Monster Commute – a Traffic Novel

As you might know, Monster Commute is a production of our company “Steam Crow.” It’s not like we’re corporate by any means (we’re not), as it’s just Dawna and me doing everything. However, I didn’t want to call the company “Daniel McDavis” since I wanted Dawna to be really involved.

Why “Steam Crow?”

Well, the company began quickly, after we attended the 2005 SDCC. I got right to work writing and drawing Caught Creatures, our monster haiku book, and eventually, this project needed a name.

I wanted a name that was unique, but also relevant to the monsters and creatures that I liked creating. After a few weeks of really working at it, I came up with our name:

Secret Creatures.

I loved the name. It was mysterious, and cool, and monstery and great. It did everything that I wanted it to do.

It was also trademarked by someone else.

Weeks before Caught Creatures went to press, I was contacted by the trademark holder to cease and disist using the Secret Creatures name. She then went on to offer it to me for a mere $10,000 which we simply didn’t have.

I was crushed.

We had to rush into a name selection, and it had to happen fast. I instantly thought of a character that I’d made up: Morrow Thatch, a steampunk powered scarecrow, who I always liked. He was a”Steam Crow.”

It was a very unique name, which was good as well. On the whole of the internet, I couldn’t find any other Steam Crow reference.

I did my due diligence, and did a trademark search. Clean, we moved ahead creating a new website, new logos, new cards… the works.

And, we’ve been Steam Crow ever since.

In fact, a lot of people think of ME personally as “SteamCrow” which is alright, but never my intention. I sorta think that fake artist tags are kinda lame, but on the other hand, there are millions of guys named “Daniel Davis” in the world.

- Daniel Steam Crow