With Creator John Allison

When you first started Scary-Go-Round, did you ever

think he would become as big as he has done?

I don't know that it is particularly big! There are more

webcomics readers than ever before and some of the comics have vast audiences. I'm not sure Scary Go Round had a particularly broad appeal and sometimes I didn't take advantages of boosts in traffic that I got for certain popular stories. Thinking back to when I started - when I already had an audience from my old comic, Bobbins, I think I could have done a lot better.

Are you a big fan of web comics yourself?

Not so much any more. I see a lot of things that I admire, great artists and clever writers, but I don't read a lot of webcomics as I spend most of my time making comics and I have less of an appetite for them than I used to as a result. But there are always a few new things that catch my eye and impress me.

You are one of the few British web comic creators; do you think this effects you at all?

It makes it harder for the most part. Britain doesn't have a strong entrepreneurial culture and many of the things that the webcartoonist relies on - local printers, copy shops, screenprinters etc, are either more expensive here or don't exist on the same scale. Plus the majority of conventions where you might usefully network and make some money are overseas. Foreign travel to work is hard, and expensive.

Where did the name of the strip come from?

 It was an old CD single I had from the early 90s, "The Scary Go ROund EP", I bought the URL before I knew what I was going to do with it.

What is the process of actually making a strip?

 I plot the stories, then I write five at a time. Then I type out the speech bubbles in Adobe Ilustrator, print them out two comics to a page and draw my roughs around them in pencil. I draw the final comic in a program called Manga Studio on a Wacom Cintiq, then colour it in Photoshop and do the letter balloons in Illustrator.

Do you have a favourite strip that you've done?

Not really. When I've drawn them, they're done, I set them aside. The latest one should always be my favourite, otherwise why continue?

Do you ever find it hard to come up with a new idea for a story?

I used to but my brain is now very geared towards thinking up stories and working out where to go next. I have to be careful not to think about the next story too much as I will lose interest in the current one.

You are soon launching a new comic and ending Scary-Go-Round, what made you want to do this now?

I was tired of Scary Go Round, tired of many of the characters and ready to try out a new format, a new viewpoint and some new artistic techniques. I wanted to make a break with the past in certain ways and a new name and new characters was the best way to do it, even though in real terms it is a continuation of what I have done before.