Web comic to Book Comic: Talking with Amy Kim Ganter
This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on January 10, 2006 Sign up now!
By Kai-Ming Cha -- Publishers Weekly, 1/10/2006
Amy Kim Ganter is part of the Flight generation, the group of young artists included in that acclaimed anthology. Her series Sorcerers and Secretaries is forthcoming from Tokyopop and her Web comic Reman Mythology has run for a solid two years. Newly engaged to Flight editor and fellow comics artist Kazu Kibuishi, PWCW caught up with Ganter to share in the afterglow of love and success.
PW Comics Week: You went to the School of Visual Arts in New York for cartooning.
Amy Kim Ganter: I meant to go for animation but got stuck with cartooning. But that's a good thing. I've been drawing comics since I was 10. It started with a comic about my hamster but then it kept growing, for two years, until [the hamster] died.
PWCW: Before Sorcerers and Secretaries you were working on a Web comic (Reman Mythology) for the last two years. What do you think of Web comics? Are they the future of comics or are they a stepping stone for aspiring artists?
AKG: My opinion is that it's like a stepping stone or sanctuary. Readers can get it direct from you [the artist] with no middle man. You have total control—which can be good and bad. If your comic is really popular but doesn't have the most artistic merit, you don't have to improve. Why would you? It's already popular. But when you put your comic online you find your artistic voice. You get feedback and find out who reads your book. I always thought of the Internet as a communication tool, not a medium to be used.
When kids ask me what they should do, I always tell them to start a site, get their stuff out there. It's better than making a minicomic. Having a Web site is much more important. If I can just e-mail an editor with a link to [my site], it shows that I'm motivated, I've got a comic online. It shows that you do it for the love of it, not because of a fanboy mentality. A Web site is the best business card.
Maybe it's just me, but I don't think Web comics are the future. It's too nice to have a book you can put in your pocket, that you don't have to plug in.
PWCW: What's been the biggest difference between doing your own comic online and working with Tokyopop?
AKG: When I was doing my online comic it wasn't very deliberate. I was experimenting, doing things for fun. It was a hobby. With Tokyopop, I formulated the story more, I though about who would read it, the format, the length. It really changed the way I approach my work.
On Remans I would do one page a week. For Sorcerers and Secretaries, the process is a little different. I'll spend one day drawing five thumbnails and inking seven pages. It's good to be with Tokyopop. They keep hounding me to be a better artist and pay me well enough so that I don't have to take another job. I'm learned a lot about pacing myself. I'm learning the ropes and they're learning, too. We're all in the same boat. They want to do these comics but don't have a set system. They're very new to working with artists since they usually license material. They're getting a lot better. I'm excited that a company wants to do this.
PWCW: Is manga a style or a form? There's an interview where you differentiate between the two.
AKG: If you read manga, there's no one style. There's a huge range. I guess people are talking about the big eyes. I thought Ranma 1/2 was very adorable, but never I thought about why I thought it was adorable. It was a form that made me want to study it more as a storytelling tool.
Manga is so pop, so easy to read. You glance at a picture and just get sucked in. It's more spread out and, in that way, more cinematic, and because it's more stretched out, the action is more focused. If there's a scene where a samurai is chopping down someone, there's a panel with the guy holding the sword, swinging it, and then one page splash of someone cut in half. In American comics, there would just be one panel of a guy getting slashed. There's nothing wrong with boxy American comics, but kids are more picky. They have all sorts of media in their face—the manga visual style is more pop to teens and young kids.
PWCW: You recently moved to L.A.
AKG: I got engaged in Los Angeles [to Kazu Kibuishi]. I met him when he was editing the first Flight anthology. We work in same studio. We both love comics and we both love storytelling; we both love people, we both love characters. When you have the same shared passion and outlook on life, it's easier. Comics is so lonely. You have to be by yourself in order to get the acting out on a page. Tokyopop is learning that, too. They don't know what it's like to be alone. They're in an office, it's open, social. When you do comics, you're all alone meeting deadlines. I used to draw all the time with Becky Cloonan and Jen Quick. If you're a cartoonist you're going to want to find someone to draw with—not necessarily a fiance but it's great when you find someone you can draw with.
