You’re already drawn to the comic, so why not get drawn into the comic?

With Volume 1 looming on the horizon and the holidays coming up, now’s the time to put together what it’ll take to make sure this preorder stays on schedule — which includes no small amount of fundraising! Since the start of Volume 2 (if not throughout Volume 2) is going to involve, among other things, a veritable battalion of Star Org soldiers, why not ask you to help me find a solution to both?

You can help support the comic and keep Volume 1 on track, and I can draw you into the comic as a Star Org soldier instead of having to come up with random extras! You’ll not only be helping me, you’ll become part of the story!

You know what a single cameo on a similar web comic went for last year? $1,750. The next highest bidder was willing to pay $1500 for the privilege! Even at that smaller sum, it’s still twenty-fold the price I’m asking here, which should be all it takes to convince you that this is a bargain price. The custom conbadge (each one an original piece of artwork!) included in the deal makes it all the sweeter.

So… why am I offering these cameos for so cheap?

Simple — I’m not arrogant enough to think I can convince one person to pay $1000+ for a cameo, but I’m pretty sure I can convince twenty folks to pay $50 (or fourteen folks to pay $75, or a dozen or so folks to buy a cameo and the rest just donate a few bucks and/or buy a shirt…), and besides that, we’re talking about needing no small sum of extras!

• For a basic cameo, $50 makes you a Star Org Cadet, complete with a custom conbadge of your character in their shiny new Org uniform (a $25 value!)  in addition to your cameo role in Volume 2 of Last Res0rt.
• For folks wanting to stand out among the troops, $75 makes you a Star Org Officer, which still gets you a custom conbadge of your character (still a $25 value!), but makes you a higher-ranking character and thus a better chance of getting good lines, having a more important role, a lower (but still non-zero) chance of dying a horrible death at the hands of our contestants… you get the idea. You want this.
• And of course, no matter which version you pick, both pieces (cameo and conbadge) are original artworks, digitally crafted to the same specs as anything else in the comic — which means you’ll be getting some high quality stuff out of this deal!

This way, everyone wins — I raise enough funds for the books that I can safely open preorders in a timely fashion, lots of folks receive a cameo in their favorite webcomic, and hopefully I don’t wear myself out on commissions in the process.

Some ground rules, though:

• The price you’re paying here only covers the conbadge + cameo deal — you can’t use the cameo as a way to purchase Volume 1 when and if it comes to print. (Likewise, paying more than the cameo price(s) is nice, but I still can’t sell what technically doesn’t exist yet.) If you really want to pay extra, consider buying a second cameo as a gift for a friend. The holidays ARE coming up, after all…
• The conbadge is included not only to make the deal sweeter, but also to verify that your character is being illustrated accurately. If you don’t want a physical, honest-to-god conbadge, I’m still doing it as an original, digital commission for the sake of being able to pin your character down properly.
• Please make sure to include enough information that I can accurately depict your character / yourself without too many revisions needed — reference images and specific details (a special accessory, a particular “quirk”, a certain way of wearing your outfit) help a lot!
• And don’t forget to include a mailing address — it’ll make it easier on me if I don’t have to ask you for it later (which will delay getting your badge shipped out!)
• You’re welcome to suggest any character (even a caricature of yourself if you like  – there ARE humans in this comic, after all!), but I still have the right to “adjust” characters as needed in order to keep them within the PG-13 rating, allow them to remain within the range of plausible canon, and avoid potential lawsuits because your species is somehow copyrighted, among other things. Yes, I’ll let you know what changes are necessary to make it all happen, but if you have a feeling your Electric Hedgehog Pokemon is going to need some major adjustments… talk to me first. Really, email works.

But wait, there’s more! Not interested in a cameo, but still want to help out? Donations are accepted as always, and just to sweeten the deal, you can get a sweet new wallpaper out of that nifty “Free Personality Test” image we’ve got up top of Jigsaw encountering our two hapless recruiters!

As always, any donation of $1 or more will net you this nifty wallpaper, available in a bevy of sizes. Who wouldn’t want one of these?

If you’d rather something a little more tangible, there’s no shortage of new shirts (and a hat!) available over at Zazzle as well! We’ve even got them on dark shirts this time around, too, so you can keep your geek cred intact and still have cool art to wear!

Don’t forget why we’re doing all of this — all proceeds, profits (HAH!), and assorted payments are going towards one thing and one thing only — covering the costs of what it’ll take to print the first volume of Last Res0rt!

… and I mean it.

In order to not go broke trying to provide a high-quality book (which would be the height of irony because books are supposed to, y’know, make enough money that they subsidize this whole “put comics on the web for free” thing), we need a good chunk of change set aside beforehand before I can even offer preorders.  If I don’t do this first, and people don’t order enough books to cover my costs, I’ll have to print them on-demand, which is… well, it’s expensive all around, especially for me since I’ll still need at least a couple dozen set aside for the year’s conventions either way.

In fact, it’s entirely possible that I might hold off until after the first few conventions in order to make sure I have the funds, which would defeat the point of rushing to have these books ready in time, and depending on how well those conventions do…

We could all be waiting a while for these books to show up. Nobody wants that.

On the other hand, if we raise enough for the printing costs first, I can safely offer preorders within the next couple of months, get the books printed at a reasonable rate (or at least reasonable enough that I can have something resembling a profit margin here), and make sure I have books in time for my March conventions (Furry Weekend Atlanta, MomoCon, possibly others) without having to wait to the last minute for funds or any other potential hiccups that could cause problems!

So… go ahead and order a cameo. Even if I offer these in the future, you can bet they’re going to cost more than they do right now, and every purchase goes towards the printing of the first book (which can only make the comic even better than it already is)! No matter how much you contribute, it can only help… so go ahead and order one now!

1. It’s good practice. All art is, really.
2. If you’re not already drawing a comic, it’s good to learn how to. Anything that encourages you to find new ways to be familiar with Photoshop can’t hurt!
3. Free publicity! Because we all know everyone wants more traffic/popularity, right? What better way to get it than to have a sample of your work on display somewhere you know people are already looking?
4. So many artists insist on sticking to their personal artistic ruts. Some people draw only girls, or only furries, or only characters that look like you just put together some paper dolls… doing a guest strip forces you to stretch your creative horizons!
5. It’s a way to volunteer your time. Ever wanted to volunteer your time to something worthwhile but don’t have the energy to go spend a day picking up litter by the side of the road? Guest strips take a load off the artist’s back by giving them time they would be spending on that update and being able to put it towards other projects!
6. You get a link back to your own projects / accounts! People knowing you’re cool is one thing, but people knowing you’re cool and knowing they can go to your own webcomic / dA / FA account to find more cool stuff you drew is even better.
7. Acknowledgements from the artist(s)! Hey, this just feels good.
8. Transformative works rock! People love to see stuff in a new light — this is why people love parodies, after all, and being able to take the same stuff on in new perspectives is really eye-opening.
9. Legitimate fanart! Fanart’s a tricky subject to broach, but let’s face it — being legitimized by having it featured on the website is a great thing, and plus, it’s not only fun, it’s also directly beneficial since it’s helping the comic you already know and love!
10. I need Guest Strips! Yup, this one’s the real reason I’m telling you all this other stuff – and go on, you saw it coming anyway.

Don’t worry, nothing bad’s happened — in fact, just the opposite. Volume 1 is almost over, which means we’re about to shift storylines, and more importantly… there’s a book coming soon!

… and I am freaking out like crazy over it!

Books take a lot of things, but in this case, they mostly take time — time to do print-exclusive material, time to draw the cover, time to assemble the book in a way that the printer can handle it,  time to find a printer that’ll print it for cheap enough that I’m not losing money  on the sale, time to promote the book so I actually sell enough preorders to afford the first print run because NOBODY who does Print-On-Demand does color at anything remotely close to reasonable prices… you get the idea.

Long story short, I would love a few weeks off like you wouldn’t believe. Save somehow learning to clone myself so I can draw pages  in half the time, the easiest thing to do is post some Guest Strips as a breather, but in order to do that, I need guest strips in the first place!

There should only need to be about a month’s worth of guest strips, but I’ll post all the strips that I think’re good, and each one of ‘em will come with credit and a link back. This ought to be plenty of time to get things right, and then when we’re done, we ought to be ready to leap into a whole new volume and get the heads ball rolling again.

And oh, will it all be glorious.

Footnote: No, I didn’t realize the timing of this page until it was time to put it up on the site. That the pages where Jigsaw finally gets to transform where we all get to see it just happen to fall on Halloween is a big ol’ coincidence.

… And one I hope you enjoy.

If you’re paying attention, you’ve noticed that spiffy glowy version of Last Res0rt’s logo… it’s a special lineworked version, in the style of Hugh MacLeod (’cept ours is nice and radial, and in the shape of the logo), and looks sweet all by itself.

And if you’d like a closer look at it as well, you’re welcome to it — so long as you’re willing to buy a shirt or two from Last Res0rt On Demand (available at Zazzle!) with the design on it! These shirts are made to same high quality standards as all other Zazzle Merchandise (which is to say, it beats the pants off Cafepress), and all pieces come with the art on the front and a little URL for the sake of “you know where this came from” on the back.

Naturally, all purchases from the shop help keep the comic going, and even when they don’t, it’s a nice ego boost. So go buy a shirt today!

It’s that convention exclusive wallpaper that you may already have if you went to Mephit Fur Meet and looked in the conbook like we suggested you did. You used to be able to get this baby for free… if you had the special coupon code hidden in the conbook, which only a few lucky folks had access to.

Well, good news! Now everyone can have this wallpaper!

It’s the newest donation incentive, which means all you have to do to get it is donate some money via Paypal (minimum $1) , either through that handy link or by clicking on the donation image up top. And it’s colored up for Halloween too, which makes it all the more timely!

So go on, grab a new wallpaper today!

Since doing cast pictures for all of ‘em isn’t happening anytime soon, I’ve taken the cast page and updated it with a slew of faces and descriptions, which should be plenty to keep you busy and able to identify everyone. Also, since some of the characters are better explained than others, you might find out some new stuff about the more obscure characters in there…

Go check out the cast page now!