Jess Cate

Sooooo. Page 26 is finally here. Only a little bit late. ????

Getting all our ducks in a row has taken a lot longer than we would have liked and I was both super busy and getting pretty burned out towards the end of the year. I very much needed a break, and the Christmas/New Year holidays could not have come at a better time.

We’re not quite ready to commit to a regular update schedule as yet, but we should have that figured out in the next month or so and we’ll let you know asap. We thank you so much for your patience with us as we shift organisational tack on this epic journal of ours. To say the last 4 years we’ve been working on Heart of Millyera has been a learning experience would be an understandment. But Jess and I can finally see things coming together and we’re super pumped about what the 2018 is set to bring.

And the first exciting development it’s bringing is the Australian Comic Arts Festival in Canberra. Jess and I are going to be there soaking up some comic knowledge from some amazing guests on the Friday and Saturday, then selling our comic wares on Sunday the 11th of February on Market Day.

This will be the first interstate event we’ve ever attended and we’re super excited about what we’re going to learn and bringing Heart of Millyera around Australia. We’ll also be selling our Banksia Project mini comics ‘Great Beasts’ and ‘Space and Time’. It’s only $20 for ACAF market day if you buy tickets online, so please drop in, say hi and pick up some comics by wonderful local creators.

Thanks again for readying and supporting this crazy endeavour!

– Jana

We may have been slightly late on getting this new page to you, however we have a valid excuse!

There is nothing quite like a last minute brainwave to suddenly propel you from everyday life into the exhilaration of furious planning! A two weeks ago we decided it might be a good idea to launch a mini-Kickstarter campaign in order to raise a small amount to cover the extra costs of printing our new mini-comic Great Beasts. After the success of our Kickstarter for Heart of Millyera: Prelude, we couldn’t think of a better way to gauge interest in our new comic, and help pay for it’s printing.

We quickly put the Kickstarter together in a weekend, and launched it on the 25 June. Well, we can safely say that our sudden brainwaves do pay off! The Kickstarter was 1096% funded!

Two weeks later and we already have the freshly printed comics in our hands! Better yet, this weekend we will have these new comics for sale at our table for the Burnside LibCon, an initiative of the City of Burnside Library. Jana and I will also be taking part in author and artist panel discussions at the event, along with some great local talents. You can find out more on Facebook or grab your ticket to Libcon online now. It will be a fun day!

A height of concern and/or fashion for Celeste and Ida.

The past few months have been hectic with events and although they have been all wonderful experiences, I’m glad we should have a bit of a break from them for now.

Issue #4 of the exciting Dieselpunk indie comic Skies of Fire has just come out and it keeps going from strength to strength. Captain Helen Pierce is such a wonderful badass and I’m really enjoying where the story is heading. The incredible detailed art and beautiful colours make me cry a little on the inside with envy. If you haven’t already checked it out the Issue #4 Kickstarter’s Digital Bundle with the back issues is amazing value. I picked it up on their last Kickstarter and all the behind the scenes content you get with it super interesting! I highly recommend checking it out.

And we’re back! Thank you to all our readers for your understanding.

April has been a busy month for both comic and life stuff! Lots of moving, house-hunting, renovating going on. However, we also had an amazing time at Oz Comic-Con Adelaide! We shared a table with our friends from Hail Comic for the second time, and were lucky enough to have some amazing comic creators such as Mike Cooper and Shane W. Smith as our Artist Alley row mates for the weekend.

On the Saturday afternoon we were involved in a panel, along with Miranda and Rosanna (from Hail). The panel, entitled “Writing to Women: Drawing Comics for a Female Audience” was a great opportunity for us to discuss how gender representations influenced our comic creation process. We were surprised and delighted to see such a great turn-out for the panel, and we received some lovely feedback. It is endlessly amazing to me when someone approaches our table, after seeing our panel, having tracked us down to chat and buy a copy of Heart of Millyera!

Oz Comic-Con also saw the launch a brand-spanking new, one-shot comic!

Jana and I are thrilled to announce that earlier in the year we were selected to take part in the Banksia Project mentoring program for minority comic creators! The program is a partnership between Petrie Press and Supanova Pop Culture Expo. Over the next 6-7 months, Jana and I will be coached by Ledger Award winning comic creator Alisha Jade. Our first finished product from the mentorship is entitled Great Beasts, and it will be for sale next week at the Adelaide Comic & Toy Fair.

If you want to come along and grab a copy of the Great Beasts mini comic, or if you want to pick up a copy of Heart of Millyera: Prelude, then please head along this Saturday 22 April, at the Christian Brothers College, Adelaide. The fair starts from 9:30am! Hope to see you there 😉

So I obviously dropped the ball on getting page 22 out in a timely fashion. I feel like I owe everyone a bit of an explanation for practically disappearing from the internet for a while.

I had, and still have grand plans for 2017, but earlier this year my partner of 7 years and I split up. I don’t really want to go into details publicly other than it was very amicable, but dealing with that and the aftermath of moving to my Mum’s place has taken the majority of my attention.

I’m very proud of what I achieved last year, but something I did not achieve was a good life balance and that is something I am making a priority this year. So while I will try and get the next page up in 4 weeks time, I don’t want to make any promises. I have friends and family I’ve neglected to spend time with and my own place to find and furnish. I have some amazing study opportunities, some of which we’ll be very excited to share with you when we can. However I promise we’ll keep everyone up to date on social media if there going to be any more delays.

Thank you so much for you patience and sticking with us.

– Jana

Phew this page was a marathon of trouble to get done! The display port cable for my Cintiq died at the exact moment I was messing with the colour/brightness settings, leading me on a wild goose chase to figure out what was wrong. After finally figuring out the cable was the problem and not anything I’d accidentally done, I’d messed with every single setting so much that I created other problems and it was a nightmare to get back to normal working functionality again. ????

But we got there in the end and I’m pretty happy with the result.

2016 has been a crazy exciting year for us, with lots of achievements and meeting wonderful new people. Jess and I are catching up this weekend to discuss our plans for next year, including more conventions and setting up an online store; so we should have some exciting announcements soon. Mostly though with Prelude printed and done I’m really looking forward to knuckling down and pumping out new pages. Bring on 2017! ????

– Jana

There is so much comic stuff happening in November my goodness.

Firstly we’re doing a joint book launch for Heart of Millyera: Prelude at Greenlight Comics with the gents of New London Comics for their new comic DAPPLED on Friday the 18th of November. You can find more information about the launch here.

Immediately following the book launch, Jess and I are sharing table 22 at Supanova Pop Culture Expo in Adelaide on the 19th & 20th with the wonderful creators of another great local webcomic Hail. We’ll have Prelude, prints, bookmarks, original sketches and a zine on sale, come along and say hi!

We also have another exciting announcement about Supanova soon to come!