Emery: How did you get involved with publishing Chris Gooch's comics?
Brendan Halyday: First let me say, this guy is unbelievably talented.
I remember seeing his work probably three years ago at a Melbourne Comic Creators meet and thinking he was pretty advanced for his age (he was 18 or 19 at the time). I ended up helping him with the design, production and print management of his 1792 graphic novel. When i came to the point where i wanted to expand my own publishing line, Chris was at the top of my list. He showed me three stories he was sitting on, we reworked two of them and they became the two stories in 51% issue one.
After releasing a second issue we decided to skip straight to a graphic novel collection. With 80 pages of brand new material, another 20 completely redrawn and the last 60 pages tweaked, plus chris has done an ink wash for the entire book, its like a whole new work.
Emery: In conversation you've mentioning being involved in an editorial capacity on Chris's comics and also the need for more editing in local comics in general. Have you seen any progress in this area?
Halyday: When we started working together, I edited Chris a lot more. Lately, he's improved so much, it's happened less. Chris is really good at taking constructive criticism and building it into a work. He has a really good instinct for what does and doesn't work. Everyone can benefit from an editor, but Chris's need for one has diminished in the time i have been working with him. He is more polished and less raw now than two years ago.
Generally I believe the local comics scene would benefit from a more editing. Often books look good and read poorly or vice versa. And lets face it, few, if any, creators can look at their own work with any real objectively. Usually the creator has limitations they can't seem to see, let alone get past. That's where an editor helps, its not just about fixing a work its about developing an author and their skill set.
I haven't seen an increase in local comics being edited well though. The percentage seems the same as 2 years ago. Its hindered because Australian comics haven't a hope of the kind of profitability needed to pay creator(s) even minimum wage – let alone pay an editor on top of that. There isn't the amount of demand, nor the supply chain necessary to create the substantial volume of orders which then result in better economies of scale in production that increase profitability to a level where we have sustainable books with editors.
And while many comic creators work for love, (or are pure hobbyists) very few editors will do the same thing. Thus, supply of good editors is sorely limited. There are a handful of good editors in the scene, typically, they all have more work than they can cope with, and there are not enough of them to meet the need.
