Creators. how far ahead do you write your longform script?

Years.

Seriously, I can't imagine writing a story page to page, let alone chapter to chapter. I can't even imagine how to write without knowing the ending before you start writing!

But one thing I have learned is that a lot of people think they can write that way. And unfortunately, I have read far too many stories on the web that felt like they were being written that way.

Have a plan, as another poster said. When I am reading, I don't want to feel like the writer is winging it, I want to feel like they have a plan. Also, some of the best literary devices such as foreshadowing don't work as well without a plotted and planned story.

Eagle
(It's not easy, but it works best in the long run)

The beginning, middle, and end of my comic, Shadosassins7, and all of its major plotpoints have already been planned. I've gone ahead and wrote the entire script for my comic, but aside from the key moments, they aren't set in stone. This is just to allow for some creativity when storyboarding and plannng panels. I too have wrote stories in the past with no direction and it simply doesn't work for me. At the very least you should know all major plot points and your ending before every deciding to put pen to paper (or however you make your comic). I envy anyone who can create a successful comic without planning the story ahead of time.

When I create a story I don't consider doing work on it as a comic until I have an end to the story. I'm not saying I have to have everything written out until the end, I'm still writing out the journey and experiences so to speak, I just know what the end of the series will be and that it will have one. Sometimes in concerns to to comics specifically, I try to have an alternate ending as well, one that unfortunately comes earlier than I would intend for if I find that I can no longer work on drawing the series anymore. It's not ideal and I would rather not use it, but it's there if I need to use it.

I also like to have major events at the least mapped out. I don't know what all these major events will be sometimes, but when I do know what they are I know how the story will get there, regardless of if the script is completely written to that point or not.

For the actual script it varies, but I always keep the writing ahead. Some series can be as little as 15 chapters ahead, others can range well into the 100's (the series that jump that far ahead though usually do so because I originally wrote the story as a novel series, and is currently being translated into a comic form) and sometimes 'written chapters' don't always translate into illustrated chapters, so some scripts end up being longer then one illustrated chapter, while others don't have enough content to make one comic chapter so I'll have to work with content from the next chapter to fix that.

For the thumbnail layout, I only work on those on a per chapter bases. I'll complete the layout and such for the chapter I intend to work on, but will not move onto the next chapter until it's done. Mostly to allow myself to improve art wise as I go through the series.

I thought I might add that writing out a script allows you to foreshadow, which is one of the most intriguing pieces of good stories. Planning out the details aren't as important, and they likely will change. Sometimes most of the script can change or be fixed because a script isn't permanent. It's a tool to support you, and generally ease the stress of being both the author AND artist, which are pretty overwhelming jobs even by themselves.

Well I script the story at least 20-30 pages ahead of the comic pages, I don't set anything in stone because once it's time for me to actually draw the pages I find that I come up with something that I think works better than what I scripted a week or a month ago. Basically I put what I generally want to happen in the script knowing that it will change when it gets to the drawing phase. Usually when I start to draw a page I start out with rough thumbnails on one side of the page and some written script on the other side, I call it thumb scripting.

For about a year I was doing the chapter by chapter business. I had an idea of where it would go, but I was pretty much exploring the characters and their rapport. I then traded critiques with a fellow comic creator and realised that … he was right, I needed to clean up my goals! I had also read something by another comic creator who said they scripted everything out and even knew how many pages a comic would be. I was floored. The page count! Does anyone else do this?

But I didn't quite go that far. I knew the main points, arcs, etc already. I had just been filling in the blanks as I went along. I used to write scripts by hand (and I do still write out those quick ideas in my notebook), but one day I happened to have my computer but not the notebook and I just began typing and never stopped. Somehow, within days, I had the entire script defined.

Sometimes a change in my routine can do that. That was probably the best feeling in the world, when I reached the end. I was floating around for days in this glorious haze like, I know where it ends. I have the end. Ah, natural comic highs.

Anyway, the whole thing is planned out. That doesn't mean I am not messing around with it every week! I move chapters around, cut some, add some, etc as it suits the needs of the story. I also have it set out in twine, which is software for making text games, because I can write out main points or things that need to be addressed and just move them around on the board to make sure I am not forgetting them (by accident). It helps me keep track of main points, events, actions and things that need to be revealed before such-and-such incident. (btw if anyone is curious about twine, it's free, you can get it here: http://twinery.org6)

tl;dr: Whole script done. I edit very, very carefully about ten chapters in advance. I story-board chapter by chapter. End is absolutely set; other things may move as necessary!

I have a very general outline spanning the entire story of Grassblades6 - from beginning to the very end. And by "very general", I mean my first chapter is summed up as follows - "Masahiro and Akane meet --> they go to town, he leaves her". That turned into 33 pages and got a BUNCH more details filled in and more stuff tacked onto the end once I sat down and actually started working on the chapter - but the outline is good to have, because it allows me to have an idea of where I'm going, and where each scene needs to end up.

But it's also so general that I can adapt it.

I mean, I know who each of the major characters are/will be, and I know where they'll show up in the story, and I know how everything ends. But I have creative freedom when it comes to HOW all of that stuff happens, and I'm free to add scenes or subtract scenes wherever I feel it's necessary.

I then script the story chapter by chapter; I decide which general notes of the outline should go into one single chapter, and then I sit down with a pencil and some paper and I start storyboarding and writing the dialogue together. I really can't write it all as just plain text and THEN do the storyboards; they kind of have to grow together for me.

This process allows me just the right amount of structure to keep me headed in the right direction, and just the right amount of structure to keep me from getting bored AND allowing me to fix things that weren't super-great in my outline (because you KNOW there are gonna be some of those; sometimes, we can't see the problems before you run into them). For example - I realised that I needed my secondary characters to show up a little more often to keep people from forgetting them, so there's a brand new scene in chapter four that doesn't exist in the outline, and there's another coming up in chapter... six, I think? Also, I can do a bunch of foreshadowing of stuff, because I know where we're going.

I also have a buffer of pages, so that I'm VERY far ahead of what's being posted online (55 pages ahead, at last count) - this means that once I finish drawing a chapter, I can go back and tweak and adapt the dialogue one last time, if that's necessary.

I don't write the ENTIRE story by script first because my mind does tend to change as I go along, I know what I want especially for the beginning, middle and ending. The way I make stories is well...I think a bit odd. When I do the writing it tends to change drastically in the storyboards and thumbnails, even though that does tend to happen I just use the script to give me a basic idea on what to do for the scenes. I guess I just write better by pictures shrugs

I have my whole story planned with ideas written down in points- to remember what I need to include, parts that are the most important for the story and some random dialogues. As for detailed script/thumbnails, I am a chapter ahead. So before I start working on chapter 2, I draw storyboard for chapter 3. This way I still have time to change it if I get some new ideas c: (though of course there are also some last-minute changes while drawing).

It depends on the storyline for me. Some are longer and need more preparation. Some I write page by page.

So far I have every scene plotted down to the exact number of pages up to about 180 pages worth, which encapsulates a beginning, middle and end, but in truth, I've only actually plotted the final script up to page 35.

The main timeline from beginning to end is plotted out before I even draw the first page. Little events that build on character exposition but do not influence the story course are inserted as the story progresses and I think on it more. Finally the actual dialogue is done when I work on the chapter-by-chapter thumbnails.

Yes, but the difference between most creators and serialized manga artists is that serialized manga artists have editors to keep track and pay attention to that sort of stuff (especially since the editors can often be the ones offering direction in how a story should go - that's their job).

Most creators are working on their own (and I say most because yes, some are working for companies, ex. Mikiko, and others are working with writers/artists as a team, ex. Reon Merryweather) and so it's best to start practicing and getting into the habit of crafting a good story through and through instead of trying to wing it. There's no downside to it - all it does is help you work out kinks in your story, make sure everything fits and works, and assures that you'll tell the best story that you can produce. Winging it only works for some people, and most of those stories are shorter and not as long and complex as series like One Piece, Bleach, Naruto, etc. (IMO, Bleach should have ended after the Aizen/Hueco Mundo arc, at the end of Volume 48; and One Piece isn't even half-done yet!)

Not to mention, while it still stands as one of the most popular animes to date, DB is not a good example of a well written piece of work. It's inconsistent, most of the love for the series comes from nostalgia and the high-action fight scenes, and DBZ has been said to be even worse. Lots of people love the Cell/Freeza/etc. saga but that was considered the highest point of that show, and everything else got most of its charm from its crazy martial arts sequences. The story itself is all over the place, and you're not really justifying your point by pointing out the fact that Akira Toriyama made it as he went along - cause if you look really closely and actually start thinking and looking for the plotholes/inconsistencies/etc., you can really, really tell.

(that being said I do love DB and have nothing against it, and don't want to start a fight over that lol DB is an awesome show/manga <3)