This is the LAST DAY to vote for Phil Meadows and me in the “Small Press Idol” contest. This is an AMERICAN IDOL-ish contest held by Dime Store Publications for independent comic book creators.

To VOTE, go to our page on the DimeStore Forum, register as a user and then vote for us.
Broadband version.
Dial-Up version.

Our entry is from a project called “Metro Med”, which combines medical drama (like “E/R” and “Chicago Hope”) and superheroes. It’s about a special hospital that deals with all of the injured superheroes who come in with damaged radiation shields, poisonous skin, radioactive home planet fragment bullet wounds, half of their body in another dimension…or in the case pictured, a robotic suit that is defending itself from the doctor’s scalpel.

We could really use everyone’s vote. So far, we only have 22 votes. that may be enough, but if everyone gets last minute votes we could run the risk of losing. Please vote for us if you would. I have complete instructions on how this contest runs and how to vote in the Extended Entry below.

The way this contest works is, participants submit one image for voting. The judges look over the pencils and decide who makes it to the next stage, then we submit our inked version of the same image and this time THE PUBLIC votes. This means we need all of our friends and family and supporters and readers to go over to this forum, sign up to vote (it can’t be anonymous, or one person could keep re-voting) and then just click on the “YES” button to vote for us. Currently we have about 22 Yes votes and we need to get a bunch more by April 15th.

After April 15th, IF we make it, then we go to the colored version of the image along with a write-up of the characters. Once our colored version is posted, we have until May 15th to get enough votes to make it to the final round. That means that I’ll need you to vote again then. On May 15th, the final contestants submit two pages of their story and have until JUNE 15th to get their final votes and see who wins. The winner gets a full 8 page story published for FREE as part of DimeStorePublications new magazine. If we win, Phil and I are going to take the story and the publicity and try to launch a full “Metro Med” comic book either on our own or through a company like Image.

If you want me to e-mail you a reminder for each round, please let me know and I’ll send you another reminder in 30 days.

But for right now, I really need you to click on over to our entry and vote for us before April 15th. I will now specifically spell out how to do this for my mom and anyone else who might find this confusing. (That’s not meant to be insulting. This web site is actually a bit confusing.)

1. You need to sign up for Dime Store’s forum before you can vote. To do that, go here. Scroll to the bottom of the page, hit the button that says “Agree” and then fill out the basics of the form. (The five things at the top marked with red asterixes as the ONLY parts you have to fill in. Everything else on there is optional, for personalizing your posts if you want to stick around the forum and I’m betting you don’t.) Then submit it. I think it then e-mails you a confirmation e-mail. You open that e-mail, click the link in the e-mail to confirm that it’s you and you’ve used a proper e-mail address.

You won’t be added to a spam list or anything. There is a “Kick Start” newsletter that Dimestore puts out telling you how the contest is going; you can either read that each week to see how we’re faring, or you can click at the bottom to not get it anymore.

2. Now that you’re registered, you need to vote for us. If you’ve already clicked that link at the top of this e-mail (the one going to Michael and Phil’s contest entry), you’ll see the words “CLICK HERE” in big blue letters. You can do that and that will take you to the voting area. (That link I just made will also take you there.)

3. Okay, you’re on the voting page. You can tell because it begins with a post by the Admin (the guy with the animated wizard icon) asking how you feel about Michael Hutchison and Phil Meadows’ piece. Now that you’re logged in and on the right page, click the little circle button by “Yes, this is one of my favorites” and then the VOTE NOW button. DON’T click the “View Results” or you will not get a chance to vote for us and the vote won’t be counted!

4. That’s it! Now let’s hope that our totals beat the other totals and we make it to each eliminating round! Again, I will need your votes for the next rounds as well.

Oh, and one more thing you need to do: Use the form below to send this post to anyone else who might be willing to help.

Thank you very much for doing this. Phil Meadows and I (and our buddy Erik Burnham) will be at MicroCon in St. Paul, MN, signing copies of “Job Wanted.” That’s on April 25th.

Oh, and if you want to read “Job Wanted”, our first anthology that featured our first collaboration (it’s a space mystery story), just go to the web site and I’ll sell you one for a lot cheaper than the cover price. It’s a good book, but I mainly mention it because Melinda wants me to get rid of the leftovers so she can put her Longaberger baskets in that corner.