So…Girlamatic, the girl-friendly, webcomics site has been redone and has relaunched with everything free! Before, Girlamatic had worked on a system of a free area and a subscriber only area, but in terms of the changing times of the internet (which hasn’t seen people latch onto subscriber based options as much as it has ad based options, as even I refuse to conform to DeviantArt’s multiple attempts to make me subscribe to them-), it has revived itself with a new way to present its content while maintaining the core importance for those of us who contribute-which is-the desire to maintain all creator rights to our work. “Why does that matter, Michelle?” you may be asking, “It’s not like your work is Marvel Comics or anything.”  ><  Well, I KNOW that, and thanks for making me feel bad-but I can’t draw F-cups on my female characters. (Just kidding. However, I refuse to make them more well-endowed than myself. It isn’t fair.) In any event, I’m making my stuff on my time, when I can-as I come up with it. I get total freedom, for good and bad-I pretty much write whatever I want, draw whatever I want, and I get to be part of a group of very talented women and gentlemen who enjoy comics, and enjoy putting it out there. (Though I’m sure I could use an editing hand sometimes!) And honestly-Girlamatic has been extremely understanding with my artistic ADD.  People are free to comment, love or hate, so even though you get complete creative freedom, you also get complete responsibility. (However I can screen comments. Nyah!) But each member of Girlamatic seems to have a true love of comics, and of making GAM an artistic community, as much as a friendly one. Plus, with some of us in Canada, one of us is in Alaska, some in California, some in the midWest, our editor in chief is in NY…you kind of get a rather unusual scenario of people working together only through the web interface, vs. in an office building-a scenario that’s only recently begun to be possible. In any event, the appeal to me lies in the fact that working with others who keep GAM running by putting their work out there for the world to see and scrutinize, makes me braver in putting my work out, and in keeping me on track.

As many had noticed, a lot of us (myself included) went on hiatus, or stopped last year when the Comic Space changeover/redesign began to take place. Speaking for myself, this gave me the opportunity to work on something new, to begin fleshing it out, and go forth with something kind of bombastic and more in tune with me as I am as an artist now. But GAM was never actually dead-many of my more responsible webmates (Tara w/”Galaxion”, Andre’s “Jeepers”, Jean’s “Fairy Underground”, John’s “Gypsy” (as seen above) among others…) continued to update through the switchover. So I’m excited to be back working alongside them, and to prove to them that I can be responsible and deserving of my reappointed spot next to them with Mad Sugar.

Anyways, Girlamatic is part of the Comic Space family, and as it says in the about page:

“Girlamatic is an internet-based, webcomics magazine hosting over 25 independently owned comic series. Girlamatic is one of several sites belonging to the ComicSpace family. Girlamatic’s mission, along with ComicSpace, is two-fold: to empower comic creators and readers while also proving, again and again, that women and girls enjoy comics, read comics, and make comics.”

(Though, I don’t want to sell short the very talented guys who work alongside us. Plus-most of the guys draw and write stronger female characters than I do.) The idea is not that GAM is a site only for females, it’s the idea that it is a central place to begin looking at webcomics that are drawn by women, or written about women, or at the very least, appealing to women. I love the world of comics-and I love drawing my own. And I will try to take criticism as best as I can. After all, the delete button is only a keystroke away…

Anyways, enough with this long rambling blog post. Go visit GAM at: www.girlamatic.com. Whether you love or hate everything on the site, at least you checked it out, right?! I’ll get back to doing more ARTSY blog posts very soon.