Artist J.K. Woodward Talks About His New Book “Behemoth” and Advice to New Creators
We were lucky to land an interview with professional comic book artist J.K. Woodward a few weeks ago. Fans might recognize Woodward’s work from IDW’s “Star Trek” comic book line, where he has been hard at work for years. Woodward’s signature painting style lends itself to both starships and actors like William Shatner and Patrick Stewart. He’s also worked for many other publishers, including Marvel and BOOM! We talked with Woodward about his work on Trek (which you can read more about here), on advice how he broke in as an artist, and on his own creation, “Behemoth,” for Black Caravan.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
Can you tell me about your new project?
J.K. WOODWARD:
It’s called “Behemoth” and it’s something I worked on with writer Chris Kipiniak. It was initially his concept. It’s a sort of a ‘transformation body horror’ type of thing. It focuses on the protagonist, a young woman, who, as a teenager, was transforming. And as we learn — we started with her — we pull out a little bit and learn that that’s happening to a lot of kids.
They’re being rounded up by the government and given the opportunity to be of service. So it’s really dealing with the question of … what is humanity? Can we keep our humanity under these conditions and is choosing to kill for your government make you less or more human?
Because what they’re facing is not all of them transform just physically, and they become monsters. It follows this one character’s journey through journals. We do some interesting things with the lettering too, because everything’s narrated.
Then we start doing some hand lettering and then I started toward the end doing the doing the lettering myself … after drinking way too much coffee (laughs).
Kind of like a visual look at the transformation that’s going on, not just in her body, but in her mind. It’s a four-issue miniseries. Issue two just came out — I think is still being solicited now. So, it’s still early in the in the process.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
What was the comics company that it’s coming out from?
J.K. WOODWARD:
It’s Black Caravan, which is division of Scout Comics.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
I’ve been admiring your stuff for years. I have a buddy of mine who’s a big Procreate fan. He’s got the iPad Pro and the Apple Pencil. Have you ever considered trying your hand at painting with the digital tools that are available?
J.K. WOODWARD:
Oh, sure enough, I’ve actually done it, in various forms, I’m mostly a Photoshop guy, because I’ve been working with that since the 90s. It’s only gotten better. But I haven’t done that, as far as comics. just yet… I’m not sure exactly what I’m waiting for.
One of the things is I like having the originals, because it’s hard to get a living page rate nowadays. And so often, you can often like, add selling of the original art, to your salary. Somehow all works out. Without that, I’m not sure how I could [make a living].
But then I think about how much faster it might be. And, and of course, there’s always the, the number of undos you have in digital work that… that that’s something that attracts me because paint is permanent, you know. So it’s often much more stressful, to work on originals.
Look for that soon, because — I think my next book of “Behemoth,” which is the very first property that I actually own a piece of that I’ve done, and I want to do a lot more of that. So look for [the all-digital painting artwork]. I’m gonna delve into that and see what we do, or at least the combination of it.
My problem is like, if I do something painted in, in digital, it’s just the technology. There’s a good box of tools now that weren’t always there, but it’s still not exactly what I want. If it was something I enhanced with, say, scanning in my own brushstrokes, or working with that. Yeah, I think I might give that a try. So, I’ll go on record saying.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
What is what was the hardest part for you to do something of your own creation?
J.K. WOODWARD:
Well, just there’s huge apprehension when you’re first doing it. And the one of the things you want to do is you want to have a little bit tucked away in case in case you know, you want to have your rent paid, basically.
And that was my biggest fear is that there’s no guarantee there’s no page rate. There’s no invoicing and getting your money. It either does good and you get lucky or it doesn’t and you better have a plan B so you can get some more work. And also, there’s a lot more work to do. There’s a lot more promotion, there’s a lot more phone calls, there’s a lot more work outside the easel and drafting board that you have to do.
It takes a lot of time. And that was hard kind of budgeting my time in that way. But I got pretty good at it. It’s worth it to have something so but yeah… there you are adding more hours to your to your job when you’re doing your own thing.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
I read recently that some people are considering this — the MCU era — comic properties at their most popular that they’ve ever been. There’s more interest and there’s more money being made on comic book properties.
As an indie comics guy, do you feel like the “Avengers” or the “Batman” movies are trickling down? Do you see more interest in what you’re doing, because of the big interest from pop culture?
J.K. WOODWARD:
I definitely think there’s a bigger market in the intellectual property part of it, just based on people’s minds are more open to it than they certainly were in like the ’80s or even the ’90s. The thing is, that doesn’t always translate to comics, it’s still hard to get people in the comic book store.
I suppose it’s easier to order online and go directly to distribution to get your comics in which… I guess in some weird ways, [online is] the new spinner-rack. There’s something about these properties… as much as they love the MCU, that doesn’t always translate to the comics. What it does do is it open opens up other markets, for instance, I have this [intellectual property] and then there is an immediate aspect to the contract that I have with Scout.
[Hollywood] is constantly looking for properties to option, or whether it be for video games, for movies or for other things. That’s a much more likely thing to happen now than it ever was in in comics history. In that aspect, it’s opening up a new market that I’m kind of looking forward to exploring.
INDIE COMICS ZONE:
I’ve interviewed a lot of folks who make indie comics with day jobs, except for illustrator Ryan Dunlavey. What kind of advice would you give to the new creators or the young guys just starting out in comics?
J.K. WOODWARD:
Well, first and foremost, whatever you’re working on, get out of your comfort zone. That’s going to improve your work immensely. And that’s something that I wish I hadn’t wasted so much time staying where I was comfortable.
Get out of your comfort zone, experiment, learn new things. As far as if you have something you’re shopping, the best thing you can do nowadays is publish yourself. That way you have a story to tell, even if it’s digital. And that way you have a story.
If you’re pitching yourself as somebody wants to get work for another company. You’ll be able to tell them, here’s my publishing schedule, they’ll get an idea of what kind of how you meet deadlines, which is something they don’t get from a portfolio review.
I can tell you from experience, talking to some friends, it’s something that editors get nervous about when they’re hiring new talent. So, if you have something that’s published, and you can talk to them about your publishing schedule and get that conversation going about how quick you are, even how you know how steady your pages come in.
That’s something that that you wanted, you want to find a way to slip that in there talking to somebody as far as like publishing your own property. I just approached everybody and anyone I could. And that’s more about persistence. That’s kind of like dating, you hear a lot of “no’s,” but you do it for that one “yes.”
Here’s what a friend Joe Schmalke, who was involved with Black Caravan, a founder, in fact… something I learned from him is a lot of people neglect the retailer. When you have a property that’s coming out, approach your retailers, approach them for their, retail covers, offer them incentives to buy maybe an extra 10 copies.
Get on that phone and talk to retailers. They’re going to be your friends in this, because they’re the liaison between the people who would buy the book, if only they knew about it. Right? They’re the ones that make sure everybody knows about it. Those are the people you want to talk to. And, you know, he pointed out to me that everybody neglects the retailer. And I said, Geez, you know, I’m one of them! I hadn’t even thought of that. And I did that to great effect with “Behemoth” Number One, it really helped a lot.
Learn more about J.K. Woodward’s new work and past creations at his website, or his blog. Follow J.K. at his Twitter.
