Any advice for those who want to make their own comic series?
If youâre not familiar with doing a whole lot of comics, donât jump into a long series. Start small and work up: 4 page shorts, 10 page shorts, 20 page shorts, etc. After a few projects are complete, THEN consider doing long form. You have to learn how to start, climax, and resolve stories. Endings are the hardest part because people usually donât get to do them!!
Design characters that are easily replicated cause you gonna be drawing them 200000 times. Iâm used to drawing more complex characters but if you read my comic start to finish youâll see I simplified them over time cause OOF. It was too much even for me! And honestly if I started over I would make things sooo much easier to draw.
Make SMALL casts too. Youâll regret drawing those group shots of 20 characters in one panel. *looks at @tristikovart đ* I canât exactly tell you a recommended size but 1-2 mains at minimum you always follow.
Come up with an art style thatâs also easy to produce quickly. Iâve had to experiment with this for years to find a good place. You have to update frequently to get readers and to do that you have to produce pages quickly. So donât digitally paint your pages or draw every head hair unless you KNOW you can produce them quick enough to make it worth it *looks at @tristikovart again đ*
Youâre gonna wanna redo your pages because the style changes over time. Resist. Iâm not against revamping at all cause I have and WILL do it, just make sure you can still produce NEW pages too! If you pause producing new pages to redo your old ones, youâll get stuck in a perpetual loop of reboots. It happens to a LOT of new comic artists. Get used to imperfection. YOU CANT BE PERFECT.
Be reasonable on story length if itâs your first too. It doesnât have to be your Magnum Opus. Round it out at 300 pages, 500âŠ. idk. You donât have to make a 10,000 page story. Please donât in fact, if itâs your first go. Please.
IT WILL TAKE YOU A VERY LONG TIME TO FINISH SO YOU GOTTA COMMIT TO THAT. 5 years, 10 years. 20 years. Itâs gonna be your fictional child youâll have to raise and put through comic college. Do the math: there are 52 weeks in a year. If you update once weekly thatâs 52 pages each year. If you have a 500 page comic? Thatâs gonna take you around 10 years. Twice weekly? Still gonna take you 5 years.
That said, take breaks if youâre mentally unwell to handle it! Breaks are fine and needed sometimes and if people complain they can DEAL đ you are giving people free entertainment and you owe them nothing if they start bitching. True fans will understand and support you!
Write outlines and scripts. Know how your story will start, climax, and end. Know where things will lead at LEAST roughly. Long form changes a bit over time, but so long as you have a guideline you can keep the story consistent and itâll save you many headaches!
Experiment and have fun! It can be hard finding time to do Webcomics and financially and mentally taxing at times. So when youâre able to do them, just do the best you can!! They can be a LOT of fun and very rewarding!
These are my PERSONAL hot takes from my on and off 12 years of experience. I made a lot of mistakes so Iâm trying to save others from my fate! Hope it helps you, Anon, and anyone else who reads it too!
Miss something? Please reblog and add to it đ
tangentwithtanner
areudirty
romaincrisis
germansingergirl
dededos
origamiaround
