drawing a comic strip

But that doesn't matter, because what you'll find right away is that the big, big, big thing isn't the drawing -- it's the pacing. Especially if you want to be consistent and take up the same amount of space with each installment (possibly divided into a non-consistent amount of panels; but the same amount of space still translates to a very specific, very rigid range of wordcount and beats).

My advice is to practice, lots, and do a whole bunch of strips -- like 20 -- where you're focusing on the rhythm and the beats, not the drawing. If any of them come out well, you can redo them from scratch, but it's hard to write a "script" for a strip without drawing it out and seeing it in action. It takes awhile to get a feel for what words are going to fit on the page, for the amount of space you save just by using a shorter word, for when it's worth saving that space, etc.

And even though it's hard to write that script, I recommend taking other peoples' strips and "reverse-engineering" the script -- not just strips that are done the way you want yours to be, but any strips at all, especially published ones. Take them, look at them, and jot them down --

PANEL 1.
Very brief desc of art.
SO-AND-SO: Blah blah blah
SUCH-AND-SUCH: Blah blah blah

PANEL 2
etc.

It gives you a feel for wordcounts and rhythms, and you start to pick up on things like which cartoonist keeps doing gags that really don't need to be a comic strip but wouldn't get readers otherwise since no one syndicates thirty-word jokes.

Practice practice practice.

Comedy, I think, depends on pacing and rhythm more than non-comedy does, and the strip format is so tight that you really want to get that rhythm down.

If you do a comic strip long enough and work at making it better, you'll eventually get a lot of the structure just through osmosis and intuition, but if you can start thinking about it ahead of time -- if your creative ability works that way -- you can skip over some missteps, I think.

I've done some online comics (and I am working on others), though I hardly think I've mastered the form in any sense of the word. I'd say the most important thing is to start with reasonable expectations and always finish what you start. Write a 3 or 4 frame comic. Set out to tell a short story in 9 or 10 frames before going for something bigger.

Re: Having difficulty drawing characters "the same" in multiple panels: This just requires practise. Try just drawing your character (outside of the comic you're working on) from different angles, in different poses until you feel more comfortable drawing him/her/it. Alternately, try starting with simpler drawing styles. (i.e. It's easier to make a cartoonish character look the same across multiple panels than a more realistically drawn one.)

What I'm having trouble with is - fitting the text into the panel and knowing how big to make the panels. I guess it's a matter of drafting though. I'm trying to turn a comedy script I once started into a comic strip. I'll paste the rough draft of the script (it's shit and unfinished but here goes):

There’s Something In the Water.

Effect like the beginning of an old VHS tape that’s been recorded over several times. Eventually picture settles onto an old BBC logo. Appropriate music plays and the ANNOUNCER’s voice is heard.

ANNOUNCER:
*Mumbling* My wife does anal *clear speaking* Time to party now on telly, when Auntie Ro comes to visit. With sickening displays of sextagenarian alcoholism from the outset - classic comedy: My Giddy Aunt!

BBC logo fades out and we go to the beginning credits of MY GIDDY AUNT, a spoof 70s family sitcom in the vain of Are You Being Served, The Good Life et al.

INT – TERRY’S HOUSE – DAY

Music: Plonkerish trombone/tuba music#
Effects: Fake applause

Camera pans across the living room. Everything is decked out in typical 70’s style. Plenty of dirty green, brown and orange furniture and ornaments – lots of ornaments. Very breakable.

Opening credits fade in and out, superimposed onto the screen in shakey garish pink and yellow lettering. They read as follows:

***** COMEDY PRODUCTIONS COMPANY LTD PLC PRESENT

My Giddy Aunt

WRITTEN BY GILLIAN HORSEBOTTOM

Camera settles on TERRY. He is sitting on the sofa in the middle of the living room engrossed in the paper.

Music fades out, applause ends

ENTER JULIE

JULIE:
They’re everywhere Terry! Absolutely everywhere!

TERRY (still looking at paper):
Hmmm…

JULIE:
I just opened the oven door and there they were! They’ve already invaded the entire garden! Goodness knows what we’re going to do!

TERRY gives JULIE a disinterested shrug

JULIE (moving the paper away from TERRY):
You haven’t even noticed them have you?!

TERRY:
Sorry darling, I was reading the paper. What were you talking about?

JULIE (calming down a little):
Oh it’s not important now anyway, darling. Are you all set for tonight? I’ve invited June and Malcolm; Judy and Martin; Julia and Ian and I think their children are coming along - they can play in the spare room if they get bored. I think the Briggs’s are coming too as long as Simon can get his “little problem” sorted out. Have you invited anyone else darling? I need to make sure we have enough cheese footballs to go around.

TERRY:
Well I did mention it to Alan the other day, he’s unlikely to miss a good party…

JULIE:
Alan… the one with…?

TERRY:
…the gammy leg, yes. His doctor told him to take it easy or he’d never walk again.

JULIE:
That’s terrible.

TERRY:
Yes, he’s hopping mad about it, I can tell you.

SFX: Over the top canned laughter.

JULIE:
Yes, well invite who you like. Just so long as you don’t let Auntie Ro get word of it.

TERRY (looking guilty):
Ummmm, well I was going to talk to you about tha…

Sound effect: Doorbell rings.

JULIE (going to the door):
Who could that be? I thought I wrote 7 o’clock on the invitation!

JULIE opens the door and in bursts AUNTIE. She is carrying a half empty bottle of gin and is tottering all over the place. The canned laughter is at breaking point.

AUNTIE:
Hello Julie! Hello Terry! Alan told me about the party! He said to bring a bottle so I did.

She takes a large swig.

JULIE (flustered and trying to get out of AUNTIE’s wild flouncing):
Oh, err… hello Auntie Ro. I’m afraid no-one else is here yet (nervous laugh).

AUNTIE:
That’s okay dear, that’s okay. If you could just fix me up a glass of sherry, I’ll stay out of your wa… oooops-a-daisy! (knocks over expensive looking vase by the door) Oh deary me! I’m ever so sorry, dear!

TERRY:
Why don’t you come over to the settee and put your feet up Auntie?

AUNTIE:
Don’t mind if I do Tony. (Goes to couch but trips over and lands on sofa, legs in the air with dress falling round her legs and big silly bloomers showing)

JULIE (whispering to Terry):
Don’t let her go upstairs! You remember what happened last time!

TERRY:
Yes, she thought the radio in the bedroom was talking to her and decided to attack poor Poochy.

Camera shows POOCHY the dog cowering in a corner.

AUNTIE (muffled):
What’s that dear? I’m a trifle deaf!

AUNTIE frees herself from the sofa but manages to smash the coffee table to pieces with her legs.

TERRY (desparingly):
Oh my giddy aunt!

Waves of fake laughter drown all other dialogue out and screen buzzes and switches off.

Obviously there's a few devices I won't easily be able to translate into comic book form. Also I'm going to have to trim the dialogue right down but I think it would be quite fun to draw, with a TV screen in the first panel and then moving onto a "Good Life" style location.

I don't think I've ever quite managed to do that, but it sounds like a good goal. Intuitively, it also seems like there are certain things that work for dialogue when you're going to have a voice around to deliver it, and certain things that work when the only voice is the one in the reader's head.

With the TV chatter, at least, you can keep the lettering smaller than you normally would, and overlap for that sort of "noise" effect, so you don't necessarily need to cut there.

Anybody have thoughts about getting into cartooning (purely as a hobby, not as a livelihood)? I fell into a Youtube rabbit hole yesterday and came out of it with sudden urge to draw cartoons for fun. I doodled when I was in grade school but never really cultivated the skill (aside from drawing caricatures of professors I disliked in undergrad/grad school), so I'm essentially starting from scratch.

https://s.put.re/iu7Zwf72.jpeg

I've been working off and on on two - hopefully, eventually - comic books: one a horror comic sans blood or gore, going more for creepiness and a supernatural vibe and the other a collection of one-page dream sequences. Been at it for a year almost by now and have a good portion of the stories pencilled or roughed out. These things take soooo much time to do! There's little examples on an IG account I made just for this stuff as well as assorted random doodles, etc : @jvelezdrawings

Ilxorfield!

https://s.put.re/qhtWDUbE.png

churlie brown