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Sixteen panels before the first establishing shot, and by then we were already invested in the plight of the main characters, and would follow their story regardless where it was happening... Just sayin' Always focus on characters and their conflicts. Please give the webtoons link.
FirstBastion,
I agree on the need to establish character and context early on but I think 3Diva handled it well. Keep in mind that the webtoons format is meant for reading on mobile devices. Unlike comics in book format, the images are laid out strictly in linear sequence; there's no chance for the eye to zig-zag over a spread and grasp the gestalt of the scene. The overall effect? The story appears to take longer to unwind, increasing the urgency to scroll forward -- potentially, upping the reader's impatience. (It's not just with webtoons though. You could argue that overall the web conspires to "hurry up" our consumption of information. Alas! 'Tis the end of civilization as we know it.
) With creative layout, sixteen panels could easily fit into a two-page spread. So that's not so bad a pace before the first establishing shot. Besides, storytelling in medias res never really went out of style. It just asks the reader to keep more details in mind while the narrative timeline reels through a long flashback sequence.
Cheers!
Exactly @3Diva did an excellent job on focusing on the characters and the conflict. Earlier in the discussion we were considering how important an establishing shot is, and whether or not it is important to add one early on. 3Diva just showed a perfect example where the establihing shot after the initial scene works too. There are lots of option in storytelling.
Thank you! If/when I do someone hanging again I'll try and give it a bit more of a physically accurate hang. The "active pose" trick sounds very helpful - I'll have to remember that one! Thank you, Linwelly!
It is the Call to Action Contest. Here's the link to my entry: https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/humane-harvest/list?title_no=772089 (Note that links to specific comics on that website almost ALWAYS redirects you to the front page instead of to the comic the first time the link is clicked, so you'll likely have to click the link twice to get to the comic.)
Thank you! That's very nice of you to say! As for the establishing shot - I hope it wasn't too jarring to make it come a little bit later. I felt this was very necessary due to the limitations of the contest of which this episode is an entry for. The contest's theme and upload file size limitations made me have to go outside the way I would normally write a comic. The Call to Action contest's focus is on action, so it needed more action than I had originally scripted. And I couldn't start with an establishing shot because if I had shown the neighborhood at that point, it would have given away something that wasn't meant to be revealed until a bit later in the episode. :)
The original script I had for this comic had it start with the opening shot of the neighborhood and the reader getting to know the characters a little more before things got heavy, but was advised that, due to the contest's theme, it would be best to start with some action. So I made some tweaks to the script and started with a flashback.
Thank you for the sweet comment and the feedback! It's much appreciated!
I'm glad you thought it was handled well. I was worried that starting with the action would be too jarring for people. I had to make some tweaks to the original script I had for the comic. I was told due to the contest's theme that starting with action would probably be best, so I started with a flashback. And due to the file upload limitation for the contest, I wasn't able to spend as much time as I wanted getting to know the characters before things got a bit chaotic, but I do hope that I included enough to help the audience to care some about what happens to the characters.
Thank you for your comments and the support! I really appreciate it! And you're right, web comic layout is a totally different beast. The original script and storyboarding for the comic was in a "traditional comic page" style. When I decided to make it a web comic instead, I basically had to chuck all the storyboarding that complimented a "comic page" layout and rethink things from a vertical scroll layout. It was an interesting exercise. I do admit that vertical scroll is a LOT easier to do - as you don't have to stress as much about "guiding the reader's eye" along the page to make sure they read the panels in the correct order and to make sure that everything "flows" to each panel in a way that moves the eye across the page from panel to panel. Having a vertical scroll layout is quite a bit easier.
3Diva (or anyone who produces comics regularly),
You mention wrangling your script into the proper form. If I understand the typical process: first there's a script; then there's a storyboard; finally there's the comic product. The script is all text, much like a theater or movie script. From here work moves to the storyboard were panels are laid out, scenes are sketched and dialoged set. Finally, the comic is produced, usually by digital software as a series of image files.
In Manga:Masters of the Art, Japanese manga creators were interviewed about the process. Interestingly, some treat the script and the storyboard as a scaffolding, to be discarded, and eventually they focus their efforts on the digital comic. The script and the storyboard are simply first sketches, inspirations to get them started and rough out their ideas. Then as their comic evolves in final digital form, they never bother to update their script and storyboards anymore.
Do you find this workflow practical? Do you find yourself working that way too?
Cheers!
.Story, storyboards, and final finished art. Each of these are separate specialties and are required step in the process. Not recognizing them as unique steps will lead to a less than optimal final product. They are also separate stages in the pre-production - production pipeline. If an artist is wearing all those hats on a one person production, then the line blur. But in larger organisations each of these talents are separate and distinct. And credited as such.
I'm working without story boards.
What I do is that I have a story draft which goes through several editions until I've come to a pont where I say this is what I want and need. some parts are rather detailed and contain conversations I want in there finished other parts are far more loos in their layout. as well this contains background information abotu the place, the culture etc, all relevant characters and ther descriptions for the main characters the characterdevelopment is in there as well.
from this I write a script which is very detailed for each episode, giving the setting, the mood, the lights, descripbing all characters positions and actions and what they will say including camera angles etc.
from that I create the panels
if I would go through making story boards like from hand I would never finish a single thing
. But then I'm working in scroll down format. I believe getting a good arrangement of the panels towards each other with a traction through the page is important for traditional format.
so my opinion on this is go by what you can do, experiment with what works for you ( for as long as you're working alone, one you get more people on board you need to find a routine that works for all). Sticking to rules for the sake of rules and by that losing interest would be a pity
also don't be like me, go for a small project first, something that can be wrapped up in a few weeks or month time. That will give you a huge learning boost for larger projects
Sticking to rules for the sake of rules and by that losing interest would be a pity
I think too many people think there are rules. I see so many different "How to make comics" books referenced across the internet(s). I'm not speaking specifically about any set mentioned on the DAZ FORUMS, but I have heard comic pros make fun of books that show you how to do things and then list a bunch of 'rules'. I think it should be about TOOLS and the only rule is to use the tools effectively.
That said, @3Diva: I'm glad you popped on an explained why you made some of those choices. I honestly didn't think you made some grand meta choice for better storytelling, but I didn't want to say anything.
Your real 'establishing shot' looks like the wide one that shows where you characters are throwing down. (It lets us know they are in a suburban house).
The shot that shows the street is more of a chapter break. And usually, a convention, not a rule - is that the scale of the image matches the scale of the information.
You name the city/town and show a population count. Usually an image that shows the whole town/city would be expected. It's like showing a picture of a large City and saying "Planet Earth".
Overall it's a very fresh start. What happened to the young girl and the dojo? Where's that comic?
-------------------
My friend who draws- saw your comic and LOVED IT. Was blown away by the style and said "If I drew like that, I'd be happy!".
He loves the alien design and the characters. Loves that you got right to the action.
What else....says he wants to know what going to happen the couple - especially her future-baby.
The nit picks ....well, yeah they were some of those....
Thought the guy was wimpy and soft. Lolz.
Said he would have done better if he was there. (I guess it's good that people are putting themselves in your story).
All good so far. PS, he took martial arts, but I don't think he's beating one of your aliens. double-lol
Yeah when it comes to art or any creative work there, for the most part, aren't really any hard and fast rules - more like strong guidelines. There have been people who have been very successful with "breaking the rules". That's not to say that they aren't helpful though, and more often than not when those "rules" are broken, the work suffers for it. So I'd say just use them as guides and if you feel very strongly that you want to go in a way that a "rule" advises against, go with your gut. As @Linwelly put it "experiment with what works for you". And I couldn't agree more that sticking to the rules for the sake of the rules at the expense of your own passion to do something would be a real pity. I'd hate for anyone to lose their drive to work on their art simply because of a "rule" that they didn't feel like following. Whatever works for you (as long as it's not hurting anyone else), I say go for it. :)
Yeah, perhaps it could have used a city shot first and then the shot of the neighborhood. Or maybe just under the name of the city, adding something like "The Neighborhood of Westbank". Might have been better, idk. Something to keep in mind for future establishing shots. Thank you. :)
That's Monster Crush. It's my "baby", so I'm still working on it. lol But I wanted to release a mini-comic for "practice" first. So Humane Harvest is kind of my "test run" to work out the kinks and help me get my workflow solidified a bit more. I found it too stressful trying to get out Monster Crush when I have so much invested in the characters and the story and not having enough experience with comic production on a solo level. Don't get me wrong, the work I've done in the comic industry in the past as a colorist and inker has been a huge help, but wearing "all the hats" and telling MY stories 100% on my own and in this particular medium (as opposed to traditional comics) is a completely different animal. I felt it was best to do a story that was kind of small first - that way I can work out what issues I might have, get my style down a bit better, and help me to figure out the whys and hows of getting a comic from my written script to a readable fleshed out comic.
Humane Harvest SHOULD be only 3 episodes long (as long as I can work out the scope of what I want to tell in the last episode within the upload limit of Webtoons). If not it will end up being 4 episodes long, but no longer than that. I have the first two episodes up. The last bit is going to be tricky. Being able to convey the meaning of the story in a way that I want the reader to understand it, is challenging. But I hope I can pull it off. :)
Hahah That put a big smile on my face! I'm very happy to hear that he liked it! As for what's going to happen, hopefully, he'll be interested in continuing to read the series and finding out. :)
haha Well I did try to convey the size and strength of the aliens, but I guess if he thinks he could have beaten one of them I probably failed in that regard. lol Their size and strength is even greater than that of a gorilla, and it's been said about gorillas that they can even rip a man's arms out of their sockets. So yeah... unless you are superhuman, I don't think there's much of a chance there. lol I suppose I could have done a better job of showing their size and strength. I thought with the alien knocking the door off it's hinges so easily and knocking David unconscious with just a backhand that it was enough to show their strength but I probably should have done better there to show how powerless humans are against them as far as their sheer size and strength.
Tell your friend that I do appreciate the feedback and that I'm very happy to hear that he likes it so far! And thank you, Drew, for the feedback as well! It's very much appreciated!
^^ THIS ^^
All the YESES x 1000! Start small, very small. A comic that's just a few pages long would be advisable as your first project. So don't try to do your big story or passion project as your first comic. I HIGHLY recommend doing a short mini-comic that can be wrapped up in a few short pages. Just a mini-story or something short that you don't have to stress about as much. It's a GREAT way to get your workflow down, to get some experience, to really solidify your style and help you to get the "bad" out. Because we all start out sucking at anything new we do, having a small project we don't have quite as much invested in helps to gain experience and really work out the roughness that we all have when starting something new.
Oh no, the aliens are PLENTY STRONG. It's that the guy didn't get much done. I just don't think he's the typical guy-who-can-do-it-all character.
And I think - he thinks that the guy is your main character. I lean more towards the female as the central person.
Update us when the next section goes live, please.
3Diva, Linwelly:
Hear, hear! And so this is my stab (once again) at a x1000 small comic.
Cheers!
Sgts. Andrea, Cleo & Inez: Invitation to Bloodsport | Daz assets and set up | Blender Eeeve render | Clip Studio Paint post-edit
nice one box @csaa
that's a start
I really like the way you turned the render to comic style there
I have no idea what the context of the panel is in the overall story, but I'll take a stab at it just for fun. Sgt. Inez wants Cleo and Andrea to get along, hence the peace offering of the flower and the ask, as she look down upon her two friends in the fray, while both Cleo and Andrea are at odds with each other and ready to go to war. Their whole 3 person alliance is at risk of blowing up.
3Diva, Linwelly, FirstBastion:
One important thing I've learned is that once an author puts his creation out in the public, the author loses some authority on his handiwork's meaning. That is, viewers will apply their own interpretation, bringing their own POV, their own beliefs and assumptions, their own life experiences and cultural background to the experience. I'm quite guilty of posting one-piece images, thinking that it has enough to get my meaning across. But invariably people will react as if the image meant something else. Like a Rorschach Inkblot, they reveal something of themselves.
Thankfully the responses I've gotten have been netural to positive. So I've learned to roll with it -- to appreciate and even to learn from other people's POV. "Oh, I didn't think about that!"
Life is full of pleasant surprises that way.
I find that the most meaningful characters are those that act out stories which draw from our shared experiences. Looking at real world events, one long running theme is the greater role that women have come to assume. This trend has been going on for decades, uppending the convention of a male-dominated world. It's the kind of change that invites counter-reaction -- conflict -- which sets up an interesting story.
So in this one, there is a fourth person off-camera, the one the three ladies are interacting with. In the police force, he's the alpha male, the swaggering colleague who's intent on showing these women their proper place.
Sgt. Cleo (Exasperated): Pff-fft. C'mon, show up or shut up. Why not get in the ring and settle this the time-honored way?
Sgt. Inez (Taunting): Oh, I'll go easy on you ... like the wallflower that you are.
Sgt. Andrea (Mock-Comisserating): Eh, you know she graduated top in her class in hand-to-hand combat, right? Yup. Nice knowing you by the way.
So the dust up unfolds. Without let up. Without anyone emerging the victor.
Then the twist in the story happens. A higher up -- a stiff upper lip lieutenant -- arrives at the gym and breaks the fight off. He then announces that both brawlers have to team up to solve a crucial case, regardless of their differences. So the sulking, unlikely pair head off to work together. Eventually they solve the case, but along the way they learn something about one another, mellowing their outlook, and, in the end, rewarding each other with grudging respect. A redemption story.
Cheers!
@csaa
thanks for adding the story idea there, so if I may add some idea to the visualisation, this would be a thing I believe woudl work and give the viewer this feeling of revelation
zoom out for a second set shouwing us the 4th yet invisible person to whom their conversation is addressed showing his reaction (walking in the scne with a sway of having the upper hand?)
then add a third panel zooming out even further showing the higher up commanding them into a team - everyone in shock
I wrote a lot of GURPS books some years back for Steve Jackson Games, and they always required an extensive playtest online. But, for example, on a word-count basis, All the King's Men (about 81,000 words) generated more playtest comments than the original book! THAT was a little too much information from would-be readers. Did their comments help the book? Definitely - some of them. But the bulk of it was me just wading through the comments, arguements, trolling (!), and so forth to find the gems.
For my graphic novel, I have a very small cadre of people I trust who actually give me helpful comments, not opinions or judgments or anything like that. It's made up of only 8 people and I find it very helpful. They've done as much for Crossroads as 90,000+ words of playtest did, without all the rigamarole.
So my point? Finding a small group of critics that you trust can make the difference between a good project and a mediocre one. No man is an island, as they say, and no matter how good you think your work is (or bad!) you're wrong. :) And, side note, if you've got a large audience you're posting to (e.g., webtoons), make sure you don't take it personally. ("Don't listen to everything people say." - Ecclesiastes 7:21).
Really like this thread - thanks to all who are posting!
Witt / Brian J. Underhill
Deviant Art, Facebook
wait what? you made GURPS books? Cool, I played the system for a while
I haven't posted in a while. I just wanted to share some renders with the new shaders I've been developing.
Cheers!
Sgts. Andrea, Cleo & Inez | Daz assets and set up | Blender Eevee render | Clip Studio Paint post-edit
I don't really know what to say about this. It started out with the new hair asset I used for Sgt. Andrea. As usual, I then tried out a few test renders. Something about this pose stayed with me. From there I built up the scene from foreground to back, topping off with dialog to introduce tension. (BTW the off camera VO belongs to Sgt. Cleo.) I don't really plan anything else beyond this single panel.
Hope you like it.
Cheers!
Sgt. Andrea: Caught Sneaking Around | Daz assets | Blender Eevee render | Clip Studio Paint post-edit
very nice image, yeah sometimes they happen like that and often that's when it gets really good
Okay. So I guess I'm going to "out" myself. Which unnerves me, honestly. LOL
My name is Chuck Austen, and I'm sort of a multi-purpose guy. I've worked in animation for 30 some years, and comics off and on for longer than that. I've produced shows like Croods, Rocky and Bullwinkle, and She-Ra for Dreamworks, among others, and written comics for Marvel, and DC, along with personal projects like my recent series for ComiXology, Edgeworld. I've also written novels (and used DAZ for the covers), won awards, done quite well, and played around with DAZ Studio as a hobby for a good twenty years, at least, making dozens of personal comics entirely for myself. It started as a way to have fully poseable "mannequins" for reference, but evolved into using the actual finished images as I learned more about the lighting and rendering aspects of DAZ, Reality, and now Iray.
Recently I've started testing the waters publishing actual comics using this as a finished art technique, as I feel that the technology is finally there to make not only good comics, but better comics than what we have now. But I think it's going to take more work and material to get the process understood, and accepted. To that end I've decided it's time to out myself, and help on this particular forum as much as I can. More material, more genres, more good comics might help shift public perception. So it's my intent to help and offer advice where I can, encouragement where it's needed, and hopefully see more DAZ produced comics in the near future. Because--honestly--I'd like to do more comics this way, myself.
These forums were invaluable to me in learning DAZ, and hopefully this will be a way for me to return the favor. By "outing" myself I hope to avoid the "how do we know you have real-world experience" responses, and just get down to helping where I can. Attached are samples of covers and pages I've done using DAZ, at 400 dpi for both Amazon's print on demand, and ComiXology's Guided View process, hence the simple, boxy layouts. Guided View works best, and fastest with clearly delineated, 90 degree angles, and rectangular panels. I also think it's a great way to present comics stories and is very similar to how we now pitch storyboards in animation.
Thanks for reading.
@Space Viking Nice intro Bio and it's always good to hear from others who have experience working in the industry.
Looking forward to hearing more about your print-on-demand workflow, Comic Book tips, shader techniques, marketing, etc.
Thanks, robertswww.
First question first...
My basic Print-on-Demand Workflow (POD), (assuming you don't need the "How I make a Comic" workflow, only the "get it to market" workflow) is this:
First, you have to set up a publishing account with Amazon, if that's who you use as a vendor. If you have an account for ordering stuff, this is pretty easy. You just have to give them your bank info so they know where to send the money if you're lucky enough to sell copies. This will take you to your personal KDP, or Kindle Direct Publishing, where you can follow the steps to upload, once the below steps are completed.
Next, your pages/issues have to be formatted to fit Amazon's POD workflow, which is essentially just a properly sized PDF, and you should want a Digital ComiXology version, as well. ComiXology offers templates at the Amazon website for both, but here's a basic breakdown for those of you who want to build your own.
Start with an image
w = 6.875 (2750 p)
h = 10.438 (4175 p)
400 dpi
I have pre-ruled panel borders that I manipulate as needed for each, individual page. Again, keep the panels 90 degree angles, with no overlapping images/broken panels for best results.
Once the panels are set up as I want, I begin pasting in the rendered images using "Paste Into" so that I maintain a hole which will hide word balloon edges when I bring those in from Illustrator. Some people make their template IN Illustrator, but this is how I set up my workflow, and I've gotten used to it as it shows me the resolution of fonts and how small/readable they are when they get reduced for ComiXology's lower res. Given that the first "print run" is through ComiXology's Digial platform, I want these easily readable on devices as small as iPhones, so my text is bigger than most "normal" comics.
Once the pages are assembled, effects, and lettering added, I make copies, flatten them, and put them in separate folders (easy as two clicks if you have Bridge). The "Print-on-Demand" resolution is the full 400 dpi (and can go as high as 600, maybe more, but that increases rendering times massively, and as low as 300, but that gets a bit pixely for my tastes, so 400 seems to be the sweet spot)--which is much higher than the ComiXology resolution of 830x1280 with a file size NOT GREATER THAN 800 KB (anything over will be chunkified by the converter's terrible compression algorithm).
Keep these files labeled, and separate. You don't want to mix these two sets up and accidentally print the lo-res version. Customers will not be happy.
POD is uploaded as a hi-res PDF file, and gets archived for sale and print once it has been approved by Amazon.
ComiXology needs the book to be run through their Kindle Comic Creator app first, which you can find for Mac or Windows, here:
https://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Comic-Creator/b?ie=UTF8&node=23496309011
To prep these images for conversion resize them, 830 at the maximum on the small edge, and 800 KB max for file size. Once you run your pages through this Guided View process, you'll see why I recommend "boxy" panels. It's a matter of minutes to convert, as opposed to hours of fiddling. There are YouTube videos that show this process nicely. Once you have the Guided View set up, I recommend changing the images it compresses (the app does a horrible job), and replace them with your original reduced files. You'll find the KCC crushed images in your pre-named ouput folder, in the HTML sub folder, in another sub folder called "scaled-images". Drag, drop, and replace. You'll be happier when you do.
Once this app has done its work, you export a small, self-named file:
Which is your entire file to upload to Amazon, through Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP).
Then you go through the somewhat lengthy process of describing your work, adding in keywords (crucial to help people find your work), etc, etc, and set a price. This is individual to everyone, and very much based on file size, and personal desire.
Hit the submit button and wait for Amazon to approve your comic. Once it is approved it is "LIVE" and available for purchase at all Amazon sites. At this point I buy a copy, download it and look at it in the ComiXology app, just to make sure I didn't screw anything up. Often I do which requires replacing the original file, and resubmitting to go LIVE. I did this a few times with my first book, and is how I learned about the terrible compression algorithm built into Kindle Comics Create.
Now it's time to work on the next one, because having a shelf of books is the best way to sell more books. One upload will rarely get you noticed. Several gets people thinking it might be worth checking out.
Psychology.
Best,
-C