Indie Interviews - Dream Fury Comics

This week we sit down and talk to the awesome person at Dream Fury Comics. If you like comics, and we’re sure you do, you’ll want to take a peek at what they’re up to. After you’re done, be sure to check out their work here.

What was your reason for getting into comics? That is, how did you end up involved in comics?

I’ve been reading comics since I was ten years old. I loved them so much that I drew my own comics. Although I loved creating comics when I was young, I never really considered it as a future profession. Part of that reason was that I had computer programming as another passion. I’m currently a computer programmer and I love it, but I’m also a creative person. For years I’ve had stories just building in my head. Then a couple of years ago, I discovered the comic book category on Kickstarter. When I saw people (who were creating comic books for the first time) getting funded, I was hooked on the idea of creating a comic book via Kickstarter. So on December 2016, I decided to seriously pursue the idea of printing my first comic book. Within a few months, I had started the Crescent City Monster webcomic to build a following for the Kickstarter project.

Who would you say is your comic book inspiration as a writer?

As a writer, I would say that Robert Kirkman’s Walking Dead comic book series is the most recent inspiration. Years ago I was into only superhero comics and had very little interest in any other type of comics. But when I started reading the Walking Dead a few years ago that changed. There were so many things that I loved about Walking Dead comic series. The one thing that amazed me was Kirkman’s pacing of the story. When there was no action for a long period of time it never felt like the story was dragging. Pacing is one thing I’m still learning to master.

Before comics, what did you do? If you’re still doing it, what are you doing?

When I started my webcomic I was a programmer and I’m still a programmer. Even if I quit my job and became a full-time comic book writer, I’d still probably program as a hobby.

What was your first work in comics like?

Crescent City Monsters is my first major webcomic. It’s been a great experience mostly because of the awesome Crescent City Monsters artist, Gian Carlo Bernal. Gian’s artwork inspires the way I visualize the story. I imagine how panels would look in Gian’s art style. If it doesn’t look right in my imagination I’ll tweak it. I feel those tweaks have always made the story better. It feels like we have a symbiotic relationship. My words inspire his art and his art inspire my words.

How many years have you been working in comics?

If you count the years since I was ten years old, it’s been decades. LOL. I’ve been working on Crescent City Monsters for about a year.

Tell me a little bit about your work. Where does it draw inspiration from? Where do you come up with your ideas?

Some of my ideas come from actual real-life events or people. I’ll read or hear some small thing that really interests me. Then I’ll think about all the different aspects I can explore with the idea. I’ll do some research on Wikipedia for anything that could make the story interesting. If I find a ton of cool things that can add some meat to the story then I’ll put the story on a must-write list. Crescent City Monsters was a bit different. As I mentioned I’m a fan of the Walking Dead comic series. There seemed to be a zombie craze at the time. While thinking about this zombie craze a thought occurred to me. Why not create a zombie story leaning towards Haitian zombies? As I thought about what would be the motivation for turning the main character into a zombie the story morphed into something larger than a zombie story.

Who have you worked alongside in the industry?

So far I’ve only worked with Gian Carlo Bernal, who has a few indie comics under his belt. Gian has worked on Last Days of Kevin, Valkyrie Saviors, and the Ronin.

Growing up, who is your favorite character or team? Who is it now?

This is a hard question for me to answer. I love many of the Marvel characters and teams. I probably leaned towards Wolverine as my favorite character growing up. Currently, it’s a tie between Wolverine and Thor.

Do you have any advice for a new person who is just getting into the business?

I’m just starting out myself but the one advice I would give is to work with an artist in which you feel in sync. When that happens both of you will really be into the project and it will improve your story.

Where do you see your work taking you?

I hope to start writing a lot more webcomics in the future. I have a few unique ideas across different genres that I want to put out into the world. I would also love to create a web series on YouTube. I dabbled a little bit in video content creation and I find that I enjoy writing and producing videos content.

What are you up to next?

We’re going to wrap-up chapter one of Crescent City Monsters and begin the Kickstarter project in a few months. So look out for that. I’m also starting to work on another webcomic series. It’s a story about Hercules with a different take on the character. It’s going to be a fun action adventure story.

Where do you see the direction of the comic industry heading in 20 years?

I’m going to go out on the limb and predict semi-crazy somethings. There will still be comics in print but they will mostly be graphic novels. Single issues will die out. I think the big publishers will lose market share to the smaller independent publishers. I think this because I believe, in general, all entertainment will depend less on established channels or large distributors. We’ll become a more content creating focused society.

How can people get ahold of you?

You can find Dream Fury Comics on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook at @DreamFuryComics

Where can we buy and/or see your work?

You can read the Crescent City Monsters webcomic for free by visiting the Dream Fury Comics website at www.DreamFuryComics.com

Any last words for the industry?

Keep an eye on me! You won’t be disappointed!

A Little History…

Newton Lilavois is the creator and writer of the action-horror webcomic Crescent City Monsters from Dream Fury Comics. He was born in Haiti and grew up in New York City.

As a child, Newton was surrounded by other children who also loved to draw superheroes or collect comics. It was in this environment that Newton took his passion for comics to the next level. At the age of ten, he started drawing his own comics and selling them to kids in his class.

As Newton got older, his other passion, computer programming, took precedence in his life, but the stories were always there. Year after year Newton’s imagination kept producing new stories in his head.

Then one day while backing a project on Kickstarter he discovered the comics category. There he saw a bunch of first-time comic creators and experienced indie creators who were fulfilling their dreams of creating comics. He was hooked and determined to finally put his stories out into the world. Crescent City Monsters is the first webcomic from Dream Fury Comics with much more to come.

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Indie Interviews – Dream Fury Comics