Week 14:

Objective:

Objective of this final project is to create something and write an essay about it. In the case of this final project I decided to take the opportunity to see what goes into comic creation and how much work it is compared to what it pays especially as an indie comic artist.

Research:

I had the story and some images in my head already but not how to execute them or lay out the panels so I started with a script. I first wrote a screenplay script before turning that into a comic script. I looked at google to find what comic scripts looked like and also took to Youtube to see what is the mindset you need while writing a comic script. What you should think about when you write one. The process given by one of the videos is to first write down your ideas and then compile a summary of the story or synopsis. For this I used the method we had done during class where I wrote the synopsis this way. I kept the synopsis vague for readers as not to give too much away and I do not actually have the ending quite planned out yet so it doesn't include an end to it.

Synopsis:

Normal Script:

The videos I watched:

How To Write a Comic Book Script (Part 1) 

How and Why To Script a Comic (Even When you Hate it)

After that was the sketching part. I did incredibly messy small thumbnails with pen so I had my first ideas down on paper of how the comic should look like. I took the thumbnails to my computer where I digitally sketched cleaner sketches and started to play around with the layouts. During this part I looked at my own comics like Marvel's Spider-man/Deadpool comic as well as a comic called the Snowcat Prince by Dina Norlund. From them I looked at possible layouts as well as speech bubble styles.

Sketches/thumbnails for the pages

Some progress images

I needed to create a character for murals in the cave wall so here was a character design I came up with for that.

The character design for the main character I had already done.

I got feedback from my comic artist friend. Check her comic here: Stay. And she advised to change the first page and give a better showcase of why the Stoat character is afraid so I needed to back and change that.

The revisited thumbnail. Not very clear unless you made it yourself I suppose xD But going back it gave me two whole more pages! In this I also looked to Snow Cat Prince to look for panel inspiration the first page might get revisited again in the process.

Current layout of the pages.