Contacting Editors/Publishers

Hey,
I'm a published fiction writer and filmmaker and recently went to San Diego's Comic-Con to approach editors about an original graphic novel property I've created.

I had a sample packet with a synopsis, 7 pages of sample artwork, script pages, etc. And I've got a friend in the business who was kind enough to introduce me to some editors. I left sample packets with about a dozen of them.

The guys who illustrated for me were great, but ultimately, I'm not sure their artwork was up to par and at the very least I don't think it fit with what I was going for. So I've enlisted a new illustrator (he's excellent) to redo the mockup pages.

My question: I'd like to follow up with the editors I met in San Diego, but I don't know whether to do that immediately (and tell them I've got someone new working on the art) or to wait until the new artwork is finished and resubmit the sample packet.

Any advice?

Thanks,
-Adam

Thanks in advance.

It was at a convention, so rather than including SASEs, I spoke to various editors and most asked me to contact them after about two weeks or so...

Thanks a lot, Axler. I appreciate the advice.

johnzakour said:

You should have the business cards from all the editors you talked to. Just drop them a quick "just checking in" email.

I imagine most editors are still calming down from comic con and then wizard world.

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Yeah, I have all the business cards and was actually going to make some phone calls today. Do you think emails are better?

I had good personal interactions with a few big ones (Dark Horse, Top Shelf, etc.) and I thought it might be more personal to call (but would vastly prefer to email so I could craft my response a bit better).

Most of the editors I spoke to seemed to want a good few weeks of lag time before people got back in touch, so I'm not too worried about that. Comic-Con was so intense that I'd bet most editors needed a week or two just to recuperate.

wordmonkey said:

Also, if and when you do send new stuff, I would always include art unless you have been invited to submit to them regardless. It's the pretty pictures that sell the book.

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The new stuff will definitely include art (that's my whole reason for resubmitting), but your mentioning the pretty pictures actually brings up another question. I might post on another thread, but...

My experience is in fiction writing (and filmmaking) so I've had to seriously adapt my writing style for comics. More exposition. Less time to digress. Especially in a short mock-up, which i kinda see as a glorified "trailer" for what would be a much larger book, I've tried to make it as visual as possible and only include limited text. I figure most editors will want to see the art and the story, but I didn't want them to get bogged down in lots of dialogue and narration...

I'm proud of the script I wrote for this mockup, and consider it to be a great example of my ability to write for this medium. But I'm wondering how closely editors might look at the text. Should I beef it up and make it more literary? Will they assume that the panel compositions and the overall layout was based on my script or will they assume it was the illustrator's ideas?

Mainly, I just want the book to sell. I don't care about differentiating my work from the illustrators, and am enjoying the collaborative process much more than I did during my filmmaking days. But I just want to make sure the "writing" gets its due as well as the artwork.

Does this make any sense?

-Adam

Thanks a lot for the help. I'm gonna send some emails right now. Wish me luck...