Questions to whoever feels like answering.

[Tom Siddell]

faxmaster said:

Any chance you could post some wips of a page being made at some point? Not for a tutorial or anything (unless you want to), I just always love to see the process of other artists.

I'll probably do something like this as soon as I get a chance.

[Tom Siddell]

mrw said:

Hi Tom,
I hope all is well with you.

Question: If people seem to be getting too close to predicting actual events or plotlines in their speculations, are you going to feel compelled to change the storyline?

Thank you!

That's not been a problem so far.

[Tom Siddell]

yeochild said:

Tom, is Sullivan's John going to become a more important character in the future?

Maybe. Maybe not!

[todd]

We know that you already knew when you began the webcomic that Annie's mother had recently died, and that when you were writing Chapter Three, you knew that Reynardine, once he possessed Annie's plush wolf doll, could shape-shift into an actual wolf big enough for Annie to ride upon (even though you had to wait until Chapter Twelve to show it).

Have there been any moments in the twelve chapters that you've already released that you genuinely didn't expect to write/draw until you actually did them, ones that took you by surprise?

[yeochild]

Does GC have a headmaster?

[Tom Siddell]

todd said:

We know that you already knew when you began the webcomic that Annie's mother had recently died, and that when you were writing Chapter Three, you knew that Reynardine, once he possessed Annie's plush wolf doll, could shape-shift into an actual wolf big enough for Annie to ride upon (even though you had to wait until Chapter Twelve to show it).

Have there been any moments in the twelve chapters that you've already released that you genuinely didn't expect to write/draw until you actually did them, ones that took you by surprise?

This is a good question. The answer is yes and no. Everything that I've drawn plot wise so far has been according to plan, but there have been some minor things that I've changed last minute when I realised something just wouldn't work. If I do make changes to the storyline they are usually things that won't happen for months, so they are just as planned as the rest.

[Tom Siddell]

yeochild said:

Does GC have a headmaster?

Yup, it does.

[yeochild]

Is the "very nice man" native to Gillitie Wood?

[Tom Siddell]

yeochild said:

Is the "very nice man" native to Gillitie Wood?

Lips are sealed.

[apathychan]

Is Gillitie Wood pronounced:

Gill-it-ee?

Jill-it-ee?

Guh-lit-tee?

Help, it's been confounding me for far too long.

[Tom Siddell]

apathychan said:

Is Gillitie Wood pronounced:

Gill-it-ee?

Jill-it-ee?

Guh-lit-tee?

Help, it's been confounding me for far too long.

Gill-it-ee would be the proper way to pronounce it.

[Lotus]

On the subject of pronunciation (I feel a bit foolish for asking, but this has been bothering me for a long time), is it AN-ti-mo-ny or an-TI-mo-ny?

I suppose I could just call her "Annie"...

[Tom Siddell]

lotus said:

On the subject of pronunciation (I feel a bit foolish for asking, but this has been bothering me for a long time), is it AN-ti-mo-ny or an-TI-mo-ny?

I suppose I could just call her "Annie"...

It's pronounced with the same inflection as "alimony".

[yeochild]

Who is Tea? General avatar? Real-life girlfriend? Something else? I can't believe no-one has asked this already . . . please forgive me if you've already answered this somewhere.

[monkeybucks]

Hello Tom! My question is:

How are you?

[Tom Siddell]

yeochild said:

Who is Tea? General avatar? Real-life girlfriend? Something else? I can't believe no-one has asked this already . . . please forgive me if you've already answered this somewhere.

She is nobody important.

[Tom Siddell]

monkeybucks said:

Hello Tom! My question is:

How are you?

I am okay, thank you.

[yeochild]

Tom, is the entire tale being told by Annie after the eventual end of her story, or is each chapter narrated by the Annie that just experienced it?

[nickgoodway]

yeochild : that's a damn good question. But if Annie was narrating from the end of the story it would mean that she has to survive everything (like Dee Dee Truitt in 'The Opposite of Sex'), which would be a bit of a tension breaker to say the least.

[todd]

Of course, we haven't seen that much narration from Annie for a while (I think that the last "caption-narration" was at the start of Chapter 8 - Annie narrating earlier events to Kat in the course of the story, which she does in Chapters 9 and 12, doesn't count). Chapter 1 and the start of Chapter 2 were the biggies for that. (Once she made a friend in the form of Kat, she no longer had as much need to speak directly to the reader, obviously.)

[Boksha]

nickgoodway said:

...if Annie was narrating from the end of the story it would mean that she has to survive everything...

Actually considering where Tom got the inspiration for the first page (or at least for Antimony's look, but the text on the first page is remarkably similar as well), I'd say that's not true at all.

I think a narrative structure leaves a lot of room for the writer anyway. There's no reason somebody couldn't tell the story after he/she died, and you don't even have to explain it.

[Tom Siddell]

Carver is currently narrating the story, even if there are no obvious dialogue boxes. From what point she is narrating, however, remains to be seen.

[sbj]

We know that Annie has blue eyes, but what about Kat or the other students, like Aly and Winsbury?

[todd]

admin said:

Carver is currently narrating the story, even if there are no obvious dialogue boxes. From what point she is narrating, however, remains to be seen.

The "currently" part makes me wonder if, at some later point, Annie may stop narrating the story and even pass on the torch to another character who will replace her as the webcomic's protagonist, although I hope that that doesn't happen.

I might hasten to add that this is a comment rather than a question.

[Count Casimir]

So Tom, how'd you get your own website?

That is, who's your host, what'd you do to find it, etc.?

I'm the guy who's trying to start my own webcomic, if you remember. Just trying to get off the ground, 'cause I know very little about hosting a personal site.


On an unrelated note, are you ever going to consider having guest comics?

[Tom Siddell]

sli said:

When exactly are our heroines' birthdays?

At some point during the year.

[yeochild]

Hey . . . is it a coincidence that Antimony's name and nature both seem to reflect the word 'antidote'?

If not, have you been wondering when one of us would pick up on that?

[aoeniac]

I dunno, personally I think antimony is as far from an antidote as you can get, seeing as how it's toxic an' all.

But that raises a question for me, one that Tom probably won't answer clearly due to how it might provide insight into things we're not supposed to be thinking about yet. Regardless, Tom why did you name her Antimony in the first place? Not that I'm implying it's not a good name, I think it was a pretty inventive decision to name a character after a periodic element, and I think you're pretty observant for picking one that actually sounds like it could easily be a normal name.

But really, why? Is there some property of antimony that somewhat reflects a quality of Antimony?

[Tom Siddell]

As you've guessed, aoeniac, I won't be giving away anything but I can say that Annie's name wasn't chosen just because it sounds nice.
As for Carver acting like "antidote"... I don't quite see the connection.

[monkeybucks]

Tom, I missed if you ever replied to a comment I left on the last comic (the one where Kat first has her make up on) about if the dorms change every year/if it's been longer than a year? If you didn't reply, that's fine, I was just wondering. =)