True story. Swear to god.

Not sure how many people still check in here to see if a strip might miraculously appear, but here one be.

Me go to bed now.

Today’s guest comic by Ryan Estrada — if you don’t understand the bollywood thing, you might reference this earlier Yirmumah news.– and as a double whammy, he did a guest strip for HERO BY NIGHT as well! Both very funny, and the man is a lean, mean, cartooning machine. Today, we bow before Ryan’s cartooning greatness.

Return of Yirmumah… the wheels ARE turning here, and things are in production. I’m hoping for an October 1st relaunch for our 10th year doing thing. Some neat things to report on later when I can… thanks for being patient if you’re still coming around here.

Jack Kirby would have been 90 years old today. He’s the type of man I aspire to be, both in work ethic, family and values. I’m working on it.

Every time I hear a story about how Jack would just plot a story in his head, then sit down round the clock and jam it out, man that energizes me.

Here’s to you Jack!

Yeah, I’ve been taking a break from posting online and all that jazz, except for over on herobynight.com - Thought i’d pop in and give an update on what’s been going down.

Before I go on— it’s the LAST 24 hours of this years voting for Comic Book Challenge. Go help crown a new winner. These guys worked hard to get where they are, and it’s been a rough two weeks of vote pandering for them I’m sure. VOTE NOW!

Today I spent the day out at Idlewild Park with my family. The kids start back to school on Monday, which means back to full steam comic production. It’s been nice to spend more time with the family, mess around with the kids on Xbox (even though I suck and I’m a lousy gamer)– but yeah, it’s been nice. I also spent the day admiring my hot wife as she rode the spinny rides with our two brave kids and I toughed it out on the bench with our brainiac child who’s afraid of anything that goes fast and high. What a lucky guy I am. I almost feel like seeing pictures of me with them, i think “Who’s that dorkish oaf standing with that hot chick and her kids?”

Comic wise….I’m currently doing M-W-F on Hero By Night, while working on the new upcoming ongoing series, and a couple more HBN announcements probably next week when things are in order.

Thanks to the magic of “google alerts” I got an email today alerting me that the world renowned, T Campbell had posted something about me in his blog… I went to check, and i it was something about editing Wikipedia entries. To be specific, someone had been going around and editing Yirmumah or something to say it was the greatest comic ever, and renamed Graphic Smash’s entry to read “Completely Graphically Smashingly Comics online!”— Hmmmmmm… Now, a couple weeks ago, I would have wondered who that could have been, because I don’t mess with Wikipedia bullshit…. but here’s a funny story that could clear it up, and to old Yirmumah fans, you probably already know… but Bob was over here a couple weeks ago, and he says something that he saw something ackward in the “D.J. Coffman” listing at Wikipedia, and I was like HUH??? So I went and glanced over and didn’t see anything… but he specifically points out a paragraph and it now reads:

“After several years freelancing while earning his degree from Rutgers University, Coffman began publishing his own works online and in print in 2003 starting with his daily comic strip Yirmumah. Coffman also balanced his off time by gaining a brown belt in Brazilian Jiu - Jitsu and achieving an amateur fight record in Pennsylvania , West Virginia and southern Ohio of 7 wins and no losses at the time of this writing.”

So we laugh. I see now that he actually went back and added the Rutgers University thing. Bob. Bob + Wikipedia…. sigh. Bob+ Internet actually equals MADNESS I think. He doesn’t care about any of this online horseshit, case in point, I have a note he hand scribbled to me when I was on a podcast with Scott Kirtz and that other guy, telling me to tell him he’d challenge him to a UFC type fight on Youtube or something…. cut to me looking at him like “WHAT???” — Bob is madness, but it’s this awesome little contained madness that can be wildly entertaining.

That whole comment there makes me sad now. Because.. Bob is awesome is to Yirmumah is awesome. And Yirmumah was probably never the same after Bob left. Bob IS Yirmumah. Well, Bob and DJ are Yirmumah. No offense to Wiz. In fact, out in San Diego, Wiz and I had this conversation about the future of Yirmumah and how maybe we should let Bob take it over, with all sorts of wild shit…. while it sounds like a fantastic idea, it also made me worry… because Bob + Internet = MADNESS. I don’t know if I’d be able to contain it. I’d always be the level headed guy in a conversation with Bob telling him why it wasn’t a good idea to tell the people who were paying me to draw comics that he’d like to punch a hole in their head like a rotten pumpkin. But that was Bob in a nutshell. Still is. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Now I’m waxing all nostalgic here. Were coming up on the unofficial 10 year anniversary of Yirmumah. It September of 1997 is when I drew the first Drew and Bob comics adventure that would later become the underground mini comic adored by tens of dozens of people around Fayette-Nam and the surrounding Pittsburgh area. 10 years…

10 fucking years of Yirmumah…. What will the future hold? Are we done here now? I don’t know. I’m not sure. I don’t want to be sure.

In a way… it could be said, that we spent 10 years fucking around and not giving a shit about anything we wrote, drew or published anywhere. If it made us laugh, as dark and twisted as it might be, that was it. That was Yirmumah.

Maybe now it’s time for Yirmumah to get serious? We’ll see. I can feel it down there inside somewhere… but we’re missing pieces of what made it GREAT. I’ll try to put it all back together again.

Wow, do I wish I had a time machine right now. I’d go to this convention and meet all of my heroes. Check out the awesome photos from 1982, that include Eisner, Kirby, Hogarth, Caniff and MANY more legends of our industry.

Seriously… my left nut for a time machine. Maybe both of em.

You can see some random photos from the trip on my Flickr page.

Another whirlwind of busyness at Wizard World Chicago this past weekend. It was really great hanging out with “my boys”, Jason Embury (colorist extraordinaire) and James Patrick, who I’ve collaborated with several times in the past (Crakurz, Lionxor, Soda, Hero Happy Hour and more) - I think the highlight of the show for me were the kids fighting over the comics. Seeing kids walk over, as if here’s a special magnet on our table we hit the button, they suddenly just turn and get pulled over to the table to look at the cool hero stuff. I had a set of twins, probably 8 or 9, brother and sister who were fighting over who to sign the book to, Justin or Emily… I ended up giving them an issue one AND two for them to barter with.

I’m glad I had good friends around me to witness some of the crazy things I hear at shows now. None of it is probably good for my ego at all, but one guy was nervous as crap, I guess Hero By Night is one of is favorite comics and he told me he felt like he should be bowing down….. I turned to see if my pal Brandon Carr actually just heard what I heard and we were like “Huh? hahahha” — Then people always tell me how nice I am and cool to talk with, but I think it’s just because I see all of these nameless people as actual FRIENDS if they read my books or webcomics. We brought that guy around to get a photo with the standees, and he was blown away. I kept thinking, isn’t this common though??? I’m surprised to hear that a lot of creators can be brief dicks with fans at shows. I’m just nice naturally, but I’m making a vow never to be a prick with ANYONE at my table, or if I’m in a bad mood about something else don’t take it out on a fan or a possible new fan standing there. While I thought it was odd, the guy saying he would bow down, I can honestly say there are a few creators out there I would have said the same thing to.

Hanging out in the evening with all my webcomic brothers and sisters was awesome too. Old friends like Brandon J. Carr, Zach Miller (Joe and Monkey), Joe Dunn, Phil and Irv from Digital Pimp, and the rest of the pimp crew, Tom Brazelton. Got to meet Gordin from Multiplex too…..and many more. Bottom line, these are the guys in the trenches, and soon they will be in your base, killing your dudes! heh.

Speaking of webcomics, the BUSINESS OF WEBCOMICS panel went well. Room was packed (standing room only) and I’m glad I was able to put people in the right mindset as far as how they should look at their own work, what markets or niches or even mindset to have when doing it yourself. I often call it guerrilla, or grassroots, or “in the trenches”– cease opportunities when they come your way, and see everything that comes along TOOL you can use for your comics. And make sure you learn to do things the old ways too, cutting and pasting actual paper balloons. Basically I gave brief glimpses at the things I talked about on my old Make Money blog. I’ll be writing a big book soon with some cool surprises in the future. It’s outlined I just need time to do that actual work. Several publishers have already asked to do it, but I want to get the book done first– shoot it’s not even a guarantee that it will happen, but I’m VERY encouraged by private conversations at the show with other webcomic folks.

Now it’s back to work here. We’ve started the NEW webcomic story arc over on herobynight.com - The buzz at the shows has really been amazing to hear. I guess i’m just not use to any of that. Even old pros I’ve known for years coming up to congratulate. I’ve lined up some people to do some alternate covers too, I’m REALLY excited about that. Which reminds me I should tell my EIC that. (done!) -

It really does feel like we’re slowly accomplishing my goal of creating a new iconic super hero for a new generation of readers. Again, I got to meet many retailers who all have great stories about the book’s success in shops. The stories go usually like this, the retailers ordered maybe 5 copies or so to check out the new title and try it out, or did preorders for customers and ordered a couple more for the shop,– then the copies fly off the shelf and they try to reorder through Diamond and can’t get reorders in. I’ve been telling any of these retailers if that happens, to contact me direct or Platinum Studios and we’ll be sure to get them what they need for their shop. I really love sending NEW readers into stores. One lady told me that she’s gotten 5 new customers with pull boxes thanks to Hero By Night. That makes me proud. I remember something Jack Kirby said once in an interview, about it ultimately being his job to sell comic books to readers and it makes stores happy, and I always keep that in mind when talking to retailers. I look forward to creating some grassroots, direct system for retailers to get cool incentives direct from me. If there are any reading this right now, e-mail me and we can definitely talk. I’m more than happy to send things out to shops, because in the end it helps us all– creators, publishers, readers and retailers. A big comic book circle of life.

DRAMA: There are a couple things I’m really personally annoyed by and the old me would have just went off online and ranted and raved and just TOLD THE TRUTH about But I’m holding off. It doesn’t effect me directly, but it’s caused nightmares for close friends of mind—- All I can say is that I’m annoyed by a couple other “wannabe” publishers, who don’t even have books out yet, are jealous by HBN’s success, and then constantly say nice things to my face, then ask where we get our standees or backdrops, or what printing deals we get, etc.. and I of course don’t answer them because I know the next show suddenly they’ll have the same standees or setup, and then they talk shit behind my back about how they don’t like HBN. I challenge them to actually READ it, and to let them know that word always gets back to me when they’re talking smack. I want to be the bigger man here though and not get into specifics. There are other parties involved who aren’t public about it yet…But talking about it a little gets it off my mind. Let it be a word of warning of how NOT to start an indy comic company, and not to work with creators who are too full of themselves and who are ultimately going to make you look bad when the group’s name comes up at the lobby bar and they all know you work with this one asshole creator who who’s burned every bridge behind him. Be careful the bridges you burn– they might just end up burning you back. It’s funny how cutthroat the industry can be, especially for NEW guys just jumping in. For use old timers, we understand that it’s a small small world, this little comic book pond. You can definitly drown yourself pretty damn easy by being a dickhead or weaselly type. I shouldn’t even mention this, because chances are, these “publishers” won’t be around in another year or two. That’s just how it goes usually.

Alright– I’m still not back to work officially yet– I gotta get back to the drawing board!

I just got back in from Chicago Wizard World, woke up to find out Mike Wieringo has passed away. He was a phenomenally talented comic book artist, and just an all around fantastic human being. 44 years old is too young to go. That is the same age Jack Kirby was when he drew Fantastic Four #1. It makes me think just what could have been…

My thoughts and prayers are with his family and loved ones today.

We just lost one of the greatest.

I haven’t posted an update in a week or so, mostly due to busy stuff going on here. Again, I want to encourage folks to go vote for who will be the top 3 in this year’s Comic Book Challenge. LINK!

So busyness… I’ve been working hard on the writing and art for the NEW Hero By Night webcomic updates scheduled to begin this coming Monday, August 13th. Also been doing things like drawing up a new cover for the ongoing series coming in December. Oh, and getting ready for Wizard World Chicago.

Wizard World Chicago- We’ll be at around booth 5900, in the Drunk Duck comics section of Artist alley. I’ll have all 4 issues of Hero By Night on hand (limited, get em while they last!) and also the variant covers with Saul Simian and HBN standing in FIIIRE! As a super special con exclusive, we’ve printed up 150 special signed and numbers prints commemorating Jack’s “discovery”— I’m going to try to do one special print per show, almost like tour posters or something. So you know you could have only gotten this one at Wiz Chicago.

Planning more shows… I’m possibly setting up at Mid Ohio Comicon this year. Haven’t booked it yet, but it would be my first year back since a drunk driver crashed into our car in the Hilton parking lot, and the guy got away with it scott free. A week before that is Wizard World texas, which I haven’t booked yet either, but I think the Drunk Duck team is going there, and I wouldn’t miss that for the world. (cool people!)

Pittsburgh Comicon Conundrum! - I wanted to do Pittsburgh BIG this year. Maybe have the cover to the program book, since Hero By Night is from “Steel City”. It came as quite a shock to me to learn that the organizer, Michael George was arrested for a 17 year old murder of his ex-wife in Michigan. Nothing has been proven yet, and i hope the man gets a fair trial. I’ve known the Georges since the Pittsburgh comicon began, and they’ve always treated the small press and indy comics creators awesome. To boot, they’ve raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity here in Pittsburgh. Genuinely NICE people who have a love for comics. I’m hoping all of this isn’t true, it feels like a mini bad dream for me, I can’t even imagine what it’s like for their family right now. So, if I were a religious man, my prayers would be with them right now. Hopefully they can keep Pittsburgh Comicon going no matter what transpires, because it’s a great show, and does a lot of GOOD.

Drama - I’ve made a pact with myself, like I did in January, not to mention and or reply to a couple more idiots online. More often than not, I get personally insulted by loud mouths on a semi-big podium just painting me as someone who “won” success, or as a corporate cheerleader. It does no good at all. I’d like to say more and rip into them like the old me would have, but again, it ultimately does NO good. Instead, I should be focusing on my work and plans for the future. Ultimately time will tell these tales better. When I see into my own future, these people don’t exist anyway. Will they still be drawing and creating in 20 or 40 years? I know I will be. I’m just looking at the bigger picture here I guess.

Yirmumah - Not much has changed Yirmumah wise. Still on hiatus. Not sure if or when it’s coming back. I still get the e-mails from disgruntled readers who want updates, but there are only so many hours in a day. For now, Yirmumah is more of a FEELING than it is a comic strip. So enjoy the laughs in our forum. And if you’re lucky enough, our super secret forums. Muhahahhaha!

See some of you in Chicago!

Just crossing the wires, Platinum Studios has announced the final judges for this year’s Comic Book Challenge. They include, include John H. Williams, producer for the “Shrek” film series; actor Donald Faison of hit TV program “Scrubs;” Platinum Studios’ CEO Scott Mitchell Rosenberg, and yours truly, winner of last year’s Comic Book Challenge.

You can also check out the commercials ATT will be running for the contest, currently there are two up.

Wednesday is the one year mark, when I received an e-mail from a guy named “Dan”, telling me I had 7 days to be in San Diego to pitch Hero By Night.

The funny thing is, I almost didn’t go. I was THISSSSS close to not going. I mean, SEVEN DAYS!!!? To get the biggest comic book show of the year, it would be near impossible. The only money I had at my disposal was $1200 bucks in my “Yirmumah Bankroll”, which was profits from previous print books, which I had saved for future printing projects. My wife said to go for it– and it costs just about that entire amount to book my last minute trip, airfare and hotel.

As everyone knows, I ended up winning last year. I thought I’d just post this saying how my life has changed since then. Well, for one, we have an entire kickass new super hero universe going on. I started online in October of 2006 after cutting a bonus deal with Platinum to produce the daily comic strip there that acted like a prequel to the book series. It was originally going to be weekly, but i was pushing the editors saying I could totally do M-W-F or even M-F if they wanted me to, and that’s what we ended up doing for quite awhile there. I’m really proud with the amount of work we did there fleshing out a background universe for the characters to play in. The mini series launched in March and ended in June, to TONS of great reviews from the comic press and reviewers out there. It was a very humbling experience. And it’s still not over.

Without getting too much into details, I’m also in a much better place financially. While I was doing well with Yirmumah stuff on my own, it was a lot of work and hustle to keep it going to the point of paying bills. Work on Hero By Night has kept me really busy and I had to put Yirm on hiatus here, but in the past month or so I’ve been really contemplating how cool it would be to just bring Yirm back, “ad free”, no sponsors, because I don’t really have to hustle around to make money with it. Usually the goal has always been for me to keep producing comics, build audience, sell to them, make some money of advertising, etc to pay bills. But now I don’t have to do that. So when Yirmumah makes a comeback, I want it to have also benefited from my success with HBN, where we’ll have absolutely nothing to pimp except for our own projects and that’s it. No more googleads, no more sponsor ads,etc. It’s a different feeling to think that way. It’s funny, because you hear about the creators who finally quit their day jobs to work on their comics full time, and now I’m maybe the first webcomic guy who has had something else come along that pays me to not HAVE to do the job of creating another webcomic. When I say “job of”, i mean all that hustle and flow. I don’t have to do that morning-noon-and night, and it’s a relief. But i Know that you miss Yirmumah, and I miss her too.

Over the past year I’ve had the chance to work with some talented people at Platinum Studios as well. They have so many things going on internally, many of which I just can’t talk about, so it makes it hard to be specific, but I can just say that it’s an honor and exciting working with them. Yeah, I’m always cheerleading them, but it’s only because I trust them and I understand the business end. I’ve learned quite a bit there too. It’s hard biting my tongue, but I’ve sort of learned that a whole lot of small petty things out there are just not worth commenting on. Instead of sitting around defending all the time, I thought I’d show some offense and prove things by my own actions with the company and my property that I trust them to represent well.

There have been several geek out moments I haven’t posted publicly about. Because ultimately, it doesn’t really mean anything, but just to know that my name or creations are brought up by some pretty powerful people in Hollywood, it’s cool to hear. While they specialize in all this other stuff that can be great for me down the road, I’m really just focused on putting out a great comic for me, them and YOU. I don’t let any of it go to my head— trust me though, there are some EXCITING things in the works. Hopefully a couple of them I can spill the beans on soon.

Case in point, one year ago, I was drawing comics about my Dad and bikers and all that jazz… and now suddenly we’re working with ATT, and there’s word how they want me to be more featured at this year’s challenge, and sort of be the “face” of Comic Book Challenge on the ATT site. It seems like everyone values my opinion on what’s a good idea and what’s not, and that too is very humbling.

So what about this year? You know, I really can’t wait to get out there and meet the new contestants, and just encourage them, or answer any questions they might have. I didn’t have that luxury last year of asking a winner how the deal has worked for them– and I’m hoping I can set the record straight for anyone afraid I got bad deal, because honestly I have one of the best deals in independent comics, barnone. I honestly want something BETTER than “Hero by Night” to win this year. I want to hear that idea that knocks MY socks off. Other people I’ve spoken to say that we’ve set the bar pretty high with the Hero By Night universe, but I totally believe there can be another creator out there with a better idea and as much or more passion than I have for the comic book medium. And I want to meet that person!

Here we are, about a year later. I feel like one of the luckiest mofos on the planet.

read Hero By Night…

Instead of cluttering up the homepage here with random blabbering about random things that are on my mind at 6am in the morning, I decided to post “Morning Mind Dumps” in my forum for people who really want to read such things. DUMP LINK! (must be registered forum user)