Terrence Marks interviewed married creators Amber Williams and Mason "Tailsteak" Williams. Amber is the creator of the comic Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures, and Mason is best known as the creator of the comic 1/0. (An interview with Mason about his comic 1/0 appeared in Comixpedia's June 2003 issue.)
Introduce yourselves – who are you, what comics do you do?
Amber: I'm Amber Williams, formerly Amber Panyko. I do a comic called Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures, or DMFA for short.
Mason: I'm Mason Williams, better known as Tailsteak. I did a Keenspace comic for a few years called 1/0, and now I have a site that, in theory, showcases all kinds of art and comics – but, in practice, hardly ever updates.
When did you marry?
Amber: October um…one sec…we sort of forgot if it was the 22nd or 24th.
Mason: I'm pretty sure it was the 22nd.
*minutes pass*
Amber: After a quick search and a calendar check later, it was in fact the 22nd of October. I already forsee anniversary antics going haywire.
How did you meet?
Mason: We actually first met at the messageboard for another webcomic, Dragon Tails. It was a vibrant community with many interesting characters, lots of socializing and so forth.
Amber: After a few months of back and forth emails and chatting, a friend and I drove to Canada to visit. We started our actual relationship pretty much right after meeting in person for the first time.
Did your wedding or proposal involve comics in any way?
Amber: Not really on mine… unless one counts the short gag I did as a cop-out for not actually updating on my wedding night.
Mason: No.
Amber: I guess neither of us are extremely vocal about our relationships online.
Do you work together on any of your projects?
Mason: Not really, we've never felt the need to do work together. Our styles are so different, it would be hard to reconcile them and create something of value. We do occasionally inspire each other, of course, but we don't do anything I'd really call "collaboration".
Amber: Yeah. Pretty much. We occasionally bounce ideas off eachother, but in terms of an actual co-op project, nothing really has struck our interest.
Why not?
Amber: As Mason said, our styles are pretty different, and not really in a very compatible way. That and we both are usually busy with our current personal projects. Another project would likely not get the attention it deserved. Granted in the future this might change, but thats too far off to predict.
Any crossovers between your comics? Cameos?
Mason: There have been a few little mentions of each other – I will talk about her when I do autobiographical bits for my website, obviously, and I have done a few non-canon guest comics… but nothing I'd call a crossover. I don't really like crossovers, in general. I'm a stickler for continuity, even in silly projects.
Amber: We did the April Fools exchange once waaay back in the early parts of our relationship. And I think there is a very old DMFA comic where the Tailsteak gecko avatar was in the background… but overall I have been trying to cut down on blatant crossovers/cameos in my comic.
Do either of you have a job outside of comics?
Amber: At the time I write this, I'm still in mid-document transit to get full Canadian residence, so I've been lacking in a job outside of comics. Mason however has a job doing tech-support… which is likely also the reason his site doesn't update as frequently.
Has your spouse influenced your art or writing? If so, how?
Mason: It's hard to notice these things – I don't think we've really done so directly, we're definitely not getting closer together stylistically. But yeah, we're influencing each other, mostly by being each other's sounding boards.
Amber: There have been a couple times when I've asked for Mason's input on how a particular character might react. Particularly my male characters. But other than that, if there has been any influence, it's been subtle.
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