Nina "Space Coyote" Matsumoto
Comic Artist

Best known as "space coyote" online, Matsumoto is a professional manga artist hailing from Vancouver BC whose first published series, Yokaiden, will be released this fall.

As a self-taught artist, she has aspired to work in comics since elementary school. Her first major work was Saturnalia, a sci-fi webcomic she started during her later years in high school about a vigilante group that offers protection to androids the government fails to provide. What began as a side project serving as art practice ended up becoming a 5-year long labour of love with a small but devoted fan following. In 2004, Saturnalia won "Outstanding Science Fiction Comic" in the Web Cartoonist's Choice Awards.

The manner in which Matsumoto got her foot in the professional door is a unique one: after losing her monotonous day job, she began supporting herself through various art commissions. In January of 2007, before seeking another retail job, she drew a cast picture of The Simpsons in her own manga style for kicks. When she posted it online, it quickly became widely distributed across the Internet, eventually even finding its way to Matt Groening's desk. The next day, big name companies began contacting her with job offers and requests for requests for book covers and character designs. Her tale of unexpected overnight success was picked up by CTV News and various magazines and newspapers, including the Toronto Star.

The first volume of Matsumoto's OEL manga series Yokaiden (about a boy in ancient Japan who loves yokai, which are Japanese monsters and spirits) will be published by Del Rey Manga and will hit book stores November 2008. Her name can also be found in the Bart Simpson Comics, which she does pencils for on occasion.