, it's interesting that compared to even like when we did book two or even book one, like the landscape is shifting and you see like more and more publishers now are doing it as well. You know, I mean top cow, use it all the time and they're great. You know, they're using it to, you know, as a marketing tool and also it helps fund some of their other like oversized like limited edition projects, which is really cool.
Yeah, it's good.
[00:37:41] Speaker E: So anything, any plans for anything else from you, directly from you there is that you're able to share?
[00:37:52] Speaker A: Oh yeah, no, I, Yeah, this is the dancer and game, isn't it?
So I do write my own stories as well as drawing them, but I don't do writing all the time. But I'm hoping in between reanimated three and four. I'm going to be working on one of my own books, but I. I don't think I'll. I might. I'll know if it's going ahead probably by around May. Ish.
So yeah, I. I not can't say it now, but like, I'm hoping that's the case because I do enjoy writing process and like being able to play on my own as well with people.
So there's that. I'm currently lettering a new series called Pantheon. I'll have more about that later in the year.
There's bits of stuff with Blue Fox comics always coming out. Like I do all kinds of stuff with them with lettering and like book design stuff and they're great to work with. And Blue Fox, they're a publisher based in Scotland, but they're great. I highly recommend them and they do some great genre books.
Yeah, I think that's it. I'm trying to carefully dance around the other stuff. Basically.
Reanimated is very much 2025's book. I am very much prepping for 2026, 2027's book, which is ridiculous to say, but that's just, that's just publishing in books and that's like how long these things take to make.
Yeah. Oh, I will say before I forget because I didn't mention earlier regarding the Kickstarter, we will have a free preview of Books one and the opening of book three. So anyone who wants to see what it's all about and before investing, they can read, I think can read the first book for free straight away.
We're just doing, we're doing that. So the Barry century is really low. So anyone can like, you know, come and check it out before they commit. Yeah, get them so we can get.
[00:39:51] Speaker E: Them in the hook. Yeah, yeah.
[00:39:53] Speaker A: You know, here's a, here's a free taste.
[00:39:56] Speaker D: Oh, you guys are those kinds of.
[00:40:01] Speaker A: Cut it out.
[00:40:04] Speaker D: That's how you get the freshies. I get it, I get it.
[00:40:09] Speaker E: Is there anything that you want to bring up here about issue three that we haven't talked about? I mean, we don't want to jump in too much into detail because that's the whole point. Right?
[00:40:19] Speaker A: Yeah, that's fine. I think. No, because I feel like we're doing. Being very careful about dancing around stuff.
So in terms of like big cell cells and visuals. Book 3 has its reanimated story, but incorporates Dagon and Judgement are too big. Like if you need a big bag and antagonist, they're the main ones. And if you're after like other Lovecraftian pop culture, there's some cultists and a few into the beyond inverted comments when I say that. So there's, there's a lot of meat in book three and like I feel like we're now cracking the world open. So I, again, like, if you, if you haven't read the other books, I'd say those, you want to start with those before you get to this one. But I hope when people read it, they can see I'm, I'm just having a lot of fun now.
[00:41:17] Speaker E: Well, Lyndon, I want to thank you so much for joining us. And guys, if you have this is the first podcast you heard with Lyndon. We have some great other ones. Now. We did have a bit of a snafu with the past episodes. Some of them are gone right now, but I will be working on bringing them back slowly but surely. So we have episodes talking about his other work. We actually have is it the two or three movie reviews? We've talked about Misery with Andy. I think that time is when he joined us. And then we also have we need to talk about Kevin. And I believe those are the two movies that we talk. I don't think we talked about the movie the other times. But like I said, those are great episodes. Those will be coming back here shortly. We will bring back the, the, the website here soon. We're working on all that. And yeah, in the future the doors are open, the crypt is open for Lyndon to come back at any time.
[00:42:17] Speaker D: Yes.
[00:42:18] Speaker A: Thanks guys.
[00:42:20] Speaker E: Well, once again, Lyndon, thank you for taking the time in the middle of your day because I know over there in your neck of the woods, it's just right down the middle of the day.
[00:42:32] Speaker A: Yeah, it's fine.
It's still gray sky. It's still winter here in Britain.
[00:42:40] Speaker E: And but no, once again, thank you very much for joining us and we're here for anything that you need as far as promotion wise. We are here for you.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: Thanks guys. I really appreciate it.
[00:42:53] Speaker E: I want to thank the audience for joining us here on the transcript and hopefully you all can keep with us. And we're going to be working on just trying to push out these episodes on a, in a more consistent manner. I think I said that like eight times already but things happen. Things happen and but no, thank you very much and we'll see you all next time here on Nerd from the Crib.
[00:43:17] Speaker A: It's your turn to be afraid.
[00:43:22] Speaker B: Are you a fan of things that go bump in the night? Chills up your spine Paralyzed by fright Thrilled by horror at the center of a chat, then welcome. Welcome to the nerds from the Crip podcast.
