[KRISTY] VALENTI: I think there is a wolf cycle going on right now in indy comics; there was that werewolf anthology they put out at CCS.

[TOM] NEELY: I haven’t seen it.

VALENTI: I don’t know if it was the whole vampire-werewolf-zombie cycle or —

NEELY: I have no idea. I have specifically avoided reading most comics while working on The Wolf. Except for a few exceptions from friends, but I didn’t want to be influenced by anything contemporary or any external ideas. But I was very conscious of Twilight and all that stuff happening around me. And my mom was always like, “Oh, I think your book is gonna do really well, because everybody’s into werewolves and scary stuff.” And I’m like, “Mom …” And she’s like, “You should market this to the Twilight…” And I was like, “I’m not marketing my semi-pornographic book to teenage girls.”

[Valenti laughs.] That will get me arrested [chuckles].

It’s just a coincidence. It wasn’t any specific attempt to tap into that market, I was just off doing my own werewolf thing in my cave. And apparently there’s other stuff going on too — I didn’t even realize Jason did a werewolf story until somebody told me that the other day. So I haven’t really kept up with anybody [chuckles]. That’s what’s nice about finishing it, is now I’m getting to read all these books that I’ve avoided for the last five years. And someone else brought up that there’s a lot more sex in indy comics right now too. And I was unaware of that as well. Maybe there’s just something in the collective unconscious that’s leading us down that path. But it wasn’t any conscious attempt at being a part of that. I’m largely unaware; I guess there is a lot of it.

—Cartoonist and painter Tom Neely on pop culture and alternative comics’ mutual season of the wolf, in conversation with The Comics Journal‘s Kristy Valenti. He’s right — altcomix really are having a bit of a sexy time right now, and horror has gone hand in hand with that, for whatever reason. It’s interesting to think that even some of the artists responsible for this don’t realize it until they emerge from the trees enough to get a good look at the forest.

Valenti’s life- and career-spanning interview with Neely is a must-read, and not just because of insights like these into Neely’s wordless psycho-sexual-surreal-semiautobiographical graphic novel The Wolf, one of the year’s best comics. It paints a compelling portrait of how a restless and idiosyncratic artist can maintain a balance between pursuing his vision and the need to work with others — peers, publishers, day-job providers — to do so. His revelations about his failure to come to terms with Top Shelf for publishing his breakout book The Blot, the pros and cons of working as an animator for Disney, and his interaction with the alternative-comics scenes in Los Angeles and Portland all make for reading that’s both depressing and instructive. Check it out.

Following up on the interview I posted today, we’re happy to bring you a preview of Torn, the graphic novel by Andrew Constant, Nicola Scott (Birds of Prey, Secret Six) and Joh James (I.C.E., RPM). The pages include the prologue drawn by Scott (who also drew the cover), followed by a sequence of pages drawn by James.

The book is published by Gestalt Comics, who can be found in San Diego at booth #4500-4501. Check out the preview after the jump …

The book is published by Gestalt Comics, an Australian publisher exhibiting at the show this week in booth #4500-4501 (you can find their signing schedule here). Constant took the time to answer some of my questions about the book both before and after his transcontinental flight from Australia.

JK: Torn is your debut graphic novel, correct? How did the project come together?

Andrew: Torn is my debut graphic novel. It came about due to my love of the werewolf and my boredom at their current interpretations as seen across a variety of mediums. This is not to say I’m a genius writer (far from it, actually), I just thought that there was room for a different type of story, one which may challenge the reader, rather than play to preconceived notions of what a werewolf story should be.

Nicola has been a friend for ages, and she had some time many moons ago (moons, get it? sigh…), so drew the prologue for me. From there, I shopped the concept around. There were many expressions of interest, but it wasn’t until I came across Gestalt Comics that I found the best publishing home for the work.

JK: What is Torn about?

Andrew: The big picture concept is that it is the story of a wolf who is transformed into a man, in a brutal and tragic fashion. We then follow his difficult and violent journey as he tries to come to terms with his new identity in the alien landscape of a harsh and unforgiving city.

"Torn" art by Nicola Scott

JK: In regards to horror comics and movies in general and werewolf or shapeshifter tales in particular, what are some of your favorites?

Andrew: Now that is a hard question! Horror movies: I really like An American Werewolf in London, Dog Soldiers, Hellraiser and Seven.

Horror books: Anything by Joe Hill, Clive Barker, Charlie Huston and Joe R. Lansdale.

And with horror comics, Joe Hill’s Locke and Key has been excellent. Though I also classify The Punisher by Garth Ennis as a big horror fave.

JK: How did Joh James come to be involved with the project?

Andrew: Joh was found by a buddy of mine, who recommended that he would be great for the book. After viewing some of Joh’s art, I knew he would be fantastic. He gives the story a real atmospheric and visceral feel.

JK: Do you have plans for more comics after this?

"Torn" art by Joh James

Andrew: I have quite a bit of work coming up, especially with Gestalt Comics. They’ve proven to be a fantastic collaborator, and encourage me to stretch what talent I have as far and as high as I can.

Gestalt and I are currently working on a straight noir book; no supernatural elements, but, like Torn, it tries to play with genre conventions.

JK: Is this your first time to come to San Diego, or just your first time on the other side of the table?

Andrew: Ha! No, I’ve been to San Diego a LOT. This is just my maiden voyage answering rather than asking questions.

JK: Is there anything you’re personally hoping to be able to check out at the con this year?

Andrew: Like every year, I’m going to wait until I get the program in my hand, and then attempt to find some sane path through the infinite choice.

The Wolfman

Today marks the third anniversary of our werewolf western series HIGH MOON. To celebrate, Steve Ellis and I thought we’d take the time to share with you our top list of werewolves that have influenced, entertained, and inspired us over the years.

Starting with this classic:

6. The Wolf Man

SE: You can’t go wrong with this classic tale of innocent Larry Talbot, a poor bastard of a man, who gets caught up in circumstances that are out of his control. I saw this when I was younger – so I’m not sure how much it would still hold up though.

DG: This is a simple yet effective atmospheric masterpiece of horror. Lon Chaney Jr. plays his role to perfection. This is the foundation that all great werewolf movies should be built upon.

5. Werewolf / Being Human

DG: As a kid, I was forbidden from seeing this show on FOX – but that didn’t really stop me. I would totally watch it when my parents were asleep – it was so taboo. I look at this as one of the major influences of High Moon for me. It doesn’t hold up that well, but there is something about it that still sticks with me.

SE: This show made me understand that when you have a low-budget – using shadow was a great way to hide your lousy special effects. It reminds me of something else … what’s that show … on BBC?

Being Human

DG: BEING HUMAN?

SE: Oh my god – totally awesome show – oh my god! Sorry, Gallaher – that’s my pick for #5. Amazing show. Fantastic story. Chilling ambiance. Great characters.

DG: Fair enough.

4 .Werewolf: The Apocalypse

DG: In the early 90s, White Wolf created an intriguing and complex role-playing game, which let players take on the roles of lycanthropic warriors who were locked in a battle of spiritual corruption and urban devastation – a battle that was set to bring about the Apocalypse. This is the first RPG that I played that really focused on character development, personal growth, and complex struggles.

SE: It was a hell of a lot of fun to play too. I love the ideas they came up with – and I loved they way the werewolves looked, the way they behaved – and it was really unique at the time. This is really what got me into werewolves.

3. Werewolf by Night

DG: When I think of comic book werewolves, Jack Russell is always at the top of the list. My first experience with Werewolf By Night was through Power Record’s CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF book and record set. The creepy music, the overwrought voiceovers, and the dynamic art really had a dramatic influence on my poor five-year old mind.

SE: You know it’s funny – I only read a few issues of this, but it doesn’t stick with me the same way it does with you. But – when Bill Sienkiewicz drew Moon Knight fighting Werewolf By Night – THAT was absolutely mind-blowing. I think it was in Issue #29 of the Moon Knight series. Amazing.

2. American Werewolf in London

DG: Despite the fact that you never see a “werewolf with a Chinese menu in his hand walking through the streets of Soho in the rain” at any point in this film, it is still pretty damn amazing.

SE: John Landis and the spirited cast make one hell of a flick – with easily the most terrifying werewolf transformation scene ever committed to film. This is really one of the creepiest movies I have ever seen – it freaked the crap out of me. The special effects were really tremendous.

1. Dog Soldiers

Dog Soldiers

SE: Stomach-churning special effects and a unique twist on the werewolf design. This British film by Neil Marshall begins with a couple camping in the Scottish Highlands – and ends in utter bloodshed.

DG: You stole my stomach-churning joke, but yeah – this is probably my favorite werewolf film. Without a doubt. Scary. Haunting. Intense.

SE: Agreed.

DG: So there you have it … our choice for the top werewolves in entertainment — please be sure to check out some of these comics, films, and television shows this Halloween.

SE: Thanks for joining us.

Tiede recently wrapped up the first act with volume 3 of the print edition, so it seemed like a good time to check in and ask some questions.

Brigid: What was your initial inspiration for Paradigm Shift?

Dirk: It wasn’t so much a single point of inspiration, but a rolling series of them ranging from superheroes, role-playing games, cop shows, ’80s action movies, horror novels, and eventually, anime and manga, too. The characters originally came from a tabletop superhero role-playing game I played at a time when I was reading X-Men and The New Mutants and watched way too much Law & Order. And while I was also a big fan of Stephen King’s earlier works like Carrie and Firestarter, I also ate up films like Robocop and Lethal Weapon. Later on I discovered works like Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira and Masamune Shirow’s Appleseed, which played a big role in rekindling my interest in drawing comics. I was really into The X-Files when I finally started writing Paradigm Shift, but I also took more than a few cues from movies like Running Scared (the one from the ’80′s with Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines) for the action/comedy elements.

However, it wasn’t until I moved to Chicago that I was finally motivated to pick up the pencil and draw the comic. There was something about living in a real, breathing city that suddenly got me excited about doing it. Bringing in real places was the thing that made telling the story much more compelling than just another experiment in genre remixing.

Strange as it sounds, I should also mention that aside from American Werewolf in London, werewolf films didn’t have much influence on the story until well after I was already posting Paradigm Shift on the web. While I’ve found a few gems, my opinion remains that most of them are dreadful.

All that said, like any good creator I’m constantly letting new books, films, comics, and other media inspire ways to make my stories more complex and compelling, and it’s an ever-changing list. I also am still a big fan of police procedurals, though these days my tastes range more towards shows like The Wire.

Brigid: What about the characters—were they based on people you know, or were they riffs on standard archetypes?

Dirk: A little of both, of course. Just as most characters are little pieces of the their authors, Kate and Mike embody different parts of my own personality; the deliberate, calculating left brain and intuitive, creative right brain intentionally echoing the Apollo vs. Dionysus dichotomy of intellect opposing emotion. Of course, this falls perfectly in line with cool-headed vs. fiery-tempered buddy cop stereotypes, too. The male/female pairing was also a conscious nod as well, though that’s definitely a more common trope these days.

Though, while using archetypes allowed for quick introductions, the idea was to stretch beyond them as the story progressed. Instead of just following a formula, I could let the situations expose new wrinkles on the characters. I also brought in elements from people around them to me. Dialogue was often gleaned from real conversations. Mike’s martial arts training and zen outlook borrow much from a couple of friends, and Kate’s grumpy side has roots in the real world as well.

Brigid: It seems like in the beginning, you use a lot of cop-show tropes—the wisecracks, people out on a walk finding the body, the chewing out by the superior, etc. Then later on the story turns in a different way. Were you consciously adopting that structure, and how did it help you (or constrain you) as you wrote?

Dirk: Yes. That was deliberate. The premise from the beginning was to shift genres mid-stream, so I wanted to use recognizable story elements to set up expectations, and then knock them down.

That said, considering the long timeframe it took to write and draw the series, my tastes and expectations also changed through the course of writing the story. What started out to be more of an action-comedy took on a much more serious tone towards the end.

Brigid: How did you plan out the story? Did you know from the beginning how it would end, and how you would get there, or are you improvising as you go?

Dirk: I originally wrote the entire plot out—first in outlined notes, and then in prose form. However, when it came to scripting, I would write it in fits and starts, often letting new inspiration shape the details of each scene. Because of this, there are elements in the story that play a much bigger role in the final pages than appeared in the original draft. For instance, the scene in Part Two where Kate and Mike interview the homeless witness Frederick was written after sharing dinner with a homeless man who told me his own story, but never appeared in the original outline.

I should also mention that I don’t do everything entirely alone. I have a friend who plays editor for me, who’s been looking over my scribbling ever since I handed her the original outline at a coffee shop in the fall of 1998. I bounce story ideas off her, and send her my scripts, and she sends back suggestions and dialogue changes. We go back and forth, and the story is much stronger for it. She likes to keep a low profile online, though I give her due credit in the books.

Brigid: More so than most comics, Paradigm Shift really has a sense of place—you set the different scenes in specific neighborhoods, and you include carefully rendered buildings and cityscapes in your backgrounds. Yet halfway through the comic, you moved to Massachusetts. Has that changed the comic’s sense of place?

Dirk: More so for the upcoming story line. I did some planning before we moved in 2008 to make sure I had all the reference material I needed in order to complete Part Three. At this point I have thousands of Chicago photos in my library, but it doesn’t hurt that I make it back there a few times a year for conventions since we left. I always bring my camera and snap more pictures when I’m visiting.

However, the new story line finds Kate and Mike on the road, and while some scenes will still take place in Chicago, I’ll be working in new locations. While I’m not strictly limiting myself to specific places I’ve been, I am trying to include regions for which I have at least some familiarity. I also plan to do some research on my travels to and from conventions this spring and summer, so I can continue to pay attention to the details of my settings.

Brigid: Also, you use a lot of unusual panels and devices, like the scene where Kate and Mike are chasing a bad guy, and Mike takes the stairs and Kate takes the elevator, and you use a stairstep pattern for the panels, with the elevator numbers counting off the floors. Which comes first in a scene like that—do you decide to draw the scene, then fit it into the story, or do you start with the scene and work toward the composition?

Dirk: While the story always comes first, I don’t always know how exactly I am going to depict a scene when I first write it. It depends. The trick with the stair-step panels vs. elevator numbers was just a spur of the moment inspiration that occurred to me one day while riding one up to my job on the 20th floor in downtown Chicago at the time. Whereas I had always planned to do away with the distinct panel order and borders in the nightmare sequences, though I didn’t know exactly how until I was drawing the final layouts.

Regardless, I always make sure my panel compositions somehow reflect what is going on in the story. For example, I tend to make the action scenes’ panels more energetic and angular, and overlap them to give a sense that all these chaotic events are happening all at once, and the panels themselves almost appear to fall down the page as a result.

Brigid: To what extent are you thinking about the eventual print edition as you work on the comic? Do you deliberately structure the story so each part will fit neatly into a single volume, for instance?

Dirk: The plan from the start was always to release the story in book form, and I wrote each part with that in mind. That said, I didn’t let specific page counts dictate how long each book went.

The first three books Part One: Equilibrium, Part Two: Agitation, and Part Three: Emergence make up what I call ACT I, which I initially intended to be a single book. However, after taking three years to just complete Equilibrium, I decided to release it in pieces.

I did alter Part Three’s story somewhat to allow for a more thematically complete end to ACT I. Admittedly, it’s still pretty open-ended, but it’s a vast improvement over the blatant cliff-hanger called for in the original outline.

Now that I have the first three volumes complete, I will probably opt for the original plan when I run out of copies of the current books, and reprint them as an ACT I omnibus.

Brigid: What sort of changes do you make to the comic when you go to the print edition?

Dirk: It’s varied from book to book. Part One: Equilibrium saw the most changes before its first edition, because it was my first foray into the professional comics world. I made substantial changes to the artwork in the first 20 pages of the story, including redrawing several panels, and completely re-doing the graytones on several pages. I also did touchups and updated the lettering throughout the book.

Part Two saw some touchups to artwork and dialogue, but nothing on the same scale as the first book. Part Three mostly just saw minor touchups, but I did re-kern all the lettering. It was probably more work than I really needed to do, but I’m a completionist. Once I started it, I had to finish.

Then there’s the footnotes. I compile those once the artwork is complete.

Brigid: Do you go back and put those changes into the webcomic, or does it remain as an earlier version?

Dirk: Up until I launched my new website, only the most glaring ones. The archives at Webcomicsnation.com and ModernTales.com have the updated version of Part One: Equilibrium, but Parts Two and Three remain the same as when I first posted them.

However, my new website (www.paradigmshiftmanga.com) has updated versions of the artwork to all three books—as well as footnotes!

Brigid: The ending of volume 3 was more like a beginning! You still have a lot of questions to answer and situations to resolve. (Like, are there still man-made werewolves wandering at large in Chicago and elsewhere?) How do these three volumes fit into the story as a whole?

Dirk: While I altered ACT I’s story line so it would be complete enough that it could stand on its own should I get run over by that proverbial bus, it was always intended to be the setup for the larger story. If this had been a superhero book, it would have been Kate’s origin story, if you will.

ACT I ends with the first true—dare I say it?—”paradigm shift” as Kate and Mike discover the true nature of their investigations, and there’s distinct change in genres as ACT II begins. Where ACT I is a cop story, ACT II will be a fugitive story.

Rest assured there is more on the way! I’ll be starting up ACT II later this spring or early summer on my new website, starting with Part Four. And, assuming that I complete ACT II on schedule in a few years, there will also be an ACT III down the road.

Paradigm Shift

Paradigm Shift starts out like any other buddy-cop story, with donuts, wisecracks, and corpses turning up in the bushes, but halfway through, it lives up to its name and crosses over into darker territory.

In the beginning, the detectives in question, Kate McAllister and Mike Stuart, are as smooth as they come. They have their differences—Kate’s a bit tougher, Mike’s a bit cooler—but their relationship runs on easy patter and unspoken coordination. Tiede is subtle, introducing Kate’s demons a little at a time—a sudden flash of dizziness, a wound that heals too quickly—but as the story goes on, we see her unravel more and more until it’s hard to say what is nightmare and what is real. Mike, on the other hand, starts out as an understated character, but his quietness conceals his strength. Again, there is a slow build; his offhand mentions of martial arts and Zen Buddhism foreshadow his full development as a character later in the story.

Warning: Spoilers ahead.

The central mystery of this series is a series of murders that seem to be done by a wild animal—the victims’ necks are snapped and their bodies are severely clawed. The medical examiner is convinced that only an animal could have inflicted this particular type of wound, but Kate isn’t so sure, and her intuition leads her to believe that a human is behind the murders. As the case goes on, her insights become too good—in nightmares and blackouts she becomes a werewolf, and as the story goes on, it gets harder to sort out dream from reality. By the most recent episodes, Kate is staring at the possibility that she herself may be one of the murderers.

That possibility is the paradigm shift of the title. As in all good cop stories, Tiede spends a lot of time developing a cast of characters with different personalities—Gina, the uptight medical examiner; Ed and Vince, the tough-guy detectives from a different precinct; the beleaguered captain—a whole ecosystem of cops that are bound together despite their personality conflicts. Kate may be a bit of a loose cannon, but she works with her partners, protecting them in times of danger. The thought that she might have an alternate self is shattering, and she tries to bury it, with decreasing success as the story goes on.

Tiede is an excellent storyteller, and the central mystery is a good one that he develops well, but the subplot (which begins the story) is flabby. Kate and Mike find out that Alfonse, a known bad guy, is living in a posh building on the Magnificent Mile, so they go pay him a visit. Kate’s protestation aside, renting a fancy apartment is not probable cause for anything. A pal comes to the door, Alfonse warns him off, and the detectives chase him, Mike taking the stairs, Kate taking the elevator. It’s a great scene—Tiede’s scattered, slanted panels made me feel like I was hurtling down 12 floors—but at the end, when they haul the bad guys off to the police station, I still wasn’t sure what anyone had done. Similarly, the interrogation scene, in which Tiede uses symmetrically arranged panels to show Kate and Mike questioning the two suspects in separate rooms—is beautifully laid out, but they seem to be fishing around. This part of the story seems to be a case of form over function—there are great fights, chase scenes, the interrogation of a hospitalized suspect in Mandarin, all beautifully drawn, but the underlying plot lacks enough detail to be convincing. It seems like it’s just an excuse for some kickass fight scenes, although there are hints that it will tie into the other storyline by the end.

Also, Tiede wrote this comic over a period of years, and naturally his style develops over the course of the story. Kate’s nightmare sequences are some of the strongest pages in the comic, in terms of composition and art as well as storytelling.

Paradigm Shift has a manga look to it; Kate’s hair is straight out of Akihabara, and Tiede uses sound effects, speed lines, and other standard manga techniques. His style is fairly mature, though, close to the look of seinen (young men’s) manga in Japan. And he avoids the two standard bugaboos of global manga creators, overusing screentones and using character design to mask weaknesses in basic anatomy. Tiede’s figures are stylized, but they are also solid, if a bit stiff in places. Most of the time they move convincingly, and the action scenes are nicely choreographed.

Where Tiede’s technique really shines, though, is in the composition of his pages and his creative use of different panel shapes and formats to advance the story. He breaks the action into small panels and pulls back for the big picture; he overlaps the panels in creative ways, and he uses diagonals and diamond-shaped panels both for action scenes and for strong emotions. These techniques pull the reader through the story and also result in pages that are quite beautiful in their own right, as works of art.

Paradigm Shift is set in Chicago, and each chapter is set in a specific area of the city. While his backgrounds are cleaner than the real thing, Tiede has a good sense of the architecture and the feel of the different parts of the city, and many of his establishing shots are lovely, even the drawings of the grittier areas.

Although Paradigm Shift is a webcomic, it looks better in print. I bought the first two volumes at NYAF and was very pleased with my purchase; Tiede really knows how to put a book together. A lot of self-published comics look like crap (paper that’s too white, iffy print quality). Tiede picked a nice, creamy paper with a bit of texture for his books, and the lines are smoother in the book than on the web, where the diagonals take on a jagged look. More importantly, the pages in the book are presented as single pages, whereas online Tiede lays out each chapter as one long vertical scroll. That makes a difference: Online, because of Tiede’s creative paneling, the page breaks are not as obvious, so it’s hard to grasp each page as a unit. And of course the pages are a bit longer than my monitor is deep, so I can’t see the entire page at once. All that goes away in the book. What’s more, Tiede loads his books with extras—character bios, notes on the setting and action, even a comics drawing tutorial. It’s like getting the director’s cut, with extra commentary.

As I write this, the online story is drawing to a close, and I feel the same way I do toward the end of a Preston Sturges film: The characters have gone so far from their starting points that I don’t see how this could possibly end. Unfortunately, Tiede doesn’t seem to have updated the comic in a couple of months. With the denouement so close, I hope he picks up the pen pretty soon and wraps up this story. Then I’m going to track him down and buy the third volume, because it really is that good.

This weekend marks the coming of the  Harvest Moon,  the full Moon that occurs closest to the autumn equinox.

In two years out of three, the Harvest Moon comes in September, but this year it occurs in October just before hunting season.

This ominous moon also signals the debut the long-awaited fourth season of the werewolf epic – HIGH MOON!

Written by myself, illustrated by Steve Ellis, and lettered by Scott O. Brown, this season brings Macgregor to the streets of London where he must unravel a hidden family curse before it claims its next victim.

After this weekend’s update, you see new pages every Monday by sundown.

Katelyn Rae Rochelle

While the actual recognition ceremony for the first recipient of “The Ringo”: The Mike Wieringo Scholarship Award was on Saturday night (prior to the HeroesCon Annual Art Auction), Matt Wieringo posted the full scoop on his personal blog on Tuesday. The recipient of the $1,100 award is Katelyn Rae Rochelle, a Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) student who hopes to pursue a career in comic books after graduation. To quote Matt from his announcement: “Remember that name. I think you’ll be hearing it a lot in a couple years.”

Rochelle attended HeroesCon on Saturday and spent some time with one of her instructors, Tom Lyle, at the SCAD booth. She also hung out with Matt and his wife Suzanne. When asked about her genre preference, Rochelle expressed an interest in working in horror–potentially something with werewolves. According to Matt: “We took her around to meet a few of Mike’s friends who offered her some free, friendly advice. Todd Dezago, being Todd Dezago, teased her at every opportunity.”

When reached for comment, Dezago denied Matt’s vicious allegations. In all seriousness, Dezago said of Rochelle: “She was a good sport and is a very talented young artist. I loved the work that she sent in as samples and think that, as Matt says, we’ll be seeing more of her in the future.”

“Though Matt and Suzanne and I were friends before, Mike’s death certainly brought us closer and I can’t think of two nicer, more caring, or generous people,” Dezago said. “Their desire to create the scholarship in Mike’s name, and all the very hard work they’ve put into it, is such a wonderful tribute to his memory and, hopefully, a chance for some struggling students to get a leg up as they rocket toward their artistic futures.”

Matt conceded in the official announcement that the selection process was more challenging than he had expected it to be. “We assumed we’d get the portfolios from the three finalists and one would stand out above all others immediately and that would be that,” Matt admitted. “But this was not meant to be. I guess the finalists wouldn’t have been finalists if there wasn’t something there and the decision was very difficult, almost heart-breaking.”

The criteria for the $1,100 award is detailed at the SCAD website: “The recipient of this scholarship must be a full-time undergraduate student studying sequential art. All applicants must have a minimum cumulative GPA of 3.0 and demonstrate financial need. Finalists will be expected to submit a portfolio. This scholarship is renewable up to three times as long as the recipient continues to meet established criteria.”

Future plans for the scholarship fund include developing a website, according to Matt. Robot 6 will provide a link to the new website once it is live.