The Home Stretch! One more reward...
over 2 years ago – Mon, Dec 04, 2023 at 07:04:57 AM

New Pain-iacs!

One day left. The end is near and we're making some solid progress towards our 2nd stretch goal, the free New Pain refrigerator magnet for all physical backers. If we can bring in another $400 and change today, not uncommon on the final day of a campaign, we'll be able to include those attractive little suckers in your packages. 

To help the cause, I'm offering up THREE of these hardcover Library Edition Stranger Things collections to you guys, which includes the Stranger Things special I wrote last year. Wouldn't have killed them to give me a cover credit but whatever...

 I'm going to add a remarked drawing of a pretty hungry Demogorgon to the interior of these beasts, I'll even draw a mustache on Sean Astin by special request. They won't be listed as official add-ons, we're only making the books available to you guys that have already backed. So if you'd like to include one in your package, all you need to do is add $80 to your pledge and shoot a quick reply to this update so our intern can keep track. We can even arrange to have the books shipped early if you want to gift one to a Stranger Things fan in your life for the holidays. 

I may update again later if Tom Nguyen finishes a special piece of art he's been producing for this campaign in time. Your guess is as good as mine there. Otherwise, let's see what the final day brings. If you want to help by sharing today's social media posts on Facebook, Instagram and the hellhole known as Twitter, you won't hear me complain. 

I'm off to work on He-Man for a bit. Expect more soon. 

Your bestie,

Keith Champagne 

It's a roller coaster!
over 2 years ago – Fri, Dec 01, 2023 at 07:13:09 AM

New Pain-iacs!

The bad news: we had a large cancel last night and it's pushed us further away from our stretch goals. The good news: both NAMESAKE rewards are currently available again. If you want to name The Jump or his mysterious alien friend after a heroic or mysterious friend of yours for the holidays, now's your chance.

IN OTHER NEWS

We fixed the glitch that was keeping the digital version of the lost Superman story, THE COWARD JOE CLEVELAND by (Champagne and Rick Leonardi ) unavailable as an add on. It's currently live for the rest of the campaign. Sorry about the snafu.

We've also added a new reward AND a special add on to the campaign over it's remaining days to try and get us out of the danger zone that further cancels can create.

FIRST UP...

Paul Pelletier's original cover sketches for UNCOVERED #1 have been added as a reward to the campaign. If you know a process junkie that enjoys a look behind the scenes at the artistic thought process, Paul's sketches are now available. 

Keith also dug through his personal original art collection and is offering this classic Superboy page from his run with Karl Kesel and Tom Grummett as an add on at a very reasonable price. It will come signed by Keith.

And let's not forget that backers of both this campaign and Michael Katz's METAL HEAD 2 CAMPAIGN will receive, absolutely free, the two stunning prints by DC Comics' artist Bruno Abdias and our own Rich Stahnke.

Last but not least, if you're in the Allentown, PA area, you can catch Keith at his last appearance of the year tomorrow at Lehigh Valley Comic Con, where he'll have an advance copy of Jump #1 for you to flip through, if you want an early advantage at taking the New Pain Challenge. 

Please help us by sharing the campaign our for the last several days.

Keith Champagne's best friend,

The New Pain Intern

HUGE, MASSIVE UPDATE!
over 2 years ago – Mon, Nov 27, 2023 at 09:06:18 AM

New Pain-iacs!

A lot of ground to cover in this update so get your glasses on and find a comfortable chair for a few minutes. I'll try not to be as verbose as usual to help us get through it a bit quicker.

The final week of the Two-In-One campaign begins tomorrow. We're very lucky and grateful to be fully funded but if one or both of the two largest pledges to this campaign need to cancel (and cancels always happen during the last week), we would not reach the goal. It's a little anxiety inducing, believe me. 

Now is the time to make some noise on your social media and try to help us create a little more breathing room, Tom Nguyen has enough problems without adding high blood pressure to the mix. To propel us further, we've also added several "FINAL WEEK" rewards to help the cause, and give you something new to tell your friends about.

Let's break all the new stuff down for you...

This past weekend while at a comic-con, I recruited a few friends to remark copies of JUMP #1 for us (I had 10 copies printed to do my own remarks because I try and do everything ahead of time). So I'm happy to reveal that PAUL PELLETIER, KEITH WILLIAMS and JOE ST PIERRE remarked editions are currently live on the reward page. Interestingly, I asked them to choose their favorite character and they all chose our mysterious alien warrior (whose NAMESAKE REWARD is still available) so maybe we've got a breakout favorite on our hands.

We've also added a sketch cover reward tier, to be drawn by me, to the campaign for the final week. These are very limited: only five sketch covers will EVER be printed up exclusively for this campaign, and once they're snapped up, that's it. Game over, no more are ever rolling off the presses so I hope I don't spill ink on one of them. But for people that collect sketch covers (I do!), here's a chance to get something cool and collectible. 

ALSO, we've added a full-color RETAILER EXCLUSIVE VARIANT COVER tier for this final week, to be created by Tom Nguyen, myself and Rich Stahnke (surprise, Rich!). We're only offering one of these but the store that picks it up will receive a ton of copies of the book, the original art created for the reward AND their retail location will be featured in the artwork. 

Also, a quick reminder that the special "Coward Joe Cleveland" issue of Superman by myself and Rick Leonardi is still available as a digital add-on for anyone that may be interested in this legendary, unpublished "LOST" man of steel story. 

Hang in there, guys, almost done.

If you missed last week's update, let me fill you in on the crossover we're running with the METAL HEAD 2 campaign from the esteemed Michael Katz. Backers of BOTH of our campaigns will receive, absolutely FREE, copies of these two prints featuring characters from both books, by Bruno Abdias and Rich Stahnke. 

These prints will be included in the Metal Head 2 packages sent by Michael. I was lucky enough to edit the project for him and it's a good one, especially if you dig NSFW sci-fi action. Check it out and if you decide to pledge, leave a comment with the word JUMP so we can keep track of crossover backers. 

and FINALLY!

The great and powerful Ron Randall has a new TREKKER project on Kickstarter!

I don't know Ron very well, only through the wilds of Facebook, but I'm a fan of his work and he's been leaving it all on the page with his Trekker graphic novels. I wanted to bring this new campaign to your attention--although it funded so quickly you probably already know about it!

Ron is a tremendous talent doing the best work of his really impressive career on his most personal creation, Mercy St Claire and the Trekker universe built up around her. Passion projects like Trekker are kind of what Kickstarter was created for and I hope you'll take a minute to check out TREKKER: SPICE. I'm a lapsed Trekker reader and this campaign is a nice reminder for me to catch up on this and the last graphic novel, which I somehow missed. I'll be backing it right after I post this update. 

Is that enough for you guys today? Because I can keep writing, just dare me to! But...I think we should all go about our days now and hopefully, work together to bring in some new backers for our final week. 

Thanks for everything, gang. Appreciate you all.

Your bestie,

Keith Champagne 

Crossover on infinite campaigns
over 2 years ago – Tue, Nov 21, 2023 at 08:07:51 AM

New Painiacs!

Two weeks left, guys. We're halfway through the campaign and slowly making our way towards those deliciously devilish stretch goals. You know what we really need though? More backers to join our party. 

I'd love to reach 200 backers by the time this campaign ends; that's my personal goal. If you guys don't mind hitting a couple of friends in the back of the head with this two-in-one campaign, I'd really appreciate it. I've mentioned several times over various different campaigns that the algorithms on social media actually try to crawl out of my computer and strangle me to death if I dare try to direct traffic off their precious sites. They want us to pay to boost posts and while we do play that game, it sure is a tough one to win. A little boost from you guys sure helps a lot.

Anyway, Michael Katz of METAL HEAD  fame and I have officially teamed up to offer backers a couple of FREE PRINTS if they choose to support both of our campaigns. The prints will be included in your Metal Head packages because I'm far too dumb to coordinate it and I'll screw it all up. Mike is sharp though, he's got you. 

The prints are drawn by Bruno Abdias, who is a big time DC Comics artist now (25 years was more than enough of that for me but God bless him) and our own beloved Rich Stahnke is working on the colors as I type these very words.

If you're a backer of this campaign and also want to back  METAL HEAD , just leave a comment with the word JUMP to help Mike keep track of you. Hopefully his backers will do something similar and the free stuff will flow like water to all of you!

IN OTHER NEWS

I'll be chatting with the great and powerful John Siuntries of Word Balloon tonight at 9:00 PM EST to spread the word a little more. I'm sure I'll drop a link to that in the near future or watch live if you're bored. Also, Rich Stahnke and I had a good time chatting with Al Mega on his COMIC CRUSADERS PODCAST a few days ago to talk about our careers, histories and this very campaign. 

Last but not least, I chatted solo with the legendary ATOMIC TOMMY himself of Most Wanted Comics about several different topics, including the pain of writing Superman, the joy of knowing Tom Nguyen and some more words about the Jump. If you want to hear a little more about that, just  CLICK RIGHT HERE! 

That's all for today, my friends. Hope everyone has a nice holiday week, eats a lot of turkey and pie and has a nice nap. I'll catch you on the flip; let's make some noise in the meantime!

Your bestie,

Keith Champagne

Quick Friday note!
over 2 years ago – Fri, Nov 17, 2023 at 08:59:40 AM

New Pain-iacs! 

Happy Friday! It's been a long week over here, hope yours has gone easier.

Just a quick note today to show off the inked and colored cover for the new Lost Superman Story (see yesterday's update for details) addition, and also let you know that a digital version has now been included in the add-on rewards. Thar' she blows! The printed copies expire in about 24 hours, by the way. 

I had several messages asking about the infamous JOKER: YEAR ONE script-book so I'm going to see how many I have remaining this weekend and include what I have left as add-ons next week.  Anything that helps push us towards those stretch goals is fair game so if anyone wants Tom Nguyen's kidney, just drop a line. Sharing the campaign out is totally fantastic too, if you'd be so kind.

Catch you guys next week!

Your bestie,

Keith Champagne