Name:
Russell Nohelty
Nom De Plume:
NDP’s are counter-intuitive to
building a strong brand.
Creative Position:
Publisher and Writer
Contact Info:
Russell@wannabepress.com
FAVORITE COMIC BOOK:
Growing up:
Spider-Man
and now:
Y: The Last Man
The 1 Superpower you want:
Super intelligence without any of the deformities that come with it.
Location:
Los Angeles
Website(s):
www.wannabepress.com, www.russellnohelty.com, www.thebusinessofart.us
Your Credits:
Ichabod Jones: Monster Hunter, Katrina Hates the Dead, Gherkin Boy, My Father Didn’t Kill Himself, Spaceship Broken, Needs Repairs, et al.
________________________________________

The7Deadly   Questions

________________________________________
What is your greatest accomplishment ?
Even after failing multiple companies, I was able to soldier on and build Wannabe Press into a company with brand recognition and respect in the industry. I think most people would have given up in that situation but I don’t have that in me.
________________________________________
What award would you want to win?
Fuck awards. I just want my fans to dig what we do.

---

Do you think women have reached the level of equality in comic books?

To bastardize a famous Joss Weadon quote, the fact that you have to ask me that question means no. Look, a female Thor or Iron Man shouldn’t be controversial. Having Batgirl lead a book shouldn’t be crazy. Minor male characters have been leading books for decades. There have been other males taking over the reins of Captain America, Iron Man, and other characters since the dawn of comics. Yet it’s only news when a female takes the mantle. That’s bullshit, man. If we were truly equal none of that would ever happen.

That’s not even getting into how we talk about these characters. We shouldn’t have to describe women heroes as “Strong, female characters”. We never define our male characters as strong male characters, that is just assumed. And yet here we are, talking about a female Thor, railing against a female led Ghostbusters movie, and applauding when a female led book does well as if everything in the entire history of the female led movies rests on the fact that one property does well, as if one failure or success speaks for half of the population.

Never have we seen a bomb led my white males as a knock against a gender or race, yet we still see any misstep by females as a step backwards for an entire gender. Never do people think “Oh, that was a shitty script,” or “that director sucked.” No. It’s always “Well, I guess females can’t lead a movie,” or “That’s why you don’t put female leads in comic books”. That is complete and utter horseshit that wouldn’t happen if we were equal.

________________________________________
What is the Best, on going comic right now that is an Indy title, and why?
I want to pick something nobody’s ever heard of, but I can’t. I love BKV too much and Saga is his best work to date. I know earlier I talked about Y: The Last Man and that’s because it rekindled my love for comics, but everything about Saga is amazing. Fiona Staples is superb in every panel for one reason why I love it. I admire when an artist gives their all even in the smallest panels. Then the story is full of gore, blood, ridiculousness, and humor. It has everything.
________________________________________
What is 1 of the worst mistake a Indie comic’s creative teams can make ?

Not understanding that there is long term time horizon when it comes to making money in comics. Most people complain that they can’t make money in comics. That mentality is utterly and patently ridiculous. There are two multi-billion dollar companies in the space which means there is money to be made here.

The issue is that people don’t look at a long enough time horizon in order to recoup their investment. In the short term, yes, there is a sunk cost in comics initially like in any business. If you buy a McDonald’s franchise you will spend upwards of one million dollars in set up costs alone. If business owners looked at that with only a short term time horizon in mind they would never buy a franchise.

However, business owners don’t think like that. They think that a one-million-dollar investment could recoup $10 million dollars or more in the long term, so their short term loss will reap massive returns.

It’s the same way in comics. You can’t make money up front on comics because you have to make the comic. You have to hire an artist and print books and pay for marketing material. However, once that book is done you can sell it forever. With every dollar your initial investment is amortized more favorably and your investment becomes more profitable.

If you pay $10,000 for art and sell 100 books, yes that is a bad investment because that art cost $100 per book. But if you sell 1,000 books a year for the next ten years, then your art costs $1/book over 10,000 books. That investment makes a lot more sense on a longer time horizon.

However, most people don’t think like that. They don’t think about selling the book forever. They think about the initial investment. And that leads creators to hire crappy artists, write crappy scripts, and try to sell a book that isn’t as good as everything else on the market including books from Marvel and DC. They end up with an unsellable book and then they complain they can’t make money.

That’s why my philosophy has always been make it once, sell it forever.

________________________________________
Do you think Fan art at cons is a good or bad thing?

Fan art does a disservice to artists because it doesn’t build long term loyalty to their brand among customers. When somebody buys your Harley Quinn print, they don’t care about you. They care about the cool Harley print. The minute they see a new Harley print they will forget all about you and move on.

I see it all the time when amazing artists do fan art. People will come to them and ask if they have a new Harley Quinn print, disregarding everything else on the table. When they don’t find what they want, they move on without buying anything new. It’s heartbreaking.

If you want to build a long standing career, you need original art because original art builds loyalty to you as an artist and creator. When somebody buys your originals, even though less people will buy them, they have an affinity to you as the artist, not to a licensed piece of content. Those people will then be willing to buy anything else you do.

I really don’t care if you make your fan art though, because the people who buy your prints aren’t going to buy from me anyway. However, you are doing a disservice to yourself so I will say it’s a bad thing.

________________________________________
What is a mistake you made in your early years that our readers can learn form ?
I didn’t understand how to treat my art like a business and I definitely didn’t understand how to sell my products. That meant I failed four businesses by the time I was 30. That’s a lot of failure.

It became my mission to learn everything I could to make my next company succeed. I learned sales. I learned how to market. I learned about cash flow and product creation. I learned how businesses work and brought all that back to Wannabe Press. That knowledge has made all the difference. That’s what I try to teach people through my podcast, The Business of Art. The earlier you take yourself seriously as a business, the better you will do as an artist.
________________________________________
Well done Russell Nohelty you not only survived The 7 Deadly Questions but  educated them at the same time. So take some time and tell us what is on your creative mind:
Right now I’m working on expanding Wannabe Press through new novels and comic books. We are working on a new graphic novel called Pixie Dust with my good friend Nicolas Touris and I’m editing my fifth novel. I’m also working on growing my podcast The Business of Art to get as massive a reach as possible. We are at cons every weekend. If you want to see our schedule, click here to be directed to our upcoming shows link.
You can find me @russellnohelty on Instagram and Twitter. Wannabe Press is also online @wannabepress on Instagram and Twitter too, but I recommend you follow me because I’m much more active than the company.

Our stuff is awesome, weird, fun, and beautiful. We put everything we have into our books. I would put our books up against any book from company any day of the week, including Marvel and DC, and trust they would win at least 85% of the time. That’s how much care we put into making something great for you. On top of that, we also give back to the community. We have our podcast, and our blog, and we speak at conventions across the country in order to prop up the next generation of creators.

 Find Russell Nohelty at Up coming      Cons by Clicking here