CAG NEW ENGLAND MEETINGS HOSTED BY FREE LUNCH COMICS: http://www.freelunchcomics.com/

CAG/Free Lunch Holiday Party!

Posted 12/01/2011 @11:21 am in Announcements, Events, News by The Commander

We are pleased to announce that the Annual Comicbook Artist Guild Holiday Party
and the Annual Free Lunch Comics Holiday Party will be a combined affair this year!

Where: Free Lunch Studios Office
518 Salmon Brook Street (rear)
Granby, CT 06035

When: Saturday, December 17, 2011 at NOON

Join us for an afternoon of fun and friends. This will be a potluck, so bring something delicious to eat and share! Help us celebrate the Holiday Season!
RSVP to Steve Kanaras at skanaras@freelunchcomics.com or call 860.810.4927

Happy Holidays!
www.comicartguild.com
www.freelunchstudios.com

CAG Happenings This November!

Posted 11/10/2011 @ 4:50 pm in Events, News by The Commander Edit this entry

There are a few things that are coming up that we wanted to let you know about.

This Weekend:
CAG NYC MEETING: kirk
When: Saturday, 11/12 at 1pm
Where: The Stout
133 West 33rd Street
NY, NY 10001
http://stoutnyc.com/

Meet motivational speaker and comic book creator Kirk Abrigo and a special visit by CAG founder and GWP publisher Keith Murphey!

Next Weekend:
fearfest
FREE LUNCH FEAR FEST!!! See some scary artwork by artist David Davies. Meet the creators of WORSE CASE SCENARIO: OUTBREAK a zombie anthology published by Guild Works Publications. Live coverage by the Horror News Network!
The fun starts on November 19th @ 7PM. For directions visit Freelunchcomics.com

Thanksgiving Weekend:
shuffle

FREE LUNCH COMIC BOOK SHUFFLE HOSTED BY COMIC BOOK ARTISTS GUILD:
The countdown to Shuffle 4 is just about here! The date will be November 26th for the challenge and the 27th in Plainville CT for the judging. The Shuffle comic will be released at the Plainville show on the 27th! We already have a few confirmed talents! You want in? Contact Matt at mryan@freelunchcomics.com

The Comic Book Shuffle event is a two day super event to get your stuff out there! Writers and artists gather twice a year at Free Lunch Studios to be randomly matched up in a theme driven, 7 hour, 5 page competition.

The top team’s efforts will be printed in Free Lunch’s Comic Book Shuffle comic book. The winner gets the first story honor, interview, and cover. The stories are judged at Cliff’s Con in Plainville CT the following day by the attendees of the show (so be sure to invite your friends!)

There is a $10 entry fee. Open to the first 10 writers and first 10 artists to submit entry fee.

CAG Needs You – Summer Donation Drive

Posted 7/7/2011 at 10:47 am in Uncategorized by The Commander

Friends of CAG,

We hope you are having a great summer as convention season goes into full swing. CAG plans on being represented at several shows this summer as several long awaited CAG publications are completed or near completion. As you are aware CAG switched to a donations driven group and waived its dues at the start of this year. We hope you can continue to support the group to continue its mission.

The Comic Book Artists Guild (CAG) is a dedicated group promoting the positive development of new comic book creators and veterans alike. We are a small group that has spent the last ten years providing support to all comic book creators always trying to further develop their skill in the industry.

In this past year CAG has:

Supported like minded organizations such as CBLDF, Hero Initiative, and Mocca
We provided support for a creator gathering monthly in the New England states
Held our annual Haller awards show at NYCC
Produced the Worlds Beyond Science Fiction prose book
Had a presence at several comic conventions throughout the year
Held our annual Barbecue picnic and Holiday party

This letter is an invitation for you to invest in our community by making a non tax-deductible donation to CAG. During this donation drive we are going to do a little something different!With every donation of ten dollars or more you will receive a gift from CAG! In addition with every donation of twenty-five dollars or more you will receive an original piece of artwork!!!

Please make paypal payments to cagmembership@gmail.com or send a check or money made out to “CAG” PO BOX #38, Moodus, CT. 06469

Make sure to write “Summer Donation 2011″ on form of payment.

Sincerely,
CAG Leadership

CAG Table at NYCC

Posted 6/30/2011 at 9:14 am in Announcements, Events, News by The Commander

CAG Members!

As you may know, this year New York Comic Con had over a thousand artists apply for Artist Alley. As a result, some very talented women and men that applied could not get an Artist Alley table and cannot afford small press tables. Fear not, independent creator. CAG is there for you and we have acquired a small press table at the show.

New York Comic Con

DATE:
October 13 – 16, 2011
LOCATION:
Javits Center, NYC

So, if you are interested in participating in this year’s show and would like to exhibit and sell your books to the more than 100,000 people expected to attend the convention, you can apply for a spot at the CAG small press table.

If you are interested, please email Joe@joesergi.net. Everyone will pay an equal share based on how many people we get. Our corner small press table is $1175. So the more people we get, the lower the cost.

If you intend to be part of the table and don’t reply, we won’t know, and will set a higher buy in. Trust us, you are only hurting yourself (and everyone else) by not responding–so don’t be lazy. We won’t hold anyone to their initial commitment, but we reserve the right to turn people away who did not respond.

The deadline to let me know is August 1st, but we recommend you do it sooner, lest you forget.

CAG Membership Structure Change

Posted 12/01/2010 at 10:23 am in Announcements, News by The Commander

We understand this past year has been tough, on some more than others. Let’s face it, the economy is poor and for many of us comics just hasn’t been yielding the return we all hoped for. Because of these factors, CAG is taking a bold new direction as we begin our 11th year.

Starting in January, we’ll be eliminating the annual dues. Instead, we’re becoming a donation-based organization. What does that mean? Simply put, anything you’d like to contribute we’ll happily take. Whether it’s $5 or $500, or even just contributing your time and talent to the group. This group was founded on a simple concept: several people with similar interests getting together and maybe making some magic happen. We want to return to that concept, and we want to keep (and maybe get back) those of you whose financial situation might have gotten in the way of you getting, and enjoying, everything this group is about.

As a result, this change will bring about a change to the publication structure. As CAG will no longer have money on hand with the elimination of the dues, this will not only be the first step to getting away from the publisher status the group was never meant to have, but also present a bit of a challenge in how we’ll be getting your work out there. The first step is that all future publications will be released initially online in a paid downloadable format on every available device we can get to. Will we see much of a profit from this? Who knows. But this gives us the perfect excuse to finally embrace the digital age of our profession, which we here truly believe will be both the future and salvation of the industry. Any money received from the downloads will go towards the physical publication a few months after that.

However, the download money will only get us so far. As such, we’ll be running the publications very similar to our convention structure (which will not be changing). Basically, we’ll be asking participants in the books to contribute an equal share towards the printing and releasing of the books. Why should you? Glad you asked. It’s simple mathematics: if you self-publish a book, you incur all of the cost and risk, sometimes with little to no return. Those of you who have self-published before know it’s not cheap, and not getting any cheaper. This new model embraces the cooperative CAG was envisioned as being. By being a small part of the whole, you’re actually putting less money out there which means a better chance of a return.

Additionally, having published work is still a plus when it comes to approaching editors as compared to just a portfolio. We’ll also be switching to a print on demand printer to allow everyone the ability to get as many books as they want themselves without relying on the middle man.

This is it in a nutshell, the new CAG. It’s been a great 10 years, and we’re hoping you’ll be with us for another 10 as we continue to take the group to new and exciting places. We also understand there might be some questions and concerns about all the mentioned changes, so feel free to ask us and we’ll try our best to answer them all to your satisfaction.

Sincerely,
CAG LEADERSHIP TEAM

2010 Haller Award Winners

Posted 11/15/2010 at 10:46 am in Announcements, News by The Commander

Apologies to all for the delay in posting this… My only excuse is I’ve been busy setting up the new CAG social network! Thanks to Chris Buchner for sending over the list from the CAG Awards show at NYCC. Congratulations to all!

Best Writer – Joe Sergi
Best Pencils – Brian Brinlee
Best Inks – Peter Palmiotti
Best Colors/Tones – Reggie Themistocle
Best Letters – Johnny Lowe
Best Artist – David Woodward
Best Book – Iconic
Best Webcomic – Langxuan Yin
Best New Talent – Albie Luciano
Best Non-Comic – Free Lunch Comics’ Rusty Haller Benefit
Excellence in Production – Jolly Rogue Studios
CAG MVP – Chris Buchner
Special Award – Andy Schmidt

A DECADE OF CAG!

In the beginning CAG was born of two fathers. One father was Robert King and the other was myself, Keith J. Murphey. As memory serves in late 2000 I had completed a tour of several art galleries in the state of Connecticut and learned that there were several artists groups that started their own movements through art history. I approached Rob King about his interest in starting such a group for comic book enthusiasts. Rob was very interested in the idea and thus CAG was born.

As CAG has gone through its hurdles and achievements, I’ve begun to look at CAG’s existence of that of a child’s stages and age development. Much like being a parent there was no official handbook to raising CAG. During that first year of the group CAG had its name, a mission statement, and its logo. Things seemed simple at that time. CAG was in its infancy stage and began to take its first baby steps. The one thing I can say for sure about the early days was that we were consistent. We had a meeting every month and we worked diligently towards our goal of making our first general anthology.

As time progressed our membership began to grow and in our second year the NYC CAG chapter was formed. CAG began to have a voice and speak its first words at both conventions and on the web. As I recall it was also a very traumatic time as the attack on the World Trade center hit us very close to home. The world became a very unsafe place and making comics was the last thing on our minds at that moment.

Guidelines for the group were established around that time to ensure that all members would have a safe and rewarding experience. CAG had completed its second Anthology in 2002.

It was by CAG’s third birthday that it welcomed the Massachusetts chapter. At that time I found myself running and attending three different meetings every month in different states. Chapter leaders needed to be established and the CAG leadership team was born. At the time the general public was still not sure what to make of our group; some believed it was a group for artists only, while others had speculated we were a union. As the group grew so did its personality as new members brought their experiences and knowledge to the table. A suggestion at that time was that we needed to have more fun and we began to develop more social opportunities for CAG members. A third anthology was produced.

As CAG went into its fourth year, one of its fathers, Robert King, stepped down from his involvement with CAG as he began to start a family of his own. A fourth CAG anthology had been created. It became clear that if CAG were to continue it would do so with myself playing the sole parent.

In 2005 CAG hosted and independent comics after party during NY Comic Con’s first year. At the party CAG had celebrated its fifth year as a network. Several important things happened in the 2006 year. CAG began to form brand identity with the leadership of its new Creative director Mark Mazz. In addition CAG NYC metro member Phillip Clark moved out to the West Coast. Shortly after his move he was given the full support to start a CAG LA. chapter. CAG Midwest member Matt Mundorf began efforts to start a Lincoln Nebraska chapter to the group. CAG Anthology #5 debuted with attention to a much higher level of production and introduced our first flip cover book. A stronger focus on CAG publications had begun including an annual CAG newsletter.

CAG continued to blossom with a west coast edition (CAG Anthology #6) the same year. It was the first year that two CAG publications had been produced.

Individual members began to feel more support when Susan Soares took the reigns as the first CAG membership coordinator, a position that she helped build. CAG leadership began to grow and a need to meet bi weekly online for leadership meetings was established. These meetings, which continue to this day, help leadership discuss any CAG agenda items that need to be reviewed. CAG anthology #7 was published in 2008. Our first annual award show in NYC was also introduced. We also introduced the role of Convention coordinator that was a position Lindsey Kraemer helped build.

As the years continued it became clear that guidelines to form future chapters needed to be established and communication would be key.

CAG also broke from its traditional Anthology style books and undertook its most ambitious project to date: “ICONIC”. The book boated over 100 pages of content and over 20 creators were involved in its production. ICONICS goal was to take public domain literary characters and do a modern twist on them to get middle school children excited about reading. The book debuted in June of 2009 with positive reviews and a second volume is now being collected. The Iconic book helped the group take a new direction in its potential and a manga anthology (WITH HONOR) and a Science fiction prose book (WORLDS BEYOND) are also in their final stages of production.

It was my decision to step down as the President of CAG in December of 2009. I left CAG’s safety and protection in the hands of one of my closest and dearest friends in comics: Hector Rodriguez. As a founding father of CAG I will always be there for it if it needs me and will continue to watch it grow and mature. As with any group it has seen its share of growing pains that it has overcome as it continues to support comic book creators of all backgrounds. For me the last decade of doing work with CAG has been a true blessing and has helped me as a creator tremendously, my hope is that you all get that same experience in your own creative journeys.

Keith J. Murphey
Summer 2010

BUY ICONIC ONLINE!	NEW ICONIC REVIEWS! Comics Bulletin Review Secret Identity Review Other Iconic Reviews
Retail store owners, librarians and educators are eligible to purchase Iconic at a reduced rate. To place an order, please send a request to cagmembership@gmail.com

What is the Comicbook Artists Guild?
Read on and get the scoop on CAG!

Who we are:
Quite simply, we are the Comic book Artists Guild. Does this mean you have to be an artist or writer to be involved with CAG? No, here at CAG we want to reach out to everyone who shares the common interest of comic book and cartoon art and other artistic possibilities.

What we do:
We put together an Anthology that encapsulates CAG members stories and art and distribute once a year. As a group CAG works towards promoting independent comic book artists and their creations. We work towards giving the comic book medium a good reputation into the community around us.

Why join us?
Our goal is to make comic book lovers connect and network together on projects, as well as give everyone in the group the opportunity to get exposure. We share costs on comic conventions. We have planned activities, such as field trips to museums and galleries, visiting artists lectures and demonstrations, critique one another’s art work, we are a great way for you to meet people with common interests and get involved with fun activities.

Meetings:
We currently hold chapter meetings in New York, New England and Nebraska. Dates, times and locations are announced monthly.

Workshops:
Come to one of our meetings and see professionals give demonstrations and answer questions. Past workshops have included: Coloring with photoshop, drawing the human anatomy, and writing comic books.

CAG is all about participation and networking!

Thanks,

Keith J. Murphey
Co-Founder
CAG