Intro to Staigdin
The world of Staigdin and the characters inside it have been rattling in my head for a really long time. I've been working on it on and off for a decade, always getting stuck. I never really knew what shape it should take. Is it a novel? Is it a comic? A movie script? A videogame? A play? Is it a bunch of scenes and art that together tell a story? Am I publishing online? On Instagram or Facebook? Am I getting it printed? and so on. Here's a little timeline of how this thing evolved.
Antiquity
The first sparks of it started to fire off in my head back when giving your real name and story on the Internet was a big NO. It used to be normal to just bullshit your way through it and never reveal something real about yourself. A few characters have their roots in avatar websites alter-egos and niche forums. The world is whatever my brain does when it's inspired by something I see or learn about and comes up with something crazy.
2012ish
But back then I had no idea what I would do with them. I had a vague idea that the characters I came up with could Interact with the world I daydreamed about in some sort of videogame, Skyrim style. Mostly cause I myself would love to explore it more. But I didn't really have a coherent story. I sorta had a vaguely defined backstory for one character and a bunch of in world mythology.
2016 - I think..
I finally sat down and turned that vaguely defined backstory into an 11 page document. It was still just a backstory tho. But in the process I named and refined a bunch of characters. The backstory also presented a big problem in that world. But I didn't know how my main developed character, a stag magician with an attitude, would tackle a such a problem. Seemed out of his realm. I spent a lot of time coming up with ideas, never really writing them down, thinking maybe I should relegate the magician to another tale and have a better suited character tackle this one. Ans then was the worldbuilding. At this point the world in my mind was so developed and large, but I had no idea what to do with it.
2019
I really set my mind to it and wrote a full comic series scrip. I wrote it to span nine 24 page issues. Each issue split between three mirroring storylines that converge at the end. I was really proud of it. I still am. But...
This thing is written for a very traditional way of publishing. Get a publisher, print it sell it. But let's be honest, who the hell will shell out money to buy a comic from someone they never heard of, set in a new fictional world, unless it was heavily marketed before hand. Making all this happen from a business stand point was just too daunting and mostly unrealistic.
Aside from that, despite being very proud and pleased with the script, I left out so much stuff that I thought would be too controversial to tackle if I want publishing. And some of the things I left out just because I was afraid to tackle. It changed things a lot. And just how much worldbuilding can you squeeze in 9 issues? I figured that a lot of it will come from the visuals.
So I went through a few years of trying to figure out how to write it as a Instagram comic or even just a novel. Never really settled into anything. new story lines started to emerge at this time, some parallel, some sequels. I met new characters and wrote down notes here and there. I even outlined two of them. I just couldn't figure out how I wanted to publish it.
Here's what I knew:
- I wanted to make it free. To me telling the story is more important than monetizing it. SO the main thing needs to be free.
- For monetization I figured I could make stuff around it, like merch or something.
- I don't have a lot of funds and I don't know if and when I'll ever make any money out of it so I need to keep my investment low. I really wished to do this all with paper, ink and paint. But realistically I don't know if I can afford that.
- I wanted it to be able to exist physically, on paper.
2025
So here's how I plan on doing this:
- I'm rewriting the whole damn thing to include all that I previously was too chicken to include. But I'm not rewriting it for a comic, but a zine.
- I'm gonna post it in color, but at a lower image quality on this blog, for free. A black and white version will also be free to download on my substack. I will encourage downloading, printing and sharing. Stories are made to be shared not sold.
- To keep things simple the zine will be a single sheet of A4 paper folded in 4. That way is easy to print and photocopy and is also a manageable amount of work for me to tackle at one time and put these things up semiregularly.
- Speaking of schedule: there won't be one. I can't keep to one, I have a life. I'll upload when I upload. If you wanna et notified of whatever's new you can subscribe to my newsletter. I will send it every 1st day of a month with everything I was up to the previous month.
- The reason I will keep the posts in lower size and quality is because the artwork will eventually be for sale as prints and such and its harder for bootleggers to steal the image and print it nicely if its kinda shitty quality.
- I also intend that sometime in the future I will get to put it all into a big nice glossy book that I will be available to purchase. So I'm doing the art and formatting keeping that format in mind from the start.
- The art itself will be a mix of digital and traditional art.
- I'm still working on the story structure, which will keep a lot of the elements from the comic script, but not keep to it 100%. The main storytelling will be done by both an omniscient narrator but also a character that is there to make an encyclopedia and just happens to witness what the hell is going on. This way the reader can discover the plot as if they were there. Occasionally I may jump to some other character's point of view when that makes sense.
- I may make a few colored zines to print and gift myself. Maybe those I will sell. I don't know yet. We'll see.
- I will keep a journal about working on it here. I'll structure it in monthly posts that I update throughout the month.
Where I am with it now
- I made a complete time keeping system, it has conversion tables and all, so the dates of the events all match up and make sense, even if they're expressed by different cultures within Staigdin. Tho the I will consistently date the zines in one system so it's easy to follow.
- I also have a fully developed religion and notes about splinters and deafferent faiths. This document also encompasses a lot of the culture of the different peoples since those are closely intertwined.
- I have a good understanding of the geography of the world. I drew a big ass topographical map and I'm working on a digitally painted one.
- I also have a map of the main city and a full Wikipedia-like document detailing it.
This post was migrated from my old Blogger blog. A lot has changed since I wrote this, especially my plan for Staigdin. See the home page for my current plans.