VIZBlog
posted 2-17-2009 4:18 PM by Rob L McCarthy
Advice for new manga artists/writers
1. Don’t overuse splash pages (one picture taking up the whole page), Just because a punching can take up a whole page doesn’t mean it has to or should. Goodness knows the kind of story I like would be too complex to burn though pages in this way. In my own work I CAN'T use them. My strip Hell on Wheels is four panels. That’s “newspaper strip” format that I see in my head, so that’s what I do.
2. You know how all your creative writing teachers say “write what you know"? Good solid advice, but please—just start there. If you've ever been to a creative writing course, you know how boring it can be to sit though “fiction” that’s just your classmate's relationship troubles with different names and more adverbs. GIMME A REASON to read it, even if I’m your best friend, and always use your imagination.
3. Humor is your friend. It's true that too many jokes might hurt your narrative flow, but people will keep reading if it’s funny.
4. Never take advice in the form of a number.
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Comments:
posted February 19, 2009 09:12 AM by Anthony Q.
Hey, after reading that, I definitely agree with 2, 3 and 4. 1 can't
really apply for me.
I've been writing for some time now, and I'm in art college to
improve my art (first year,) and I'm finding it really difficult
knowing that there are tons of better artists than me out there. What
I AM confident in is my stories- I know I've come up with some quite
original and really interesting ideas.
Do you have any advice on what someone like me should do? I've chosen
manga as my profession and don't want to mess up my career >.>
Perhaps find an artist to do the art while I do the story? Even then
where would I start? :P
posted February 19, 2009 02:15 PM by Under Score
In comics, a splash page is known as the page that includes the title
and credits along with artwork -- be it full page, double spread, or
even several panels. What you mean to refer to is actually just a
'full page' (or 'double spread').
Cheers
posted February 23, 2009 04:02 PM by al a.
Hey could you do more like this one?
This is good information that a lot
of people might not know.
I think splash pages (are those the two page spreads?)
are good because they aren't shown that often
and when they are, it's something awesome.
