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The March of the Collectives

March 12, 2007 - 00:44 | Xaviar Xerexes

THE LATEST STYLE

Did I mention there were lots of collectives? There really are. There are several ones that started fairly recently and seem to be making a bigger ripple in the waters every year.

 

 

One that has a varied group of creators is PLAYGROUND GHOSTS. Playground Ghosts was started by Chris Yates, Colleen AF Venable, Steve Hogan, Chris Dlugosz, and David Malki in the Fall of 2005. Co-founder Malki describes Playground Ghosts as "more stylistically eclectic than most collectives. Only one of our member comics is what you might call a traditionally 'drawn' comic."

What (if anything) does the collective do as a collective? What are you doing on the collective website?

Malki: The collective website is mainly just a hub for news and a link to the shared forum. However as a collective we have a strong convention presence at shows across the country -- even if not all members are present at every show, we fly the collective banner and share expenses.

Can you tell us anything about the plans/goals you have for your collective for 2007?

Malki: More shows! We hope to be at six big shows this year. We don't have much planned online, but by "banding together" we've helped each other tremendously with real-world merchandise issues, transportation, lodging etc ... and really, none of us is a full time comics person, so on a personal and personal-professional note it's been great to network with a woodworker/printer, a book publisher, a graphic artist, a musician etc. (as well as all the people that they know).

Playground Ghosts has 6 members:

  1. David Malki, Wondermark
  2. Chris Yates, Reprographics
  3. Colleen AF Venable, Fluff in Brooklyn
  4. Chris Dlugosz, PIXEL
  5. Steve Hogan, Acid Keg
  6. Bernie Hou, Alien Loves Predator

 

Another one that attracted more attention last year was newcomer BOMB SHELTER COMICS. Bomb Shelter was founded largely by members from the former Interact collective (which no longer exists) in 2006. Co-founder Sean Conchieri told us more about his collective.

What's the "theme" (if any) of your collective?

Conchieri: Theme? Hmm. Given the variety of comics we have, there's not really one. We do have a great appreciation for the under-appreciated, though. We like to find talented people that don't really have their names out there, and try to get them the exposure they deserve. That's why Webcomic Idol was so exciting to us; a lot of talented people got quite a bit of attention, boosts in traffic, and now What Birds Know is nominated for a WCCA and has been reviewed in many a webcomics blog. Knowing that you played a small part in getting a comic like that the attention it so richly deserves - that makes you feel pretty good.

What (if anything) does the collective do as a collective?

Conchieri: Well, there was Webcomic Idol; I'm pretty sure you're fully in the loop on that. We also do podcasts, with Jerry Stephens and Chad Diez serving as the hosts.

Bomb Shelter features 17 comics:

  1. Combustible OrangeCartridge Comics
  2. Big Pond
  3. A Divine Dramedy
  4. Combustible Orange
  5. Chooken
  6. F@nb0y$
  7. Ball of Hate
  8. Cain Is Able
  9. InnerGeek
  10. Horribleville
  11. What Birds Know
  12. One-liners
  13. Zed Reckoning
  14. On the Edge
  15. Hector
  16. Amazing Superzeroes
  17. Stark Reality

 

And even more recent, is the new collective SUGARSKULL. Sugarskull was founded by Alice Hunt. Hunt explains, however that all the founding members "were instrumental in getting it on its feet, so I guess we all did! It was founded late last year and made its public debut on January 8th."

What's the "theme" (if any) of your collective?

Hunt: Sugarskull is designed to give quirky quality comics more attention. Though the Internet gives you as a cartoonist access to the whole world, unless your comic fits into one of a very few geek-friendly genres, your comic runs the risk of falling into the cracks. Sugarskull is our attempt to stave that off and promote good comics that might be hard to find. The comics are a little sweet and a little dark, like the candies that gave us the name, and each represents some kind of break from the usual webcomic fare.

What (if anything) does the collective do as a collective? What are you doing on the collective website?

Hunt: Right now, the collective has banded together to do cross-promotion and to use the site for updates and some exclusive material. Since the comics are all story-based and all quite different, crossovers are pretty unlikely, but we may have a fun event or two in the near enough future.

Can you tell us anything about the plans/goals you have for your collective for 2007?

Hunt: To continue to rock, hopefully in the form of at least one of us hitting print. And maybe add another comic or two.

The current members are:

  1. Jones
  2. Sarah Glidden
  3. Sarah Davis
  4. Alice Hunt
  5. David Patty

 

AND MORE AND MORE...

There are a lot of collectives out there that don't stress a theme or really much of an organizing hook. Some look a bit more like a webcomic host whereas others a bit more like a group of friends hanging out together online.

The webcomics collective EYESKREAM certainly has one of the cooler names in collectives. The Eyeskream Webcomic Creators Group was founded by Erik Bouchard and Douglas Curtis in February 2004. Co-founder Bouchard talked to us about their collective.

What's the "theme" (if any) of your collective?

Bouchard: There is no theme. We are more a community in a more traditional sense of the word, to provide a gathering place for webcomic creators and fans. Most of the time we are interacting on the eyeskream forum by helping each others and also others webcomics that are not part of our community but still welcome.

Can you tell us anything about the plans/goals you have for your collective for 2007?

Bouchard: After nearly three years (Eyeskream celebrated its third anniversary this February 9th) I think Eyeskream is now recognized among the webcomic community as a solid and serious collective. So this year we plan to release an "Eyeskream Magazine" in print. A sort of Heavy Metal-style magazine that will include and display work from our members that will be only in the magazine and not on the Internet.

EYESKREAM has 19 members:

  1. Diana Sasse (Antique White House)
  2. Ivan Pope (Boot_Error)
  3. Christophe Shill (Casual Gamers)
  4. Lou Graziani (Cy-Boar)
  5. Bev (Chooken)
  6. Lee Swain & Dan Liles (Flat Life)
  7. Douglas Curtis (Flying Ferret)
  8. Pavel Lujardo (Future Pig)
  9. Matt Buchwald (Fodi)
  10. Matt White & Gabe White (Gun Baby)
  11. Jared Hindman (Head Injury Theater)
  12. Eric Nault (Hellbound)
  13. Adam Marien (The Mulberry Gallows Project)
  14. Michelle Billingsley (Joe!)
  15. Andy Slack (Pinch of the Glass)
  16. Ross Curtis (The Rabid Rabbit)
  17. Jack DeLong (Samurai Pride)
  18. Lady A (Strange Fiction)
  19. Michael Gregory - (Suspicious Minds)

 

Another collective founded in 2004 is FOUND HAT PRESS. Found Hat Press was founded by Phil McAndrew, Tyler McAndrew, Zach Chase, Stuv, and Mike Stevens. We talked with McAndrew about their collective.

Found Hat PressWhat's the "theme" (if any) of your collective?

Phil McAndrew: We don't have any sort of a "theme" other than we are all young, awesome, and extremely good looking.

What (if anything) does the collective do as a collective? What are you doing on the collective website?

McAndrew: As a group we will exhibit at cons together, hang out in real life and on the internet, and sometimes collaborate. We've worked on a couple of little anthology books together, stuff like that. I think the real function of our collective is to help each other out both creatively and professionally.

Our collective website is currently in need of some major updates, but we hope to have all kinds of fun things going on there once we do a little reconstruction. In the past we've had weekly sketchbook pages from members and interviews, a messageboard..... just fun little extra things.

Can you tell us anything about the plans/goals you have for your collective for 2007?

McAndrew: Well I can't really speak for the whole group with any amount of certainty, but I think everyone's first priority for 2007 is to draw more comics.

I think as a group, we plan to be at SPX and maybe the MOCCA Festival. Some of us might even be at APE or at comicon in San Diego. I'm sure we'll put together a mini comic anthology of some sort. We plan to continue being awesome.

Found Hat's has 11 members:

  1. Phil McAndrew
  2. Natasha Allegri
  3. Mike Stevens
  4. Jamie Dee Galey
  5. Tyler McAndrew
  6. Jess Fink
  7. Ira Marcks
  8. Zach Chase
  9. Stuv
  10. Eric Feurstein
  11. Tom McHenry

 

Another veteran from 2004 is CLOVEN HAND COMICS. Cloven Hand Comics was founded by Andrew Jarvis in February 2004. Cloven Hand is much more of a community than a tight-knit collective. It has over 200 members. Jarvis talked to us about his collective.

What's the "theme" (if any) of your collective?

Jarvis: We are a very diverse community, but I think simply because of its name and the various skins the site has had over the years, we'veattracted an "alternative" / "twisted" mix of comics. I always was attracted to the idea of horror comics, but to be honest we don't have all that many horror -- though I'm quite proud of this one.

What (if anything) does the collective do as a collective? What are you doing on the collective website?

I would say this is probably our greatest drawback, we have not tapped into the community aspect so much.

Can you tell us anything about the plans/goals you have for yourcollective for 2007?

To become easier to use and easier to connect everyone and get them motivated to participate in the community on a whole.

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Transplant

Unityflow's picture

by Unityflow - 03/17/2007 - 11:03

I'm a member of Transplant Comics... another collective. Well worth coming and having a look at such great members as Toy Division, The Bean Men and Lonely Fetus, just to mention a few.

 

It's also one of the few collectives that has a transparent membership system. You submit your comic and the other members, and more importantly, registered users vote to see if you get it.

  Visit The Flowfield Unity - www.theflowfieldunity.com – it's OK.