On comic making and learning how to make them

Being a part of a large art community discord, it’s often we get people join and say something like “I’d like to make comics, what should I learn”. 

Then, when I give them the advice to just get on making comics, get that Scott McCloud book, and to look into how to write stories, they say something along the line of “I’ll go practice human anatomy and after I get good at it I’ll do comics”.

Which is not wrong but I believe it’s not the optimal way for someone to become proficient at making comics.

Here’s how I understand what comics are:

Comics are a visual storytelling medium

Key words here are “visual” and “storytelling”. 

Visual

Let’s break down the visual part. 

Comics utilise the visuals to deliver the story.
Most common way to express those visuals is through drawing. However, that’s not the only way. 

One comic I keep up with uses minis . I’m sure other toys were used too by some like in Leisure Town. I remember a comic in my school newspaper that used photographs of actors. Speaking of photographs, A Softer World is a good example of how to use them in comics. 

Recently, I also learned about sprite comics. Remember Sims? People not only use them to help make backgrounds, but also for full comics. Garry’s mod was also used before. Now that Baldur’s Gate 3 has a built in camera tool, and community poses, I’m sure there exists a comic using those too or will exist. 

Point is, visuals are a vehicle to tell the story. They can be anything. 

Even when drawn, you don’t need an elaborate style. XKCD is well known comic that uses nothing but stick figures. Dinosaur Comics has drawn its dinos once and keeps re using them with tweaks where needed. Wondermark re uses the same drawn image, with different zoom levels. 

Don’t get me wrong. Being aware of art fundamental will help you utilise the visual better, but you don’t need to finish an art course to make comics. Especially because most art courses are geared towards illustrators of some form. You will learn important things related to art, but if your goal is comics, you will not learn much about all else that makes a comic a comic.

Tho, if there is one art fundamental I’d suggest getting familiar with is composition. It’s more important than nailing down your anatomy and rendering. Because it informs how you place things on a page (or the scroll equivalent). And in comics, those things are not just the art, it’s also panels, gutters, effects, speech bubbles and probably something else I’m forgetting.

ONE’s One Punch Man is often cited as an example of how art skills are not as important as people think. But I think it’s a great example of how understanding composition is important. ONE knows how to place elements on a page in a compelling and interesting way without them being hard to read. ONE also understands storytelling, but we’ll get to storytelling later. 

Which brings me to: learn comic devices and how to effectively use them. Learn what panels and gutters represent. Learn what the purpose of a speech bubble and SFX is. Lettering is its own role in comic making for a reason - there is more to it than just writing words on a page.

How you break down or shape a speech bubble influences how it will be read. The font you use, the fonts you mix together also influences what you communicate and what reader takes from it.

I’d even go as far as to say that you don’t need any illustrations at all to make a comic. You need either a panel or a speech bubble. It’s fun to think of Via Crucis as a silent comic told in 14 panels.

Page vs Scroll? Naah, I prefer Church walls.

ALT

A speech bubble saying “this is not a comic”

Or is it?

All this is something you will have to consider and no art book will teach you unless it’s geared towards comics (like Framed Ink books… get those, they are gold).

Now, let’s get to the other key word…

Storytelling

Comics are a way to tell a story. Thus, you will need to know how to tell stories too. You will need to be able to understand characters, plot structures, plot devices, protagonists vs antagonists and so on and so forth.

You’ll need to know how to differentiate between character lore and backstory and The Story you wish to tell. You will also need to understand that what you, the writer, know about the characters and the world may not necessarily always be what the reader gets. Sometimes you wish to leave readers in the dark. Sometimes not. And putting a few points in Storytelling skill on a skill tree will help you be more effective in how you deliver that experience.

However, not all story telling writing advice will be applicable to you as a comic writer and artist. Tho, there is lot more overlap, especially screenplay writing. A lot of writing advice generally touches on character and plot development anyway. Which are universal across storytelling mediums. 

Then, once you figure this out, you’ll just have to figure out a way you like to script your work. 

Scripts are important to writing and planning. Some people prefer to do a mix of sketches and writing, some prefer different styles (Here’s an example)
Some people prefer to write prose, but then they have to adapt their comic from there. (adapting work is a whole ‘nother skill).
I write mine as a scuffed movie script. 

Point is, you gotta know what makes a story and what makes a character. You gotta know how to convey that Cool and Awesome character that lives rent free in your head to the audience so they also see them as a Cool and Awesome.

Thus…

Best way to learn storytelling through comics is by studying other comics. 

Best way to learn to make comics is by studying other comics.

Even better way to learn how to make comics is by making comics. 

It took me drawing over 100 pages of my first big project to realise that the story is not doing what I want it to do. But I can yap about that some other time…
The point is, I learned because I attempted to do a project in a medium I wanted to be good at. I didn’t first grind boxes and anatomy and rendering. I made the darn thing. That project has made me a better comic creator than any illustration or screenplay writing course ever would. 

Another piece of advice…

Comics are not cheap animation. You will do a disservice to yourself and your fellow cartoonists if you approach comics like that. 

Animation is animation.
Comic is comic. French consider comics the 9th art. Worthy of it’s own category. So treat is as it’s own thing.

And go make some.