Matt Kindt, Brian Hurtt, & Marie Enger present The HEK TREASURY: a deluxe hardcover collection of ALL NEW sci-fi/fantasy themed stories
Here's a video of me painting a panel from the HEK Treasury in real-time. This is from a short story that I wrote, Brian penciled/inked, and I painted. A bounty-hunting duo...with a twist.
We've made our stretch goal of adding yet another 10 PAGES of story content--and just in time to start the final full day for this campaign! To mark the occasion we are going to announce--not just one stretch goal--but the next THREE! With no further ado:
- 3 DIORAMAS (40k) The first of the three stretch goals will be these papercraft, objets d'arts (assembly required) that will look great on your comic shelf at home. Each artist will create one diorama themed to one of their stories.
- 10 NEW STORY PAGES (42.5k) Let's be honest, this is where it's at. We reach this goal and we get to tell more stories (or make existing stories longer). It's a win-win for all of us!
- CLOTH RIBBON/BOOKMARK (45k) This little bit of elegance goes a long way. If we reach this goal, both the Standard and the Deluxe edition will be bestowed with a bit of class. No dog-earing the pages of this picture book!
The fact that we're even talking about these stretch goals is a testament to all of your support and we can't thank you enough for making this campaign the success it is!
As always, any bit you're willing to do to help spread the word on social media or with your friends will be graciously appreciated! The link to our campaign: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ohhek/hek-treasury
And, if you're on twitter and you aren't following @hek_studio then now the time to rectify that!
We've met our most recent stretch goal (adding a SECOND trifold foldout) and now it's time to announce the next goal! Once we reach 37.5k we'll be adding yet another 10 pages of story material! There are less than four days left in this campaign and we have more stretch goals lined up after this one. Help us blow through them all and make this book even more special and unique! And bigger!
I leave you with a screenshot of what I'm working on today--digital pencils for my Star Trek homage with a dark twist:
I hope everyone had a great Labor Day weekend and I want to thank everyone who chimed in on our recent post about future stretch goals. Your voices have been heard! We've put two of the three suggestions into the stretch goal queue. But first... we have a quick stretch goal we'd like to meet. At 35k we will be adding to the book our SECOND trifold--a page that folds out three times! For an example, below is a trifold that Matt did for Volume 3 of MIND MGMT compared to a mock-up of the same trifold if it had been printed at the HEK Treasury size:
We had already intended to do one of these trifolds for the book and now we've decided that if we make this next goal we will add another of these bad boys to the mix. As with the Deluxe Edition's gilded pages that we announced yesterday, this is one of those fun things we've always wanted to do but that generally makes no fiscal sense for publishers. Again, at the heart of this book is the notion that we will explore not only different narrative approaches but also play with the print and design of the book. This is an indulgence that is only made possible by your support! I've never had the opportunity to work on a comic book canvas of this scale and I'm super excited about the challenge!
Matt is already getting started on his piece:
Since 2001 when my first book (Pistolwhip) was published, I’ve wanted to do gilded or color page-edges in a book. With those early pulp-themed books I dreamed of doing blue or yellow page edges that harken back to the old pulp paperbacks that I still collect. It’s always been a neglected area of book design.
So why haven’t any of my books every had gilded/painted page edges? The short and only real answer is expense. Every book I’ve had published, the answer has always come back that it isn’t “cost effective.” Apparently it’s really expensive to have painted or gilded page edges. So here we are. Running our own Kickstarter. Doing our own print buying and cost analysis. And the first thing on my my dream list? Gilded page edges. This time, we’re going to get them.
And then the quote from the printer came back…
Yeah, it’s expensive. Like, a month’s mortgage expensive. But with your help, we’re paying for the printing this time. So it is time to put our money where my mouth has always been. It’s worth it. We’re doing gilded page edges. No matter what the cost. Literally. We’re doing a nice embossed gold foil cover. We’re doing exactly what we want – how we want.
This is the version of the book that is not “cost effective.” It’s the version of the book we’ve always wanted to do. Ridiculous production. Impractical design. Like nothing we’ve ever been able to do before. And the only time we’ll be able to produce this book, this way.
So that’s the reason why we’re doing the deluxe version. We have us steering this ship, bottom line be-damned. We’re gonna have our gilded page edges.
-matt kindt
HEK Studio
Brian Hurtt, Marie Enger, Matt Kindt