Post by The Ultimate Nullifier on Apr 17, 2014 16:22:19 GMT -6
www.oregonlive.com/beaverton/index.ssf/2014/04/qa_comic_book_publisher_bluewa.html
As a child, Darren Davis was a reluctant reader. He couldn’t get into anything – easy readers, choose-your-own-adventure – nothing helped ease the stress that came with the new skill. Then, when he was about 6 years old, his dad threw a comic book in front of him, and Davis was hooked.
Now 45, Davis has carried that love of comics into adulthood. After working in Los Angeles for E! Entertainment and DC Comics, as well as an independent representative for top comic book artists, Davis launched his own comic publishing company, Bluewater Productions, in Bellingham, Wash.
As the company grew, Davis moved his business Vancouver, and then to Beaverton in December of 2013 to be closer to his father in Newberg.
The Beaverton Leader recently sat down with Davis to talk about his love of suburban life, shifts in the comic book industry and a possible comic book on Nike CEO Mark Parker. Answers have been edited for clarity and brevity.
Many of Bluewater Productions' comic books draw on real-life celebrities like Sheryl Sandberg and William Shatner.
Q: Tell me about your time in the comic book industry in Los Angeles.
A: It really became kind of weird because I was representing the top people in the comic book industry when they were these huge celebrities. And so I became sort of “famous” for representing the top people in my industry. This was weird, because three years before I was getting their autographs in lines because I’m still a fan at heart.
After I left DC Comics and started representing these artists, I was watching people create their own properties, and I thought, I could try that myself. So I launched my first comic book, “10th Muse,” and it launched at the sixth highest selling comic book.
It beat Spiderman, Batman, all those types of things, because I’ve learned, working with these artists, how to put together a top-notch project, and I’ve also learned how to work with celebrities like Rena Mero; she was Sable from the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment). We got the international celebrity attention because of that.
Q: When did you launch that comic book?
A: In 2001. I’m old!
Q: What brought you to Vancouver?
A: I just took a hiatus on comic books for about two years. I just got so burnt out and that was when the Internet was starting, and people were kind of horrible and mean. And people can say anything they want. At that point I didn’t really have the thicker skin that I have now, so I took everything so personally. And it kind of – it made me just quit.
So I stopped doing it for a couple years and then I got back into it, and I was publishing through other companies, so I published through a company called Image Comics, which was really one of the top publishers. I published through Alias Enterprises, which decided to go Christian, so I was trying to figure out what I was going to do and if I was going to publish through anyone else. Then my mom was actually the one who came up with the idea of self-publishing. And so in 2006, I started my own publishing company.
And at that time I launched with Ray Harryhausen – he did “Clash of the Titans,” “Sinbad,” “Jason and the Argonauts,” all those films – and we launched with “Victoria’s Secret Service.” I know, kind of a fun little play on words there. So we launched that, and they became big.
In 2007, I just kept launching and launching and launching new titles, and I just kept growing and growing, and that’s when I had to move out of Bellingham to Vancouver.
Q: Why did you have to move?
A: Because Bellingham is so far from an airport. It’s two and a half hours away from Sea-Tac. And I wanted to be closer to my dad.
Q: Why did you move to Beaverton? Why not Portland?
A: Because I like suburbia. I love suburbia. I have two dogs, a cat, I have three chickens. I do – they’re actually really cute. So I do like the suburban lifestyle. I like being close to community. I lived in Los Angeles for such a long time, and it doesn’t give you that sense of community. I wanted community, and Beaverton is that.
Q: So what exactly do you do from day to day?
A: Stress out all the time – 24 hours a day.
Q: Do you draw or storyboard?
A: I don’t draw. I write, I create. I deal with the day-to-day struggles of a business. I deal with the celebrities that we work with.
Q: That sounds like fun.
A: Sometimes. And I am a little bit of a control freak, so 90 percent of everything that comes out of Bluewater is something that I created or comes from my head. I really do have a sixth sense of what’s going to be hot, rather than what’s hot now. And I think that comes from my training at E! Entertainment television – I was trained by the right people.
And in 2008, we kind of shifted a little bit, because we were doing fiction, and the comic book world has been shifting lately too. Back in the '90s, comics were selling millions of copies, and now the top-selling comic book is maybe selling about 100,000.
Q: Because comics are available online?
A: It’s not even because of the Internet. Kids aren’t reading anymore. Kids are playing video games; there aren’t any new comic book readers. The comic book industry sort of burnt itself out by in the late '90s doing too many covers. From millions to 100,000 is a huge drop-off.
One of the things we started doing – we thought outside the box and we saw a comic book done of Barack Obama and John McCain during the 2008 elections, and my partner joked and said, “Why don’t we do Hillary?” And I thought, oh my God, that’s a brilliant idea.
So I thought, let’s do this, but let’s do it differently. Let’s not do it like everyone else, with a boring biography. We did it with a female empowerment angle. We released Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin at the same time, and whether you like Sarah Palin or hate Hillary Clinton, you have to respect both of them for where they came from and who they are.
The best thing about the Female Force, which is the series, is I have signed copies of my comic book from Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin and Barbara Walters and Ellen DeGeneres. It’s about women who are making a difference in society. So whether it’s Oprah or (France's first lady and singer) Carla Bruni, it’s always about female empowerment. I’ve had really strong female role models in my life, so this is a way to give back.
Q: Does Bluewater Productions publish anything besides comic books?
A: We do graphic novels, and young adult novels, too. And audiobooks now. We do a lot – try juggling them.
Q: So could a person go to Powell’s Books in Beaverton and find your books?
A: Yeah, Powell’s has them, the library has them. The library really is a good resource.
Q: What’s a recent comic that you’re excited about?
A: We just released a Kurt Cobain comic book as part of our tribute line. And we just got in Time Magazine, Rolling Stone, Billboard Magazine.
We’re doing Freddie Mercury next week. We release about five titles a week.
Q: Do you have any other interesting projects in the works?
A: I’m probably going to do a comic book on Nike CEO (Mark Parker). We do business people, so we’ve done Jack Welch from General Electric, we’ve done (Starbucks CEO) Howard Schultz, we’ve done tech people like the guys who created Google.
I’ve reached out to Nike already, because I do like to get the people on board to do it, and if I can’t, we can still do unauthorized biographies, we just can’t use the swoosh.
-- Anna Marum
As a child, Darren Davis was a reluctant reader. He couldn’t get into anything – easy readers, choose-your-own-adventure – nothing helped ease the stress that came with the new skill. Then, when he was about 6 years old, his dad threw a comic book in front of him, and Davis was hooked.
Now 45, Davis has carried that love of comics into adulthood. After working in Los Angeles for E! Entertainment and DC Comics, as well as an independent representative for top comic book artists, Davis launched his own comic publishing company, Bluewater Productions, in Bellingham, Wash.
As the company grew, Davis moved his business Vancouver, and then to Beaverton in December of 2013 to be closer to his father in Newberg.
The Beaverton Leader recently sat down with Davis to talk about his love of suburban life, shifts in the comic book industry and a possible comic book on Nike CEO Mark Parker. Answers have been edited for clarity and brevity.
Many of Bluewater Productions' comic books draw on real-life celebrities like Sheryl Sandberg and William Shatner.
Q: Tell me about your time in the comic book industry in Los Angeles.
A: It really became kind of weird because I was representing the top people in the comic book industry when they were these huge celebrities. And so I became sort of “famous” for representing the top people in my industry. This was weird, because three years before I was getting their autographs in lines because I’m still a fan at heart.
After I left DC Comics and started representing these artists, I was watching people create their own properties, and I thought, I could try that myself. So I launched my first comic book, “10th Muse,” and it launched at the sixth highest selling comic book.
It beat Spiderman, Batman, all those types of things, because I’ve learned, working with these artists, how to put together a top-notch project, and I’ve also learned how to work with celebrities like Rena Mero; she was Sable from the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment). We got the international celebrity attention because of that.
Q: When did you launch that comic book?
A: In 2001. I’m old!
Q: What brought you to Vancouver?
A: I just took a hiatus on comic books for about two years. I just got so burnt out and that was when the Internet was starting, and people were kind of horrible and mean. And people can say anything they want. At that point I didn’t really have the thicker skin that I have now, so I took everything so personally. And it kind of – it made me just quit.
So I stopped doing it for a couple years and then I got back into it, and I was publishing through other companies, so I published through a company called Image Comics, which was really one of the top publishers. I published through Alias Enterprises, which decided to go Christian, so I was trying to figure out what I was going to do and if I was going to publish through anyone else. Then my mom was actually the one who came up with the idea of self-publishing. And so in 2006, I started my own publishing company.
And at that time I launched with Ray Harryhausen – he did “Clash of the Titans,” “Sinbad,” “Jason and the Argonauts,” all those films – and we launched with “Victoria’s Secret Service.” I know, kind of a fun little play on words there. So we launched that, and they became big.
In 2007, I just kept launching and launching and launching new titles, and I just kept growing and growing, and that’s when I had to move out of Bellingham to Vancouver.
Q: Why did you have to move?
A: Because Bellingham is so far from an airport. It’s two and a half hours away from Sea-Tac. And I wanted to be closer to my dad.
Q: Why did you move to Beaverton? Why not Portland?
A: Because I like suburbia. I love suburbia. I have two dogs, a cat, I have three chickens. I do – they’re actually really cute. So I do like the suburban lifestyle. I like being close to community. I lived in Los Angeles for such a long time, and it doesn’t give you that sense of community. I wanted community, and Beaverton is that.
Q: So what exactly do you do from day to day?
A: Stress out all the time – 24 hours a day.
Q: Do you draw or storyboard?
A: I don’t draw. I write, I create. I deal with the day-to-day struggles of a business. I deal with the celebrities that we work with.
Q: That sounds like fun.
A: Sometimes. And I am a little bit of a control freak, so 90 percent of everything that comes out of Bluewater is something that I created or comes from my head. I really do have a sixth sense of what’s going to be hot, rather than what’s hot now. And I think that comes from my training at E! Entertainment television – I was trained by the right people.
And in 2008, we kind of shifted a little bit, because we were doing fiction, and the comic book world has been shifting lately too. Back in the '90s, comics were selling millions of copies, and now the top-selling comic book is maybe selling about 100,000.
Q: Because comics are available online?
A: It’s not even because of the Internet. Kids aren’t reading anymore. Kids are playing video games; there aren’t any new comic book readers. The comic book industry sort of burnt itself out by in the late '90s doing too many covers. From millions to 100,000 is a huge drop-off.
One of the things we started doing – we thought outside the box and we saw a comic book done of Barack Obama and John McCain during the 2008 elections, and my partner joked and said, “Why don’t we do Hillary?” And I thought, oh my God, that’s a brilliant idea.
So I thought, let’s do this, but let’s do it differently. Let’s not do it like everyone else, with a boring biography. We did it with a female empowerment angle. We released Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin at the same time, and whether you like Sarah Palin or hate Hillary Clinton, you have to respect both of them for where they came from and who they are.
The best thing about the Female Force, which is the series, is I have signed copies of my comic book from Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin and Barbara Walters and Ellen DeGeneres. It’s about women who are making a difference in society. So whether it’s Oprah or (France's first lady and singer) Carla Bruni, it’s always about female empowerment. I’ve had really strong female role models in my life, so this is a way to give back.
Q: Does Bluewater Productions publish anything besides comic books?
A: We do graphic novels, and young adult novels, too. And audiobooks now. We do a lot – try juggling them.
Q: So could a person go to Powell’s Books in Beaverton and find your books?
A: Yeah, Powell’s has them, the library has them. The library really is a good resource.
Q: What’s a recent comic that you’re excited about?
A: We just released a Kurt Cobain comic book as part of our tribute line. And we just got in Time Magazine, Rolling Stone, Billboard Magazine.
We’re doing Freddie Mercury next week. We release about five titles a week.
Q: Do you have any other interesting projects in the works?
A: I’m probably going to do a comic book on Nike CEO (Mark Parker). We do business people, so we’ve done Jack Welch from General Electric, we’ve done (Starbucks CEO) Howard Schultz, we’ve done tech people like the guys who created Google.
I’ve reached out to Nike already, because I do like to get the people on board to do it, and if I can’t, we can still do unauthorized biographies, we just can’t use the swoosh.
-- Anna Marum