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This is a weblog of one person's multi-year quest to write, draw, and publish a graphic novel. This is my story: my trials, tribulations, successes and failures. -- Robert Stradley, Weekend Artist

Trademarks ™
Since publishing wasn’t so bad, I entered the world of Trademarks.  It can be done without the services of a “professional.”   However, due to its legal nature, it is a lot harder than it looks, and takes even more money.  Here’s the short version:

For a trademark, all you do is add ™ to your mark.  This makes it a trademark.  A mark can be words in a specific type, in specific order, made up words, a particular symbol, or combinations of the above.  You can use a trademark before your register it.  You can have a regional trademark, or a national mark, or an international mark.  If someone else already owns the mark you use, however, you run the risk of being sued.  If they don’t sue you, then they risk losing the trademark.  So you may want to register it ®. 

Go to United States Patent and Trademark Office www.uspto.gov and they will lead you thru it.  Start with the FAQ’s.  If that doesn’t stop you, then start gathering information.  Identify your mark, identify your goods and services, identify basis, search the Marks database.  To file with the proper legalese, print out similar filings, copy the wording with any pertinent changes, and submit.   

It will cost you $235 for the electronic filing.  You pay the money whether or not you get registered, so be sure to do a thorough search for similar names, partial names, and homonyms, all of which will get you bounced. 

It is important to check the status of your application every month after the initial filing of the application, because otherwise you may miss a filing deadline. Within 6 months, a government lawyer will tell you what you need to change to get registered.  Answer any questions and make any changes suggested.  Do it immediately, or you can get bounced. 

Once the lawyers are happy, then they publish your mark to determine if anyone objects.  If there are objections, the lawyers are at it again.  If no one objects, then a couple months later you get a document from the Federal Government stating that your Trademark is now registered. 

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Villains – the tough ones
Villains.  The word conjures up visions of dark and seedy Underworld denizens, dank depravity, and ultimately horrendous ubiquitous EVIL.  And contrariwise, it is with interest that all readers gather the veriest scraps of information about these characters. 

As the Scribe with No Name states:

• It is the Villains who are the most intriguing characters.  The more vile, the more sinister, and the more intelligent the villain, the more easily he captures our interest and drives the central conflict of the tale forward.
• As we delve into the flaws and foibles that shaped each man and woman of Villainy, I am continually struck that, although one must not actually like or admire them, these villains are worthy of some modicum of respect and deep inspection because they are, in fact, the raison d'etre for the emergence of the city-state of Amberleigh.    
• It is their actions, cruel and heartless as they are, that forced our heroes into, well … heroism.  Without them we would have no story.  So it behooves the Writer to make them, not loveable, but at least comprehensible and plausible. 

As for the Illustrator, one can make them as insanely beautiful, as horribly ugly, or as ridiculously outrageous as one can envision.  It is for the miscellaneous red-shirted minions who are randomly bumped off in the course of the story that the Artist reserves the non-descript plain vanilla criminal or vagrant to be used, abused, and forgotten.   

As to the story line, well that must remain a secret, unfolding bit by bit, revealing plot elements and backstory alike, for the edification and education of the reader.  But a few hints are here for the Weblog reader: 

1. Johan ThunderCrusher knows how to Plan, and he does it extremely well.
2. The men and women that he chooses to help him are servants and minions, fighters and mages, pirates and priests, nasties and nosies. 
3. The Monsters, depraved denizens of other dimensions, are all brought into the world by gates de magique.

See here for Villains and Monsters first look.

Suffice it to say that there are wheels within wheels, feints and frolics, battles and baubles, meadows and oceans and dingly dells all fraught with Monsters galore. 

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