Recording copyright-free works is nothing new. Offering them cheap is no big deal. But making them free after five years to perpetually fund and build an audiobook library? That's something that continues to motivate me.

I read a lot anyway, or try to at least. I'm an actor who has little interest in pursuing it seriously beyond the local indie film and community theatre. I love spoken word poetry and think it's a shame it's so hard to find. And recording and editing fiction audio is a great way, as a writer, to really study a work and see its structure--even if I'm more interested in nonfiction and poetry as a listener.

Someday if the project's still around, I hope I'll even be able to add my own works to the project. But right now I'm content with recording those who have gone before--as well as offer a way for current peers to see a wider distribution for their own works. Though it is weird to mentioned in Locus and The New York Times and not yet be eligible for SFWA.

2) What is the most embarrassing acting role you've taken?

I'm never embarrassed by the crazy stuff (wearing dresses, doing the most unorthadox physical comedy), but I have on some nights failed to connect with audiences or my fellow cast members on stage, which embarrasses me greatly in that I at least failed to meet my own expectations.

3) What about the comics medium appeals to you as a writer and artist?

The short answer is that I like pretty pictures and it's a great, underused (and underappreciated) way to tell stories.

Longer version. Hmm. For artists working in mass media today, scent isn't practical for anyone but perfume-and-candle designers, and taste requires FDA approval. That leaves us with sight (images and written words), sound (words, music, and noises), and, in recent years, touch (interactivity, user input).

With those combinations, you've got a lot of options like prose, poetry, songs, radio drama, film, animation, video games, and comics. With mass media--so not counting live performance--you currently need a player/utensil (iPod, Xbox, television, etc) to enjoy any of this art, with the exceptions of comics and the written word. Sometimes words work better alone. Sometimes they work better with pictures. And sometimes sequential pictures work best on their own. Depends on the story.

As an artist (meaning "illustrator" or at least "2D-artist"), I'm only really interested in my own writing. (See #5, below.)

4) How often do you shave your head?

Only done it once. And it's grown out now, though short.

I did it for the first time last summer, and shaved it every week or so for about three months. I liked the way I looked, but spending twenty minutes a week on it is more than I like to spend on my appearance per month.

So I let it grow out for a part. I'm considering shaving it again now that I've switched to an electric razor for my face; if using the electric razor on my head makes it easier and faster, maybe I'll make it my thing. Right now it's just the most recent photo of me, so I use it online. And it scares away the squirrels who eat all the audiobooks.

5) You seem to have many different, yet related, areas of interest (writing, acting, comic-stripping, audio publication, &c.); if you were forced to pick only one that you could do for the rest of your life, which one would it be?

It's all about the writing. I act because I enjoy it, but I doubt I'd ever consider it as a career. I do the rest of the stuff is because I can't commission other people to do it for me. Yet.

I want to write the scripts for comics, the storylines and dialogue for video games and cartoons, the plays for people (who don't know me) to direct and perform, and the business plans for projects that can be better executed by people who know what they're doing. And I want the people helping me to get paid at least the value of their work, not what pittance I can afford today.

If I was smarter, I'd just focus all my efforts on writing prose and poetry now, and build off that success when the time is right to leverage myself into other media. But I'm impatient like that. And curious about opportunities.

I wanted to do an online comic, so I did it. I wanted to start an audiobook project, so I did it. While for fields like the fiction market, a self-published novel can be an admission of defeat, other industries (music, video games, comics) encourage self-published works as "calling cards" as a key part of breaking in. I'm picking my battles because time is precious.

These days I am trying to be smarter. Learning to say no to myself when I think of new projects to start. Hopefully I'll be in a position someday to not have to say no. But we'll see.



Filed under Carrboro Area, Journal, Vanity Smurf
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