In this conversation, Nathan Luth discusses his journey as a creative, focusing on his anthology project and the selection process for submissions. He shares insights into the challenges of self-publishing, the importance of building an audience, and the balance between creativity and business. The discussion also covers the significance of collaboration in anthologies, creative influences, and lessons learned from previous projects, as well as future goals for his work.
Follow the Concrete Arcanum Anthology on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nathanlueth/concrete-arcanum-living-with-monsters?ref=cgak10
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https://www.nathanluethillustration.com/
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Speaker 1 (00:12)
So hey everyone, I’m here with Nathan Luth. He’s an editor and publisher. Nathan, how are doing today?
Speaker 2 (00:18)
I’m very well, Ryan, pleased to be here and thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (00:22)
Thank you for being on. I guess full disclosure, we’re be talking a bit about your anthology project coming up. And I have a comic in that and I’m sure we’ll talk a little bit about that as well. But just for anyone listening, ⁓ I’m really excited about this project, but just wanted to share that it’s something that I’m part of and I’m really happy to be part of because it’s one of my favorite books actually. It’s like, I might wanna take this further. I have you to thank for that.
Speaker 2 (00:46)
no, I was happy to have you aboard. really loved ⁓ the artwork. The Satoshi Koen influences jumped right out at me. I really like what you’re working with, with the black and white and the very bright red. And I really loved the twist at the end. So no spoilers or anything like that. It was great story, very strong entry, and I’m proud to have it aboard. ⁓
Speaker 1 (01:11)
Thank
you. So I guess with anybody that I have on, was kind of just talking to so many different creatives and different people in this world. I always try to get initially, like what’s your origin story as a creative? where did you kind of started on this track to where we are today?
Speaker 2 (01:28)
Right, right. mean, stop me if you’ve heard this one before. You know, as a young warthog, I was always drawing and telling stories to myself and my mind and all that good stuff. And I was fortunate enough to have parents that encouraged and some might say enabled that course in my life. I attended art school at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. And afterwards, I
kind of bopped around doing various freelance projects, live caricaturist, let’s see, kind of whatever, basically whatever involved drawing in a paycheck. After a couple years, I started up a webcomic with a writer that I knew at the time. over the course of the next eight years, we produced a steampunk fantasy epic.
a story called Impure Blood Together. ⁓ And while it was a good, while I’m very proud of the work that I did on it, ⁓ it was never really what you might call financially successful or anything like that. ⁓ after about, after the series wrapped in 2017, I knew that I wanted to do another webcomic just because I loved working on, you know, unique projects so much like that. ⁓
But I also knew that I wanted to figure out how to make it financially Solvable, know how to actually monetize things properly. So I spent the next couple years researching making connections and just straight up asking questions about like how and kind of examining people who were making a good living doing web comics and what have you and then in 2020 I
launched ⁓ the first hardcover collected edition of Impure Blood and have been kickstarting various projects since then. I launched my current ongoing series, a post-apocalyptic urban fantasy tale called The Canon Evangel in 2022, which was also the same year that I launched my first anthology book, Concrete Arcanum, the follow-up to which we are currently discussing here. yeah,
Reader’s Digest version, but yeah, that’s kind of the track that I’ve taken. I’m very passionate about ⁓ creators doing it for themselves and just not being reliant on a publisher or a middleman or a gatekeeper or anything like that. It is a golden age for self-publishing right now, and I think that everybody should be out there. Everybody who can should be out there trying to get their stuff out there.
and get it done.
Speaker 1 (04:20)
Absolutely, yeah. That’s definitely something we’re gonna get into a little bit. now are you at a point now where you’re doing this full time?
Speaker 2 (04:26)
I am doing this full time, Full full time sometimes. It has been funny. Like lot of people are ⁓ like, you know how nice it must be to work for yourself and be your own boss. But not everybody realizes that the boss follows you home.
Speaker 1 (04:47)
I mean, I think that’s part of the issue is, you know, on one hand, it’s like you’re living the dream, right? It’s like, I’d love to kind of be doing it full time. But I also know, you know, being, you know, just having launched one, you know, Comic-Con Kickstarter, how hard that is. so if that is, you know, and for me, it was like, okay, it’s, it’s a, it’s a hobby, but an expensive hobby. I’d love for it to be full time. But to have that be your bread and butter, that becomes, that’s a lot harder and a lot more stressful and a lot more anxiety producing when that’s how you make your living.
Speaker 2 (05:16)
most definitely. I mean, we creatives, ⁓ we don’t want to deal with the business side of things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We just want to sit in our rooms and draw and write. And I get that. That has been me for the majority of my life and career. ⁓ I just want to impress upon people that if you’re willing to learn a few new skills, and I mean, that’s who we are as creative people. We are skillsy people.
⁓ We know how to learn. We’re smart and creative. So if you can apply some of that mindset and some of that intelligence to ⁓ learning how to take on the entrepreneurial spirit, learning some small business management, learning some ⁓ online advertising techniques, ⁓ it is absolutely possible to do it for yourself, isn’t it?
Speaker 1 (06:10)
What are the, so I guess, because that is a huge lesson to learn. think for a lot of people that I’ve talked to, I’ve been doing a little bit more of the like.
kind of conventions in the area and meeting people. And I do find it interesting how many people neglect that aspect of it. So as somebody who’s creative, right, who started, who was writing and drawing and creating works, how does that math in your head kind of change for you? That like, wanna work on X, Y, and Z, but I’ve got to get people to buy that. Like, how does your life change? How does your work change? And like, how much…
What percent does it shift from like, I’m a hundred percent an artist or a creative, now I’m what percent, you know, marketing and project managing and everything else.
Speaker 2 (06:54)
man, yeah, that is a great question. ⁓ And I, so I also, whenever we talk about the, whenever I talk about this, I also want to let people know that you don’t, it is perfectly valid and valuable to not make your creative passion your career because ⁓
in in so doing, you do lose a little bit of freedom. People I have a brand and people expect a certain kind of thing from me. So I can’t like if I want to all of sudden dabble in I don’t know, a sculpture or something else. You know, I like I have I’ve spent all this time building up an audience that is interested in modern fantasy comics. If I all of a sudden decide like, No, I want you to do sculpture.
You know, like, I think I like to think most of them would be like, that’s cool. Let me know when you come back to modern fantasy comics, you know, right, right. ⁓ So I think it’s important to build a career doing if you’re going to, if you’re going to do it, it’s important to build it, doing something that you love and that you’re passionate about and that you could do it all the time. ⁓ But again, you know, like I said, you lose a little bit of that freedom to explore.
whatever new and weird thing catches your attention. ⁓ So that is a bit of the trade-off. ⁓ As far as what percentage of the time I’m doing the business admin side of things and what percentage of the time I’m actually creating content for myself, I would put that at about 50-50. And I’m fortunate to be so, yeah. ⁓
Let’s see. So, and that’s usually kind of how I break down my day, actually. I spend my mornings doing ⁓ content creation, working on my comics, working on writing or what have you, and then spend the afternoons doing admin stuff. The bookkeeping, the marketing, the website ⁓ maintenance and care and feeding. So yeah, and that’s about how it breaks down for me these days.
Speaker 1 (09:07)
Yeah. So now somebody who’s for me, like, you know, I’ve been doing this now for a couple, a few years now writing, I I’ve been writing comics for maybe five years. Okay. You sing them for, you know, four, three, four. But what’s been an interesting experience for me is like starting as a writer, then learning how to do some coloring and learning how to letter, how those things have informed my work. So you started as an artist, but now you do, now you write.
How has your, how has that informed your work? Like how has one, how, how they kind of about worked off of each other? Like, you know, just, just as an artist, I feel like, or, know, for me, like just as a writer, when you’re writing, you’re just doing a certain thing. Obviously for comics, you’re writing it, you know, for the page and for panels and thinking about page turns and things like that. But I’m not really thinking too much about the colors until I learned how to color. And then all of a sudden I’m thinking about how to, how the colors inform that. So yeah, I’m just interested in how you manage it too. Cause it’s, it’s like with comics, it’s so compartmentalized.
That if you do multiple things, I find it interesting how they blend into each other.
Speaker 2 (10:04)
Which is really funny that you mentioned that because when I was purely illustrating for a writer, ⁓ one of the most common things that were the comic writer and the artist kind of butt heads is about how much you can fit on a page. know, like the writer, you know, I used to like, you know, like I can write a, it’s a lot easier to write, you know, a full battle scene.
people in this kind of armor and people in that kind of armor and you one guy is doing this and the other guy is you know ⁓ skewering a whole bunch of guys. It’s one thing to write that it’s a very you know it’s a very completely different thing to illustrate that it takes a lot more time. Although so now that I am writing for myself.
I find that writer Nathan and artist Nathan often have the same kind of conversation. Like when I’m writing it, I’m like, oh man, it would be so great. Like I do have, you know, being a visual thinker, you know, I do have an idea of what stuff happens in my head. But I will still absolutely come back to the script when I switch around to the illustration phase and be like, I swear on this podcast?
Speaker 1 (11:18)
Yeah, sure, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:21)
Fucker, like, pass Nathan as a dick, right? Writer Nathan, I hate that guy. But ⁓ yeah, although the more, I will also say the more that I do it, the more that I take on the writing stuff, ⁓ the more ⁓ cohesive and holistic the whole process becomes. in my current story, the Canon Evangel, it takes place across three time periods.
The main character’s past present and future and so as I was writing it I kind of conceived of video like oh man like I should like everything in the past is coded like with a red Red monotone. Yeah, everything. I don’t know. me. Other way around everything in the future has a red monotone because it’s a little bit The idea is that she’s trying to prevent a future that Prevent an apocalyptic future. So red being more threatening as a guy or everything the passion you read everything the future should be read then everything in the
in the past is tinted blue and then everything in the present is ⁓ true to life or true color and what happens. So that was something that just came about. And even as I’m drawing now, since you mentioned incorporating the admin part of the business, ⁓ I am a little less inclined to do things like panel overlaps, like when ⁓ a character is pointing their finger and it overlaps into the next panel.
I’m a little less inclined to do that these days because I know that’s gonna be a pain in the butt to slice up the panels and publish on my website later. Got it. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So even if, for instance, whatever stage you’re at, even if, for instance, like writing Nathan is at the helm, you know, and doing stuff like that, artist Nathan and business Nathan are still, you know, kind of in the back seat, you know, looking over his shoulder being like, what’s going on? What you doing?
Speaker 1 (12:55)
Yeah
Yeah, it’s funny you mentioned that because I do think there’s like definitely business Ryan where like, ⁓ you know, I think when I first wrote my first couple of scripts, not really realizing how much money it was going to cost. ⁓ so, you know, I could do 28 pages, 30 pages, 35, whatever it is. And then you start paying for it. And so I think more recently as I write, I’m like, okay, gotta be more concise, both for the artist, but also financially. I can’t just, know, every page is going to cost money. And, and so yeah, it’s like,
Speaker 2 (13:45)
process. And that is the truth. And I don’t think I started appreciating that until I just started my current phase of self-publishing career. That yeah, the more pages you take up, the more expensive the book is going to be. So you do kind of want to strike that balance of being concise, but also, again, like,
But I mean, that’s art since time immemorial. ⁓ Since we started using this money thing, ⁓ you kind of have to balance the ideation with what is pragmatic and possible and financially feasible. So ⁓ I think that is, again, a healthy thing for if you’re going to do it as a business, a healthy thing to keep in mind and remember. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:37)
So do you have any are there any ⁓ kind of creative influences for you like that are really important whether it’s on the art side or on the writing side?
Speaker 2 (14:44)
my God, so how long you got? ⁓ man. let’s see. Artistically, I started, ⁓ aping, ⁓ Bill Watterson of Calvin and Hobbes, like way back in the day. So that was kind of my start. ⁓ Mark Bagley, Dragon Ball Z. ⁓ I really enjoy the, ⁓ character design wise. ⁓ my, ⁓ man, I am going to blank on his name and I feel terrible about it, but the, ⁓
The main character designer for Final Fantasy VII, VIII, ⁓ and X, Tetsu Nomura. I love the way he balances ⁓ functionality with fantasy. If you look at the Final Fantasy VII character designs, this all looks like stuff people would actually wear, but it’s still distinctly not of
You know, not of our world. ⁓ Let’s see. As far as writing goes, man, I’ve taken influence. Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Let’s see. The Neon Genesis Evangelion. Let’s see. I’m a big mythology reader and fan. like creatures from. ⁓
creatures and stories from mythology and folklore are going to pop up in the canon of Vanguild. And then of course, who doesn’t like the Dresden Files? It’s a great story and it’s just like my favorite summer read right there.
Speaker 1 (16:20)
So yeah, so let’s talk a little bit about the concrete Arcanum. So the first volume, what inspired you to write that or to put that anthology together? And I guess what were takeaways for your first time doing an anthology?
Speaker 2 (16:36)
⁓ man. Let’s see. So as I mentioned, I spent a couple of years in the wilderness trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my the second half of my career, the back half of my career. And I noticed that people like Russell Nolte and Travis Gibb were ⁓ doing very well ⁓ creating anthologies. And the more I looked into it, the more of a great idea I thought it was. ⁓
Just and ever since art school. I really enjoyed the The dynamic of when a teacher will give you an assignment well like just like a one or two sentence premise and Then like a week later everybody comes back with their artwork and there are all these
different and awesome takes on the same idea. And it ⁓ is so dependent on each and every individual artist. Which ⁓ also, the way, 20 aspiring artists out there, don’t get too married to your idea. Because the idea is just the seed. It’s how you execute upon it that makes it awesome. And anthology books are the perfect example of that.
fundamental premise of Concrete Arcanum series is that ⁓ it has become public mainstream knowledge that magic and monsters are real. ⁓ So like most urban fantasy, like the mundane world and the magical world are separate and apart and neither the twain shall meet. ⁓ But I kind of wanted to blow that out of the water and be like, what if Ma ⁓ and Pa ⁓
Ma and Pa Jones from Kansas found out that, yeah, no, all of like all these fairies and vampires and everything else are real and have been living amongst us in hiding. So, and it’s been so much fun to see everybody’s take on that. ⁓ Vampire detectives. ⁓ Let’s see. ⁓ Paranormal investigators. ⁓ Been a few. ⁓ There’s a, my gosh, so a beautiful.
about a girl trying to help out her family by trying to find a real dragon in and amongst a little vending machine that pumps out toy dragons. yeah, just, again, so, I get so excited just talking about it. Just like the variety of stuff that has been put forward. ⁓
has been just fantastic and I love seeing it. This is as much a treat for me as it is for anybody else because I love reading these stories and as you can tell, I’m so very excited to share them because I love this and I want other people to love it too. Let’s see, the second half of your question, you asked what lessons I learned. man, let’s see. One,
Speaker 1 (19:47)
challenges did you find ⁓
Speaker 2 (19:51)
For all of the reputation that artists may have about being flighty and the first one going into it, was a little bit like, is this going to be like herding cats? Not at all. Let’s see, the majority, the overwhelming majority of people, like 80, 90 % of the contributors got their stuff in on time according to spec and it was all fantastic. So.
And you know, I did specifically ask for people who are specifically scouted out people who were ⁓ serious creators, know, serious ⁓ amateur pro-am professional creators. ⁓ But yeah, I had very few problems and the few…
the majority of the people who did have to back out were like, let me know that with plenty of time to spare. That was awesome. I did, let’s see, I did bend over backwards a little bit more than I should have for one particular creator. like, don’t want to, I’m not going to name names or anything like that, but we had a…
We had a big name creator who had pledged some pages to ⁓ the project. And again, not going to name anybody. But this was a creator that who had had their work turned into a movie. So I was very excited to have them aboard. ⁓ They, let’s see, and I don’t want to assume anything on their behalf. ⁓ You know, there are reasons for not getting their pages in may have been perfectly valid. I don’t know. ⁓
But I was a little sad that they didn’t get their stuff in. So one of the lessons that I have learned this time around is I’ll cut people a break within reason, but I do have to, ⁓ I don’t like being a hard ass, but sometimes you gotta be like, right, well, that was the deadline. I’ll give you some… ⁓
I’ll give you some leeway for personal emergencies or whatever else. But yeah, once it’s done, it’s done. I got to launch this thing. It is a little bit like being the captain of the boat. You can’t hold the entire boat up for just one or two people that can’t make it because that’s not fair to the rest of the crew. So yeah.
I do, as of this recording, have a few more people that I need to poke a little bit. This is it. I need to see any pages. even if they, again, no hard feelings. I’m not a bridge burner or a grudge holder. Life happens. But so if not this time, then maybe the next go around.
because I do foresee there being more concrete arcanums in the future. And this is a project that I’m intending to do maybe a new one every other year or so.
Speaker 1 (23:13)
Yeah, no, it’s great. for me, I, one of the, and kind of one of the secrets, think for, especially for a writer, where funds are limited and sometimes it’s hard to go through the process of getting a full book paid for and doing all the marketing. think anthologies are an amazing kind of resource for you both because it allows you to make these smaller bits of work. ⁓ Somebody else is handling all the business side, you know, you’re obviously helping out with marketing and things like that. It also exposes you to a community and really helps with writing. For me,
Also for me, as somebody who really got into kind of coloring and lettering, it gave me an opportunity to kind of do it and learn that aspect of comic art and creation myself. I feel like if I was like, all right, I’m gonna color a massive book first, I’d be a lot harder to do that. You know, are people to learn some of these things? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:05)
Right, and as I mentioned, is where anthologies are kind of how I first took my big toe into Kickstarters and learning how to write.
and also self-published a little bit. ⁓ I mentioned Russell Nolte previously. I had the very great pleasure of being in all three of his Cthulhu is hard to spell anthologies. So yeah, that was kind of, and that gave me the opportunity to, know, fond my legs as a writer and also kind of, you know, like peek over the collective shoulder there and being like, how’s this Kickstarter thing working?
Speaker 1 (24:44)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah, no, it’s a great opportunity for people. And I’ve had a great time with this one. think on the creative end, I think you’ve been more than reasonable as far as communicating and giving us time. think I’ve been fortunate to be in several anthologies in the last year. And they’ve all been good. I haven’t had any negative experiences. But I do like that you were very clear with like, here’s the dates, here’s what we need specifically. Everything is laid out there. So it’s really easy for somebody to follow and…
know what is needed. But yeah, it’s like, know, know with any time you’re trying to wrangle up a certain amount of people, gonna poke a little bit. But, but I’m excited. think, you know, just seeing the Facebook group and on the Discord, some of the art and some of the ideas. It’s a fun project. And I think I love that idea, like you mentioned, where there’s a prompt and then just everybody figures out what they want, you know, what they’re gonna do.
Speaker 2 (25:36)
Yeah, let’s see. And yeah, no, everybody’s been great. Like by and large, I am just so fortunate and so lucky for, I’m gushing here and I won’t apologize for it. But yeah, I’ve just been so very lucky with the remarkable talent that I’ve been able to attract to this, ⁓ with ⁓ the work ethic that everybody has had.
⁓ and just the overwhelmingly positive community and just the ⁓ level of different voices and perspectives also. mean, we’ve got like, we just got like such a great variety of people. am just, again, as you can tell, every time I get talking about it, I just get so excited. fantastic. Let’s see. But let’s see.
Yeah, and like people from all over the world as well. I’ve got folks from, I believe, India. I’ve got folks from the UK. I’ve got folks from Canada and of course the entire width and breadth of the United States.
Speaker 1 (26:50)
Yeah, no, that’s awesome. It was fun for me when I remember seeing the post-fanthology and I had watched, have ever seen Brick by Rian Johnson?
Speaker 2 (27:01)
⁓ I have not, I’m familiar with the words.
Speaker 1 (27:04)
So it’s a great movie and it’s the weirdest movie because it’s teenagers, but it is full on noir. Like it hits all those notes. I had just watched it years ago, but I’d watched it again recently. And I was like, so I just got into this noir.
So when I saw that post, was like, oh, wait, can I do a monster? And I’m thinking noir. was like, I’m going write about a vampire that’s a detective in Big Nour. And then, yeah, and I just started, you know, it’s like, I’m going to figure this thing out. And I was really happy with that, with that. But it’s like, sometimes you just need that little prompt and then like the thing you’re thinking about, you know, pops up. it was,
Speaker 2 (27:36)
school. absolutely and that is part of why I really enjoy like the whole modern fantasy urban fantasy thing is when two seemingly disparate ideas collide you know like ⁓ and kind of come together you get you get this beautiful peanut butter in my chocolate ⁓ kind of moment so like I’m brick I’m adding that one to the yeah it’s
Speaker 1 (28:00)
It’s
a great movie. it’s like he you know, I like him as a writer. I know there’s a you know, some you know, some mixed things about some of the stuff he’s done, but
Speaker 2 (28:08)
⁓ That’s creativity man, you know got an opinion about what and yeah
Speaker 1 (28:13)
But
watch Brick because it is such a weird like it’s got, yeah, again, it’s like it’s teenagers. Joseph Gordon-Levitt as basically a teenager. takes place in high school, basically in high school, but it’s full on noir. Like, again, if you just aged up the characters, made it black and white from the dialogue to the cinematography, it really feels like a noir. But I think this first film, it’s one of his first films. And so, yeah, they had me on this noir kick for a while and it was like perfect timing.
Speaker 2 (28:34)
Alright, yeah.
Right, right. Okay. You got me sold, man. I need to check this out.
Speaker 2 (28:46)
All right. So as part of the process, I’m sure you had a lot of people submit for the anthology. Especially, I think the other thing is there are a lot of anthologies that are like, need finished work, or we need a certain level of process. In your case, was like scripts. So how do you, I’m sure you got a lot more than you know what do with. So how did you go about this process of deciding which ones to keep, which ones to not keep for this anthology?
Speaker 1 (29:11)
Oh man, that was a tough one. Let’s see, there was, as you say, there was a lot of submissions and more than I could really make as we touched on earlier. You know, you kind of have to limit the page count or else your printing costs are going to be astronomical. So I was looking for something in the vicinity of 200, 220 pages or so. And that was kind of like the limitations that I was working with.
And then it was ⁓ it was funny like when I started it so Right after I finished fulfilling the first concrete Arcanum my girlfriend was like so when you making the next one and I’m like Are you kidding me? Yeah, like it took these take a lot of energy and a lot of coordination stuff like that and again, love it Make no mistake. But at that time I was just kind of like
and didn’t want to have to think about it. ⁓ Until I pulled my audience and asked them what projects, what project should I do next? What project would you be most interested in me doing next? And ⁓ Concrete Arcanum was far and away the number one thing that people wanted to see a follow up to.
So then I was like, oh, okay, alright, alright. And then part of me would still come like, oh man, know, how many people are actually going to show up for this? So I put out the call for submissions and then it was like, oh, there’s… I had literally twice as many submissions for Living with Monsters, the current anthology, as I did for…
first concrete arcannum. it was, yeah. And there were, let’s see, and yeah, yeah, it was tough. There weren’t any that were unworthy or anything like that. There was, I, there were some that, let’s see, I liked what they were doing and what they were working with, but they were just like not quite ready for prime time. And while I do,
I absolutely wanted to leave space for people who are new early on in their career and you know, I have done, you know, there are, are, you know, people who are very new and people who are veteran, you know, you know, veterans of, of, uh, dozens of kickstarters. We’ve got the entire skills gamut. Um, so I only, uh, it was really a matter of how much space there was. uh, let’s see. Um,
And so, yeah, I had to make some tough choices. had to let some people know that not a no, just not this time. And I tried to approach everything with that level of kindness. But yeah, the decisions were, the judging criteria were ⁓ basically in terms of, you know,
quality of your work of course that was kind of probably the biggest thing there was quite a how much your story butted heads with somebody else’s story like if somebody you know if two people came up with the same thing it was kind of like you know and it is modern fantasy so there’s vampire stuff
Speaker 2 (32:53)
Yours has a vampire named Vince too, right?
Speaker 1 (32:56)
Let’s see, and yeah, like ⁓ yours and mine were similar in that they both deal with vampires and I posted the script on the Facebook page and you mentioned that, yeah, like both are vampires and Vincent, but I was comfortable with that in that mine is more of a tragic love story.
Speaker 2 (33:17)
Exactly. ⁓
Speaker 1 (33:18)
and
you’re more of a crime noir so that and then also I don’t think my main character is actually ever explicitly named in the dialogue or anything like that so you know there’s just the ⁓ it’s just a male vampire and a female vampire and they’re kind of and my story is kind of about them ⁓
kind of dealing with the fact that it’s hard to date when generational differences means you’re maybe several generations removed from anybody else, you know. So yeah. So yeah, and I mean, it basically all came down to
Speaker 2 (33:48)
Yeah
Speaker 1 (34:04)
let’s see, as far as the criteria when it basically all came down to the quality of your work and, ⁓ how strong it was and whether or not it stepped on anybody else’s toes. So, and then the event that it stepped on somebody else’s toes, I just kind of had to go with the story that I felt was stronger. And, ⁓ yeah. And so, so there, there are creators that I thought did great. And I very much hope that they, submit to, concrete our canon and let’s see 2027.
Speaker 2 (34:33)
So you’re planning on the third release in 2027?
Speaker 1 (34:40)
I may not, let’s see how this one goes. But yeah, like this has legs. ⁓ And as I mentioned, my audience likes it. ⁓ It makes me happy to put together. So, and as long as that continues to be true, I think I’m gonna, yeah, yeah. We’ll see how much space I have, how much storage space I have for all of these books. But yeah, just gotta move them.
Speaker 2 (35:07)
Yeah, no, it’s weird. speaking of moving them, tell me a little bit about kind of the challenges of Kickstarter and what you’ve learned over the years running multiple campaigns. what, how are you able to, advice for somebody who wants to use Kickstarter ⁓ to get their next book funded?
Speaker 1 (35:24)
Sure, absolutely. Again, as I mentioned previously, it’s a golden age for self-publishing. the key to Kickstarter is keeping in mind that I like to use the metaphor, a band of metaphor, and that Kickstarter is the venue and you are the band. And if you want to have a good event, treat your Kickstarter like it’s an event, if you want to have a good showing,
you need to mobilize your audience to come to the venue when it’s showtime. Like if you just show up and put your thing up on Kickstarter, that’s basically like doing no advertising. You’re gonna get like the barflies are gonna be there. The people that are just regulars and are just kicking around the bar or what have you.
But if you really want a great night, you need to get your audience, the people who already know and love your work, to show up and show out. ⁓ So I like to think of it in that regard. ⁓ Mailing list has been the key to my success to do that. ⁓ I know a lot of people that have ⁓ leaned harder into social media and have had good luck with that. ⁓
I’m still trying to crack that myself. ⁓ But if ⁓ social media works for you and you get a good response from social media and you get a lot of people clicking your links and going to where you direct them, then go forth and Godspeed. If that’s your tool, use that. ⁓
Let’s see, the only asterisk I want to put on that is sometimes, you know, the people that own your social media platform go crazy. And then you’re faced with the challenge of trying to rebuild your audience on another platform. So let’s see. But then that’s again why I favor mailing lists is because you can like.
Import it export it, you know, like all your your subscribers are your subscribers not you know, whatever other platforms let’s see, so the other thing I Think is good ⁓ basic what Kickstarter one-on-one stuff is Make sure, know what it’s gonna cost to ship, you know build fulfillment into your budget. Yeah, that’s all you know, that is always always always ⁓ important ⁓
Let’s I’ve seen so many people take a bath on Kickstarter because they forget to ⁓ estimate out the shipping and build shipping into the ⁓ cost of their rewards. ⁓ be patient. And this last one is advice to myself ⁓ a little bit. But don’t launch until you’re ready to launch.
⁓ Like ⁓ a lot of people jump the gun I from my years of experience as a freelancer I Have enough faith in myself to know that if ⁓ if a book isn’t a hundred percent done by The time I hit the launch button that I do have the follow-through to you know Like like to finish up the pages and it will get out there. So ⁓
On Kickstarter, as with in the freelance world, your reliability is the cornerstone of your career. If you don’t fulfill, ⁓ then nobody’s going to show up for your next one, really. So if Kickstarter is a ⁓ platform that you want to use a lot, and for self-publishing, I don’t think there’s anything better right now.
⁓ then yeah, that reliability, that confidence that your audience has that you are going to deliver on what you promise, that is paramount.
Speaker 2 (39:42)
Yeah, absolutely. think that’s that was a good lesson that was instilled early on when I was running my first campaigns like get finished the book first, you know, then then most work is done. Then you can just worry about fulfillment and you know, And even then it’s like, you know, like at least at that point, it’s like I’m not trying to make my money back necessarily. It’s you’re able to build an audience and get in the process for it. And obviously, some people are
Speaker 1 (39:49)
Yep. ⁓
Speaker 2 (40:08)
Some people don’t have the luxury, but definitely it’s a fortunate position to be in to be able to.
Speaker 1 (40:13)
Yeah,
yeah, yeah, yeah. And then just, also the fact that again, life happens if you, you know, if you, if you funded your Kickstarter and then, and your book is like half to 75 % done.
and then I don’t know, like some kind of family tragedy happens or you get into a car accident or something like that. yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s a million things that could get in the way of that. So the closer you are to done, the better and the more insurance you have against something like that happening and you tanking your reputation.
Speaker 2 (40:52)
Well, I was like, one of my other hobbies is 3D printing and, like, that was the worst thing is like, there were so many projects over the years that I backed that fell through. And that was that that’s even worse than comics, you’re with electronics and prototypes and the prototype work, but for some reason, we can’t get it working in production. So I kind of learned that early on. It’s like, yeah, your reputation is 100%. Like if you, if you can’t fulfill, then you’re not going to get people to buy your stuff anymore. Part of it.
Speaker 1 (41:17)
A thousand percent.
Speaker 2 (41:18)
Um, and I, I’m glad you mentioned the newsletter because I think that’s a, that, for me, prefer newsletters over as personally to social media. Cause I find, you know, it’s like once a week, I, know, or once a month, I’m going to spend that week working on the newsletter. I send it out to my, you know, to, people, um, you build an audience that way that can be engaged. And, uh, it’s a lot easier to me. It’s maybe more work in certain aspects, but it’s a lot easier than trying to navigate the world of social media and figure it out.
Speaker 1 (41:46)
Yeah,
yeah, and then there’s just the fact that we’re creative and intelligent people, know, like we have opinions and things to say. So and also we are writers and ⁓ artists. So a forum in which we ⁓ people we are attracting readers ⁓ is, you know, definitely ideal for what we do.
Speaker 2 (42:08)
So now a question for this, I don’t know if you’ve built out the entire campaign yet, but for this anthology, are there going to be any interesting rewards or stretch goals or anything that you can talk about now?
Speaker 1 (42:20)
Most definitely I am looking for I’m looking forward to ⁓ unveiling a new enamel pin for this book Let’s see one of the most popular ⁓ add-ons from the previous campaign was ⁓ the sticker that featured the ⁓ An emoji circle like it’s like a magic circle for magic, but it ⁓ also had all these little emoji faces around it
And then a little d20 dice in the middle. So I’m gonna definitely gonna build that out and it’s popular to sell at cons and such. Let’s see, the pouches for dice and such were a popular item for the last campaign. So I’ve got a Brookletic of creating Meraki studios working on a little kind of purse pouch ⁓ add-on. And I think that’ll be a lot of fun.
And then of course, poster prints of the cover art. Let’s see, in case you haven’t seen it yet. Yeah, I know you’ve seen it, yeah, your readers haven’t seen it, but it’s pretty cute. Super proud of how it turned out. It’s got ⁓ the elf girl from the first book kind of reading and all of these other monsters, you know, kind of peeking over her shoulder. that’s a, yeah, thank you. Thank you, thank you. ⁓
Speaker 2 (43:39)
Cover, yeah, it’s a great.
Speaker 1 (43:42)
And yeah, like as far as stretch goals go, we’re going to see how that goes. think ⁓ metal bookmarks are not out of the question. Let’s see, maybe a little ribbon, you know, for that extra touch of glass and what have you. And let’s see, not even opposed to say book boxes.
So you know there’s ⁓ there’s possibilities. I don’t want to ⁓ I don’t want to give away too much, but yeah, no I’ve got I got some ideas and I just need to finish building them out
Speaker 2 (44:17)
Awesome. So, okay, so we a couple ⁓ of kind of rapid fire out the box questions about this series. Then we’ll talk a little bit more about when it’s coming out, when people can expect it how they can make Absolutely. All right. So if Concrete or Can-Am had a soundtrack, what would the first song be?
Speaker 1 (44:33)
Oh gosh, put, that is a good one, man. I’m trying, let’s see, I’m think out loud here for a second. Something with a little bit of mystery, mystery vibe to it. Some, like a little bit, like I like the mashup of kind of orcette.
orchestral symphonic stuff with, you know, more modern day ⁓ rock electric guitars and something like that. So I’m trying to think if there’s a more lo-fi version of like Nightwish or, yeah, but, ⁓ let’s see. I think, ⁓ man, ⁓ I was going to say like, ⁓ Nightwish, but not as hard, think. Right. ⁓
Yeah, cause like I love Nightwish and they’re very epic and such but a lot of concrete Arcanum is largely just ⁓ everyday folk, ⁓ both mystical and mundane everyday folk just starting to get by in a weird new world. it’s something I think we can all relate to at the moment. ⁓ Let’s see, ⁓ so, geez. Yeah, I…
I’m struggling to name a band that kind of has that vibe. let’s see, Whisper in the Noise is a local one that I’ve… Wouldn’t surprise me if you hadn’t heard of it. That’s fine. And then maybe a little bit more… But yeah, some things are a little bit more upbeat. maybe throw some Floggy Molly in there as well.
Speaker 2 (46:18)
Nice. So now, is there, ⁓ if you could spend a day in the world of one of the stories in your book, what would you, which world would you spend a day in? ⁓
Speaker 1 (46:28)
⁓ my god, wow, you’re good at this, holy shit. ⁓ man. ⁓ I would want to spend a day in, I mean, they’re all so, so many of the stories have such an air of compassion about them and I really love that. Again, so much about folks just trying to get by. ⁓
I, oh, all right, I’m gonna start. Okay, I should have done this in the first place, but I’m gonna, I gotta pull up my list here. Let’s see, of the entries. Okay.
I had to do that.
Hmm. Okay. I’m going to, I got a shout out. Uh, one of my favorite ones, uh, the, uh, werewolves nibbling by, uh, by an artist by the name of Mallory. She, uh, um, it’s about a, uh, a furry, a furry, uh, who is doing a, basically a ride along with her uncle’s werewolf pack. So it’s brilliant.
and, ⁓ it, it manages to be kind and funny and has some, ⁓ has some good cartoony action to it. And, ⁓ yeah, like, ⁓ it was a hilarious premise. Every, you know, every, every, or both books so far has had one that just makes me laugh out loud whenever I read it. So.
I think I’m going to call out that one and say, yeah, no, I would love to see the… I would love to also ride along with the werewolf pack as long as they’re, you know, like being cool about it. Yeah, right?
Speaker 2 (48:37)
Okay, last one. if, and there’s maybe a little bit of a little benefit for anyone who’s submitting for the next one. Is there a monster that has not appeared yet in either of the two anthologies that you’d like to see in the next one?
Speaker 1 (48:51)
Also a good question. Let’s see. All right. So here’s the hack. Let’s see. You’re the one to know is let’s say like so vampires, werewolves, dragons in the modern day, et cetera. All, you know, great. Love them all. And, you know, no shade. But as I mentioned earlier, I’m a mythology geek. So if you can give if you can give me some deep cuts.
If you can get like mythology deep cuts, know, throw in a Lamia or a Strix or something like that. You know, maybe maybe even one of those, uh, like you have the name of those, but one of those, um, they appear in spirited away. The little bouncing heads from a Japanese mythology. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, yeah. Like, uh, uh, uh, it might not matter what the rest of your story looks like. I’m going to be like, okay.
That one got me. Yeah, okay, you’re in. Get in here. So yeah, like, ⁓ so yeah, give me some, give me some deep mythology cuts. Throw me with some folklore. And you know, modern take on it, which is by the way, one of the, ⁓ one of the premises, I think, brainstormed for an upcoming concrete Arcanum is like retail a bit of folklore ⁓ in the modern day.
So, an upcoming ⁓ premise. ⁓ But yeah, just again, like as a mythology geek, know, give me something from the Nibelungen lead, you know, kind of like, yeah, what have you. Yeah, so that’s your hack right there.
Speaker 2 (50:26)
Awesome. okay, so tell us a little bit about the Kickstarter, when it’s launching, how people can find the pre-launch, and then how people can reach you or your newsletter, whatever you feel is the best way to get connected with you.
Speaker 1 (50:39)
Absolutely.
Let’s see. The Kickstarter for Concrete Arcanum, Living with Monsters launches June 6th, 2025 and will run until the second week in July. So I believe that’s the 17th 18th. Yep. But the sooner you back the better. There will be bonus e-comics aplenty along the way. the higher, the more backers we get.
the more free bonus e-comics come along with your reward. ⁓ that’s kind of awesome. Let’s see. As far as you can find that, just by searching ⁓ my name on Kickstarter, ⁓ I think Kickstarter now has a function in which you can follow creators, just like ⁓ on the social media. So Google my name, Nathan Luth. It all links as well. Yeah, no,
Speaker 2 (51:31)
including
Speaker 1 (51:34)
I’ll throw up a send you a link to the concrete Arcanum living with monsters pre-launch page again, you know strong first day is key to Kickstarter success So, you know the more people we can get to back on within the first couple days the better the law the better the entirety of the rest of the campaign will run ⁓ as for me you can find ⁓
links to everything I do at nathamlootillustration.com and if you want to follow along as I create the Canon Evangeline you can find me at nathamlootillustration on substack.
Speaker 2 (52:12)
Awesome. Well, Nathan, thank you so much for being on and obviously thank you for allowing me be a part of this project. It’s been awesome. And yeah, thanks for being on the show. And I can’t wait to see how this turns out. I can’t wait to have this, have it physically at my hand. Cause just all the other stories seem so cool and interesting.
Speaker 1 (52:26)
Yeah, it’s been great to have you aboard and I’m thrilled. Thank you so much. problem, thank you.