I’ve long thought that professional wrestling and super-hero comics have a lot in common, colorful characters, evil villains, pointless fighting and an industry that is sometimes more interesting than the output. “Ringside” takes some of those characters out of the ring to great effect. Also I look at some things I have drifting away from. A look “Into the Boxes” pulls out the classic science fiction anthology “Alien Worlds,” which boasted some of my favorite covers of all time.
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Episode X9 – to Infinity….
After a week of travel, Chad’s Attic is back with a focus on Marvel’s “Infinity Gauntlet,” new and old. Also talking about “Ms Marvel” and looking forward to new cases of Vertigo.
For Scott Baker:
Ms Marvel 16-18, From Under Mountains 1, Infinity Gaulntlet (2015) 3&4, Infinity Gauntlet (1991) 1-5
Episode X7 – the Granitecon Variant
Granitecon yesterday in Manchester, New Hampshire was a fun day. The drive was pretty easy, even though I have never been to Manchester. The venue was nice. There were nice places to eat downtown. All in all I had a pretty good day. I also bought a stack of comics, which I talked about in this week’s video.
This is the first two-camera Chad’s Attic shoot, even though camera two is an iPod.
Episode X6 – If at first you don’t succeed
This week in Chad’s Attic; A mini haul, DC’s “Prez” a sign of good things to come?, and “Wayward,” urban fantasy meets manga. Also we go into the boxes…err. bookshelves for a couple of choice bits from Neil Gaiman.
I did this one three times. I usually do them twice, once just to run through and another for production. This time I got downstairs to edit and thought my audio was messed up. I went back up and did it again, and then I came back down and found out it was my headphones, not my audio and the second one was fine. I used the second one.
Here is a link to the Bleeding Cool News story on, “Batgirling.”
If you want a blank copy of the Excel file of my twelve-cent Marvel Bingo card, Click here.
After my big article in the Sunday newspaper.
In case you missed it, last Sunday an article I wrote about my comic book collection and my YouTube show appeared in the Sunday newspaper. I explained how it came about in a prior post, but the short version is I work at the newspaper. I linked to the web version in that post. If you want to see what it looked like in the newspaper click here for a pdf. The pictures were taken right after I did Episode X3
On the web article, they embedded first Episode X3, which I didn’t think was the best one ever, both because of how hot it was, and also because of the noisy microphone. Later on Sunday, I uploaded a new episode, X4, which I thought was better and I had completed just that day. So between the debut of X4, and the article in the paper, plus the upload of a new 40 second-ish channel promo, made out of pieces of X4, I had 120 views last Sunday. The highest I’ve ever had in a single day prior to that was 57.
I picked up seven YouTube subscribers in the three days Sunday-Tuesday. At least some of them came from the newspaper article.
I posted the link to my Facebook page and got 50 likes.
The newspaper article listed the URL to this page (chadsattic.com), which got 55 pageviews on Sunday, and 19 more on Monday, when the paper posted on Facebook and linked to the web version of the article. That was up from the almost no pageviews this site gets regularly. My old site, Southwestharbor.com gets way more (30-50 a day) and I barely ever touch it.
I had a lot of people tell me how they enjoyed the article, for which I thank them. I had a couple of people where I do business often say things like, “I didn’t know you collected comics!” and then tell me about their own comic book experiences.
All in all, it was a pretty positive experience, and I know everyone will forget about it in a month, so that’s cool too.
Superman 1966. George Reeves had nothing on this five-year-old
This is me in my Superman suit around 1967. Maybe 66. along the bottom hem of the shirt it had imprinted in little yellow letters something like “Warning! This suit can not make you fly. Only the real Superman can fly”
Hey this Sunday it’s possible my face might be in the local newspaper. I’m just grateful it’s not a mugshot. I’ll post a link if it happens.
Today’s “Buy” pile.
Today’s “Buy” pile.
Rebels #4
Black Science #16
Batman #42
Providence #2
Starfire #2
Action #42
Green Lantern #42
Archie #1
FOUR DC books! I don’t think that has happened in a week since 2012. I might start being interested in Marvel again after this Secret Wars thing is over.
Did I miss anything awesome?
So that happened…
Because half of my show this week was all about how awesome Walt Simonson is, I posted my video link to the Water Simonson Appreciation Group on Facebook. …and Walt himself liked it. Now he’s even awesomer than awesome.
Why? What is this about?
One question I get asked is, “Why are you doing this? What is it for?” I’ve explained this to a few people, and now I’ll explain it to you. I’m a media professional. I have been for my entire professional career. Usually, I operate behind the scenes, but sometimes I’ve been on stage, metaphorically. I love working with video. Mostly I like editing, but shooting is fun too. Over the years I’ve invested in some equipment, which I don’t use all that often.
At the same time, I’ve always been fascinated by the Internet. I’ve been fascinated by the way anybody can operate something like a television station, or a radio program, or a newspaper or magazine, with very little investment. I’ve always wanted to demonstrate what you can do with a limited budget, but a fair amount of expertise. I’m also someone who learns by doing. I want to get better at video production. I want to become a better video presenter despite the fact that I’m pretty sure I don’t have a burgeoning on-camera career in television. For me, the best way to improve, is to practice. One key goal of the show is to improve my production and presentation skills.
I’ve always been a huge fan of audio podcasts, but it’s hard to pull off a podcast by yourself. In seeking podcasts over the years, I’ve always been drawn to the ones that feature people who are passionate about their subject, even though I may not know that much about it. When it came time to come up with a topic for my own regularly scheduled Internet media, picking a topic was easy.
What was hard was opening up about my passion for comic books and graphic storytelling. When I started buying comic books regularly, they weren’t what they are now in popular culture or society. There was a definite stigma attached to being a grown man who read comic books. Often, particularly in professional environments, I would try to hide my hobby, at least until I came to trust coworkers.
Going on the Internet and promoting myself in the video is a huge trip outside my comfort zone, but I realize if I want to want to get better at presenting on video and using social media to find an audience, I just have to bite the bullet and do it.
I also realize that for me, at this time, there might eventually be some opportunity in being someone who knows about comic books and graphic storytelling, and can talk about it coherently in the media.
Peoples’ response to the first handful of episodes of my silly little Internet video thing has been amazing. I received such support from my friends and coworkers and just people who watch the show that I’m starting to become much more comfortable with doing it. People with more expertise in this area than me have been extremely generous with their ideas and suggestions. Many have been integrated into the show and helped to contribute to my goal of better quality every single week.
My secondary goal now is growing my audience to include a smaller proportion of my friends and family and a larger proportion of people actually interested in my topic.
So getting better – and finding a new audience. That is why I’m doing this.
Welcome to Chad’s Attic
Thanks for stopping by. I’m building this web site as a companion to my video series, “Live from Chad’s Attic.” I hope you’ll visit You Tube and watch my show.