CBR: CCI: The Road to "Stumptown"

[CBR News]

During their CCI panel, the "Stumptown" creative team of Greg Rucka and Matthew Southworth went in depth on their Eisner-nominated crime title, their creative process and zombie jokes.


Full article here.

[Spectreguy]

nice the hear there's going to be more of these. Hopefully they'll be a little more timely then the last ones.

[dupont2005]

I loved Stumptown. Looking forward to the next installment. Between this and Blue Estate I'm pretty happy with my detective comics

[Awesome!]

Did a volume 1 trade ever come out? I remember a HC but nothing else.

[fredmanson]

And "en route" for the second installment of Stumptown!!!!!

I must buy the first HC... I am on the Amazon (FR) web site, €21 is very a good price!!! It's ordered!!!!

[pmpknface]

I got the HC and it's a BEAUTIFUL package. I loved the coloring and I wish the panel had talked more about deciding on Lee Loughridge as a colorist. The coloring totally added an extra layer that made me love this book.

[Matthew Southworth]

Hey there--

Thanks for the kind words on STUMPTOWN. Wanted to address a couple of issues you guys mentioned:

The next arc of STUMPTOWN will be extremely timely; the reason it has taken so long to get the next arc out is that we're finishing each issue and banking them in order to make sure there are no delays between issues. The arc is five issues long, and when I've finished drawing four of them, we'll solicit. I'm drawing the third one right now.

There has not been a trade yet, just a hardcover (of which we're pretty proud). The HC has some material not in the issues themselves (also doesn't have some of the backup material that was in the issues), is printed on a really nice heavy matte paper that does the art some good, and parts of it were recolored.

Also, in answer to the question about the coloring--there were three colorists on the series: Lee Loughridge, Rico Renzi, and me. Lee did the first two issues, which we were very pleased with; then Rico took over for the last two, with my stepping in to help hit the deadlines in the end. The colors were always done very last-minute, which led to a few weak spots, which is why those things were recolored.

Greg and I really, REALLY appreciate your taking the time to read the book and to comment on it. There's a giant pile of comics coming out every Wednesday, so for you to give us your time means a lot. We are extremely excited to get the next arc out to you--it's pretty cool--and we really hope you like it when it gets out there.

Please tell everyone you know who you think might like it to check it out and ask your comic shop to order scads of them. We're fighting a marketing battle with very little money but piles of enthusiasm, so thanks for your help!

Matt Southworth

[Awesome!]

So what you're saying is that I need to go buy the HC because I was an idiot and trade waited this series? Damn you, Southworth!

Tradewaiting is not my usual nature so for that I apologize and have only myself to blame.

[pmpknface]

Thanks for the reply Matt!

I showed the HC to a friend of mine who was visiting from Portland and he was blown away! In the first pages he looked at he saw the bridge that is prominent in that area (I forget what it's called) and he nearly jumped out of his shoes, because you could see the resemblance between the image you drew and the tattoo he has of it. ;) So what I'm saying is, you did a great job on the art! I'm assuming you must live in Portland, or visit often, because there were a bunch of other local image references too.

Keep up the good work because I'm in for the next HC!

[Matthew Southworth]

Hey Awesome! I can't honestly say whether we're doing a trade or not; Oni has been releasing things in these really nice hardcover editions, and they haven't been doing trades of most of those books, so I'm guessing we won't do one. But no one has told me that, I'm just taking a shot in the dark.

Re: "tradewaiting" (a term I've never heard before, but I like it). I often wait for trades on things I know I'll like simply because they have no ads and there are usually bonuses in the collections. So I'm with you on that! However, in the case of STUMPTOWN, we didn't wind up collecting some backup materials from the issues in the collection. We used that extra space in the collection for different material--so if you bought the issues and loved the series, there's still good reason to buy the book. And vice versa.

I was a little sheepish about this decision, frankly--I liked the backup material from the issues and wanted to include it, but I also like what we chose instead. And I was afraid people would feel we were trying to double-dip them, which I hate, but that honestly wasn't the intention. It's kind of an expensive series in issues, and the book itself is expensive, but I hope it's worth it for readers.

And pmpknface--I don't live in Portland, but I do live in Seattle, which is about three hours away. So I make a fair number of trips down there, and I've gotten really familiar with the city and locations. Greg often asks for specific locations--the St John's Bridge is a good example--and whenever possible I like to go to that area and walk around. Sometimes that yields special things, like when I visited that bridge, I saw lots of geese there, and that made for a nice additional texture when I drew that scene.

I'm really glad your friend responded to the authenticity of the book; I try really hard to make it as accurate and textural as I can.

[pmpknface]

Thanks again for the replies Matt. Feel free to pass along any updates about the book that you can in this thread in the future - we'll be waiting!

[Libaax]

The delays ruined my enjoyment of Stumptown so im glad the next series will not be the same.