#143 Hail Wordsmythes (my thoughts on the disrespect of writers)

I am simply amazed and dumbfounded at how often I hear of the level of disrespect given to writers and how everyone thinks that being able to draw is more important than being able to write.

"Sigh"  Let me start at the beginning.  A few years back, nearly a decade ago, I had some ideas, that I wanted to make into comic books.  Eiko was one of those ideas.  However I lacked the ability to draw anything more than stick-figures.  While I did make some very good stick figures, I was limited by my vision versus my actual talent.

I figured that I would be able to sell my vision based on my writing ability, and so I pitched to my favorite comic companies.

(The industry was a much different place than it is now.  It was more accommodating to those with a modicum of talent.  New comics were a dime a dozen, and new artist were popping up all the time.   However it was different for writers.)

I was rejected based on one simple fact.  They were not looking for writers, without artist.

What the hell?  That's what went through my mind.  Then it turned into...

I was seriously pissed off.  Instead of really checking out my work and seeing if it had merit, they casually dismissed it because I didn't have an artist.  This was one of my first harsh lessons about the entertainment business, and its casual misdeeds towards writers.

In hindsight, I partially realize this decision is based on simple math.  A story with script and finished artwork is far easier to package together than one that is essentially incomplete.  Most companies are not in the business of pairing up talents to produce a product especially on unknowns.

Continuing onward and upward.

The more I wrote and the more I started to push my work out the doors, the more I started to realize that writers often get the sh!t end of the stick.  Meanwhile hack artist like....

Get plenty of work.  I have to respect the fact that this guy has produced a far more substantial body of work than I have, but that doesn't mean it is very good.

Now back on the subject of writing.  Over the years I learned that the quality of artwork doesn't have to be stunning.  Take Bryan Lee O' Malley artist, writer and creator of Scott Pilgrim.

The artwork is okay.  Very simplistic, but it isn't the art that really sells the story; it's the writing.  The simple style works for the story, not the other way around.

This was proof to me that writing in general takes a back seat to art, even when the story is by far the more important element.

The art was only a means to have a complete story in a lot of cases, but it gave the story what it needed.  A visual element.

This was upsetting to me, because I was realizing that in the fields that I was interested in, I would always be incomplete, because I could never find a artist to work with me and be committed to my story, without the ability to pay them upfront (and trust me I looked).

I was under the impression that writers weren't considered as important as the artist, and that was a great injustice in my eyes.

Even the game project I am working on has gone ahead without a good writer to help flesh out the story and the characters, and those are things that should have been finalized first.  People underestimate their need for a writer in projects, and try to move forward without one, never realizing how important a writers job actually is.  The project I'm working on has modelers and concept artist and everything else it generally needs, but I am the only writer.

It's even worse in Hollywood, where writers are really given the short shaft.  Writers are deemed easily replaceable, and that is another injustice.

It's time for writers to stand up and let the world know that their role is as important as any other part on a project.  Without a writer to write the screenplay, there is no movie.  Without the writer to write the game, there is no game.  Any visual medium that tells a story, needs an artist there to write that story.  I feel that we are under appreciated in our talents and often taken for granted.  It isn't fair.  Not everyone can do what we do.  A talented writer should be just as appreciated as a talented artist, sometimes even more so.  A comic without a writer would just be a series of pictures with no cohesive story.  Don't get me wrong.  Visuals are important in a visual medium, but a picture without a story is a picture, painting or a pin-up.  I appreciate the artists contribution and have worked with artist in the past, and also understand how to write for an artist.  I would just like for writers to be shown how important they are to the visual medium that they try to become a part of.

So to all the writers out there without the ability to draw, I saw Hail! good ladies and gentlemen of the pen.  Hail to you scribes and wordsmythes.