NYCC countdown update

Well, I had planned on posting daily in the leadup to the New York Comic Con, but that did not happen.

Here is a summation update:

First, a new toy arrived today, the first of many pieces that need to fit together for Suckpax 3.

Our cutting die for puzzle pieces arrived, and it will create individual pieces  that will just fit into wax packs.  I had a bright idea, that it will work on Album covers, and be a neat part of “My Dad’s Record Collection” packs.

Suckpax 3 components:

– wrappers should arrive by Friday.  Delayed at printer

– Saw the proofs for the cards, and had some corrections needed.  Will see revised proofs Wednesday morning.

– Cards scheduled for printing on Thursday, will be ready for me to pick up Friday.

– Lenticular printed yesterday, should have by Friday

– A cool specialty card has arrived, and  is ready for a special ink application

– Stickers are being printed this week, due Friday

– Die for stickers has been ordered, and should be here by Friday

Wow, Friday is a big day.

Email to Artists, inviting them to be guests at the Booth has been sent.

Still to start:

Signage for the booth

Table cloths (higher tables will need new ones)

Countdown to NYCC, D-27, eye on calendar

Getting a little stressed, many things need to happen.

Today’s items accomplished:

– Sent out design for custom die-cut fixture that we will need for Lenticular puzzle

– Spoke with our Lenticular printer, they will be able to produce finished blanks in time, and at a reasonable cost.  Will need artwork to them Monday/Tuesday next week, though.

– Spoke with Card printer, found out that all the card backs will need to be massaged.  Can do over weekend.  They are ordering paper today (I gave them ample heads up, they should have ordered already, but should be ok)

– Ordered Aromatics for special purpose

– Finalized front for NYCC special promo card.  Now got to design the back.

– Scheduled when The Sucklord will visit us to guide final production

Did not get to yet:

– Email to artists

countdown to NYCC, D-28

I have pushed off sending card artwork to the printer until Sunday night.  I have some late entries for cards, and better to resolve them before sending.

Above is a map of the 110 cards for the print run.  On the right side is a “gutter” between the last two vertical rows.  This allows us to have different background colors that “bleed”.  Cutting is imprecise, so for cards that are all the same edge color, they can be “butt” cut, since both sides of the cut will have the same color.  But to have black bleed cards, there is a gap from nearby Magenta bleed cards, so that there will be two different cuts, separated by 0.25″.  If the cut is slight off, you will not get a sliver of black or magenta on the wrong card.

For this run, we will have 99 Magenta bleed slots, 5 black bleed, 5 white bleed, and one peculiar one which will have a black border on one side, and white on the opposite.  I could just leave that spot blank, but I have an idea for a NYCC promo card that could use an odd border.

At this moment, I have 3 open slots.

Ideas for cards to go in them:

– Tractor cards (from my vintage farm tractor series)  I have 5 from the set, which I have printed as ride-alongs on the Suckpax 2 sheet.

– My Dad’s Record Collection info card.  I could print a card to include in each pack, which explains what the series is about.

– SideKick internal series.  I have 4 of this series printed already, could add another one or two.

Suckpax 3, wrapper artwork to printer

Got one item off of the To-Do list, the artwork for the wrappers is now dispatched to our printer.  Should come back to us in two weeks, and then we apply the wax layer.

We are going to print enough for 300 boxes of Suckpax.  Series 1 and 2 each had 200 boxes in their build, but now the wind is at our backs, and there will be higher interest due to The Sucklord appearing on Bravo TV’s “Work of Art”, which will air the first episode the night before the New York Comic Con.