Creating a sellable title for a Comic Book

STEP ONE. You'll need a simple title for your comic book series. Once you decide what is the comic book world you want your comic book series to live in AKA, Action Adventure, Si Fi, etc. You will need to do a market survey to see if some on has already landed on the title you want to use. Diamond Comics is the worlds largest seller of Comic Books to comic book shop in the United States. They have sold my books in the past and the money was good. The market now is very tight. So some creators have turned to web comics ( self publish) for a while till the sales are good. The Teenage Nija Turtles began with self publishing comic book. Then it soon became a gold mine...They are still mining their pots of gold from that series.

But make sure that you have a title that isn't owned by someone else you will need to do a title
search to see if someone else doesn't have ownership. That is where you have to go and do a serach of the title. You'll have to pay a visit Uncle sam's Trademark and Copyright office to find out if the title is available. (tess) is where you have to go to find out if the title of your comic book is available. Now if someone has nailed that title you want you can still mark it. This is called
a wrap around title, with an extended tite in the front end and the back end of your Comic Book
title. There will be money in the filing phase. But if you use your computer and some time you can save the fees that a law office will charge. I have done all my own trademark searches and never needed the services of a lawyer. $$$$.


Marvel and DC publish special issues with titles that they want to mark. These Trademarks are good for five years. So do your homework and do a title search. This is very important. Once you know the title is clear then you can pick up your pencil and start roughing out you comic book.

Now with a great title you can rough out an "Ashcan" issue of your Comic Book. You'll need a small comic book. This small "Ashcan" issue will be used to file with your title (3 copies)and submit with the current fees to the trademark and copyright office. The reason for a Logo is AKA.. (Superman) so that it can be printed on T-shirts ,Mugs,Movie titles.. you get it?
I will not quote some the famous horror stories of creators that I know who failed to mark their comic book series and lost millions of $$$$$. So this a very important step needed to protect your creative efforts.

I will post more steps needed in the protection of your comic book creative efforts. The two guys that created Superman lost Millions$$$$. Everyone knows how hot Comic Book movies are now.
I have published five books on the subject of Comic Book Art ("How to Draw a Comic Book")and also "How to Draw Storyboards for Animation." The world of Cartooning &How to write a comic book.

My next post will cover More details on Creating an " Ashcan Comic Book."

Bill Barry