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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Global Comic Jam News Jan 2008

Contact Information:

Editorial Team: globalcomicjam@gmail.com
Scott Simmons: scott.d.simmons@fuse.net
Kim Larsen: udgang99@gmail.com

Global Comic Jam marks fourth anniversary with “The Armageddon Create-A-Jam Contest”

GLOBAL COMIC JAM Celebrates its 4th Year Anniversary with “THE ARMAGEDDON CREATE-A-JAM CONTEST”. The international comic collaboration site [link] will be looking for YOUR ideas for the next big jam comic on the website! But unlike GCJ contests in the past, not only will one comic be picked, this time SIX strips will be selected by votes from the GCJ community and the six-person editorial/moderator team. Looking for a bold new direction for the site in its fourth year, the community has decided to “blow up” the current site and practically start anew, and thus has dubbed this “ARMAGEDDON”.

In preparation for the contest launch in February 2008, the website will be down and its layout totally reconfigured into an exciting look. The current jams will drop down into a “Classic Jams” section, a creator spotlight feature starts, and EIGHT NEW JAMS will be featured on top (six of which will be chosen from the contest!). A companion page has been started at [link] to ease the site’s transition and also further promote the website and recruit new contributing artists. Since the main website will be down for the month of January, contest entrants and potential new readers can visit this ComicSpace page to see what the current strips are like. Popular vintage jams like “Fusion Odyssey”, “Surface”, and “Decisions” will remain accessible for artist sign-ups and page additions when the GCJ website returns, and they are great examples of the range of creativity of the GCJ artist community.

For the contest, Global Comic Jam will be accepting new ideas in the form of the first one or two pages of the strip. The theme and genres of the strips entered into the contest are up to the contestant to decide. There are two categories: voting will result in picking FOUR winners from entered strips that are totally original, and TWO winners from entered strips that use characters from existing strips (basically spin-offs). Entrants should keep in mind that the whole concept of the site is that each strip is told in the “campfire tradition”, where a story is started by one storyteller, and then passed on to other storytellers who add their own spin to develop and further evolve the story. Each page is created by a different artist, thus providing a unique and sometimes unexpected reading experience. Entrants should send in stories that would excite other artists into signing up to work on a page for the strip.

If you have an idea you would like to submit, draw up the first one or two pages, fully inked and lettered. GCJ does not accept pencils-only submissions. Submissions can either be in black-and-white or in color. Lettering is not needed if the strip is intended to be “silent”. Send off the submission to globalcomicjam@gmail.com as either a JPG or GIF file, with a width no larger than 650 pixels (or 6.5 inches at 100dpi). The height is up to you. Submissions will be accepted from now until the deadline of January 31st.

Entries will start to be posted as soon as possible in February on the newly reborn site [link] . Voting will start on February 1st for any registered users within the GCJ forum. Registration on the GCJ site is absolutely free. Voting will continue until February 8th, and the final tally of voting will decide the winners. The six winning strips will then begin accepting artist sign-ups in mid-February and begin making GCJ history.

The contest is a great way to add some new members and fresh ideas to the website, which currently has over 250 members, and 16 featured strips, as well as the start of a special section called MyJams. Artists who have contributed 15 or more pages to any jams are rewarded with their own “MyJam”, where they not only create the subject matter, but also the rules. “Zero” is the very first MyJam on the site. Created by Kim Larsen, “Zero” started out with one page and a companion gallery of characters that serve as actual model sheets. Larsen leaves it up to the other artists to help figure out the personalities and roles of the characters, but the designs stay intact, in order to aid the strip in terms of continuity. A visually striking cast and interesting storyline have made “Zero” a popular strip for artists to sign up to do.

Several other MyJams will start up at the beginning of the year, by some of the editorial team and some loyal members who have been around years and contributing many pages. These will help in the transition period of the old site becoming the new one, and serve as sister strips to the new order strips that win the contest. Also in the works are possibly a couple of spin-off strips.

Previous Create-A-Jam contests and ScriptJam contests have helped create several fun jams for the site, including Treasure Hunt, True Hero, Life Death & Ozzy, Decisions, and UpEnded. The reactions and turnouts are fantastic for the contests and help further build the GCJ artist community.

Global Comic Jam’s editorial team consists of Kim Larsen (EIC and originator, from Denmark), Jost von Harlessem (webmaster, from Germany), Jason Vasquez (assistant editor, from USA), Joshua Robertson (media, from Canada), Keith Jeter (communications, from USA), and Scott D.M. Simmons (promotions, from USA).

[link]