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Hi my friends,
Now that I've ...
1) ...I've received the books from the printer (there was a 3-4 week delay, due to binding issues)...
2) ...returned from out-of-state conventions, and...
3) ...recovered from overseas work trips (to Singapore and Thailand)...
...we are finally able to start shipping out orders!
We had a handful of backers come out to NYCC and pick up their orders directly from me at the show. You rock, guys! I hope you enjoy the books!
Digital versions of the books are being e-mailed this week, and this weekend my family and I are carving pumpkins and stuffing envelopes.
Apologies again for the unexpected delay in receiving the books from the printer, and I appreciate your patience and continued support.
BOOKS ARE COMING!
The work trip was a fun (but always exhausting) trip on a 30+ hour flight to the other side of the world, where the time difference is 14 hours in the future. I had a week filled with day-job related meetings with my teams, including a day trip to Bangkok, Thailand to meet with the team there in person.
I love visiting that part of the world, but of course am disappointed I wasn't home to prep for shipping the books. However, I will say my wife - such a trooper - was balancing our baby girl AND prepping the backerkit orders into the shipping system. I owe her some ice cream, seriously. I can't appreciate her support enough.
NYCC continues to be the largest comic convention in the USA, and I was volunteering at the Reading with Pictures booth. It was a crazy weekend filled with a lot of people, places, selling, and other great nouns and verbs.
Four days really takes it out of you, and not being home for this made it challenging to prep for the order fulfillment. I will say, though, the books had only just arrived right before leaving for the con - so there was only so much we would have been able to do anyway.
More photos and updates are available on my blog, if you're at all interested.
More updates soon, as we take photos of the fulfillment party this weekend!
On Sept 29, I started ripping into boxes of books and prepping for the launch party at Aw Yeah Comics in Skokie, IL (taking place the next day from 12-2pm). After several hours of ripping into packaging, cutting through tape, and blu-ray special features keeping me company in the background, I finally had the books ready. And also, some raw fingers... :P
Set up was quick, and we had a nice table in front so the kids could see us work and also so they could get drawing. Plus, we did a workshop around 12:30pm, where the kids got to help us design some alien characters of our own.
Never a slacker, Gabe got straight to work on signing and sketching in books for the Kickstarter, and for the launch party. We had hundreds to sign, and he breezed through them with finesse.
Art Baltazar, owner of Aw Yeah Comics Skokie, and all around awesome and amazing guy, came in to support the launch party and hang out with the kids. He drew some of his characters (Action Cat, Adventure Bug, Tiny Titans, etc) and also took a stab at drawing our character - Albert the Alien!
Original Art Baltazar drawing of Albert the Alien? Yeah, this is getting framed and put on my wall. :P
Art is such a nice guy, he even drew portraits of Gabe and I while we gave our workshop. We designed about 4-7 different aliens in the 30 minute workshop, and then let the kids go draw their own aliens.
One of our contributors to the book, Jacob Halton, also showed up to sign some copies and hang out. A good time was had by all!
Some folks traveled all the way down from Wisconsin (and some up from Indiana). These kids were so excited for the launch party, and once they saw paper and crayons they started drawing tons of pictures of Albert.
Here's a shot of Albert hanging out with some of his space buddies - Galactus and Darth Vader!
Gabe's art jam with some kids produced some very creative creatures, like .EGG, .ZIP, .RAR - and their enemy, Uncompressed Data! The kids immediately started coming up with stories and adventures for this new group of heroes!
After hours in the store, we finished signing all the books for the Kickstarter orders. Boxing them back up, it felt like we had accomplished so much (and yet, we still need to do the most timely portion: order fulfillment!)
Thank you so much to Aw Yeah Comics for hosting this incredible event, to Art and Mike for being gracious hosts, to the amazing and incredible fans that came and participated in our workshop and checked out the book - some for the very first time - and to you, our Kickstarter backers, for your support on this project.
We'll be making announcements about order fulfillment soon. Books coming at your in October (after NYCC, and my work trip to Singapore)!
Hey gang, great news!
We got the expedited shipment of volume 3 from the printer over the weekend, and so we have books for the Launch Party and for order fulfillment in early October.
I should have taken photos of the pile of books that are now in my basement, BUT I would rather share the photos from the launch party after we have that this week, Saturday, September 30, at Aw Yeah Comics in Skokie, IL.
If you want to stop by and get your orders early, I will have the pins and t-shirts there for pick up. Otherwise, we'll ship out all the orders in early October.
I just sent out the final survey request from BackerKit, so you can confirm where we should send your order. If you have not done so already, PLEASE BE SURE TO FILL IN THE SURVEY BY SEPT 30 or else your order will be delayed.
Thanks again so much for the support, guys, and I can't wait to share this incredible book with you!
Hi there,
I wanted to give everyone an update on the printing for the Albert the Alien volume 3 books. I have been informed by the printer there is a slight delay in the binding process (due to higher than expected humidity in the region they do the binding, the glue is taking longer than expected to dry).
The printer has informed me they will expedite some copies for the Launch Party on September 30 (so if you want to get your copy early, please definitely show up to AW YEAH COMICS in SKOKIE, IL, from 12-2pm).
I intend to use any leftover copies for order fulfillment until the full order can be shipped. I am hopeful it should only delay us a few weeks, in which case the bulk of the orders will go out in October instead of September.
I apologize for this delay in shipping the books out, and will keep you guys posted on progress as I hear back from the printer.
Thank you so much for your patience and understanding in this small delay, and of course for your support of this project.