What I tell people all the time is, to get in, you need to be dedicated to art and drawing everyday. Even when you get so sick of it, you just want to throw up. You have to keep pushing. And if you are just looking for a paycheck, I can tell you, this is NOT the industry to get into. Overnight success takes YEARS. The comic book industry you have to work at it. You have to want to do it and you have to love it.
I can remember when I was posting my own artwork on MySpace (yeah, going back a few years), I'd try (and I stress the word "TRY"), to ask artists how to break in and who I can show my work too. I didn't hear back from anyone. So I figured I'd just post my work on my page and see where that takes me. Then I started getting questions about doing some colored work. People who I've never talked to before or met wanted to see some colored work (which I didn't have any until a couple days later after people started asking). I posted a few pieces I colored digitally on my page and people really started commenting and liking the pictures. So I just kept drawing and coloring and posting it to my page. About 4-5 years later (2006), I was contacted by a smaller comic publisher (After Hours Press) about coloring a book for them cover to cover. Once that book came out, I found out it was a lot easier to talk to some of the creators and for sure the editors.
Of course, now being a colorist, I wanted to learn how to color digitally. I had started teaching myself about 2002-ish by picking up my favorite comics and seeing how the colorist colored, where to place highlights, shadows and even how to create some of the cool effects. However, I learned the hard way that you need to work on a tablet vs coloring with a mouse. OH, did I forget to mention that my first comic (FoxWood Falcons), I colored using a mouse??? Yes, it was (now you want a copy huh..lol). So it's time to research these "tablets" and see which one I need and which one the comic colorist are using. That took a couple of months because they were pretty pricey at the time and I didn't have the money. But to keep coloring digitally with the mouse, I downloaded a couple of pages from a comic book talent search and just kept teaching myself, trying to master the mouse (just in case I couldn't afford the tablets). Thankfully I found one that was smaller and decently priced at a store going out of business. I still have that table today and works great. So it was well worth the investment. Since then I did upgrade twice, and currently using that 3rd upgrade (Intos 4 Wacom Tablet). I love it.
But I did almost anything to learn how to color. Everything from asking other colorists (who never responded to any of my emails or comments), looking through books (which there really weren't any at the time) to even picking up my favorite comics and teaching myself (which again, was the best way I learned).
You can ask everybody how they got in. Ggood, ask them and listen to their stories if they choose to share with you. But, really the bottom line is, you have to WANT to do it. You have to WANT to be that artist who's going to stick out. Not by personality and being a jerk, but, with your talent. Don't let people tell you HOW you need to get in (not even editors). It's different for everyone.
A website I give people all the time is: www.digitalwebbing.com
This site is a good stepping stone to get yourself started. In finding projects, or even if you have a project of your own and you're looking for artists to help create it (illustrators, writers, inkers, colorist and so on) post about it on the Forums page. I even got a couple of gigs off there when I was first starting as well. But we'll save that for another blog ;)
This is an older set up from a few years ago (can't even remember the show)
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