Do you paint behind the speech bubbles?

[Darth_Biomech]

I did for a while, but noticing how again and again I ended up with painting details that nobody would ever see because later I add a speech bubbles on top of that, I recently opted for a workflow where I decide the layout of the bubbles and texts before I do any serious sketching or inking. I think it allows me to draw slightly faster, but the downside is that if I wouldn't be able to change the bubble layout on the latter stages.

A bonus hilarity is that cases of amputated arms and disembodied legs arise.

[sarrowsmith10]

I do all the art as if there are no speech bubbles. This is because in my team, the illustrator (me) and the letterer are two different people. The letterer fits the bubbles to the text. The text is different size depending on if the comic is for print or for the web. So the bubbles are always changing, and sometimes change positions on the page depending on what the final destination of the page is (web or print). Also, sometimes where I think the bubble will go is often not where the letterer decides to put it.

[biraaron]

Art first. Speech bubble later. I like trying to make the bubble fit organically. This helps. I also like to take last pass editing before publishing. This way I can work on separate elements of the page without it altering other parts. My photoshop files are just stack and stacks of layers

Additionally, it allows me to have hi-res version of just the page art if I need it for promotion or merch.

[deadbinky]

I do art first because I often end up moving the bubbles around later because I changed dialogue, or I decided it would pace better if someone spoke more (or not at all) or I change the sizes and stuff lol. basically I'm an indecisive noob out of their depth

[AmysGames]

I draw what's behind the speech bubble, yeah. In fact, I've been doing semi-translucent speech bubbles for years now so that the art behind the bubble shows through, haha.

[gparsons]

I plan the speech bubble as part of the layout, so I never draw behind it.

[Shanny8]

My word balloons are the LAST thing I add to my pages coz I do them separately from the page in Illustrator. I used the finished colored page as the template & start laying my balloons and dialogue on top; once that's done I save the lettering as a sep file and import it to PS where I merge them together.

[Iris-Grimoire]

Art first always. It's important to work on lettering as you make the page for proper flow, but you might have to adjust things on the fly, or alter an entire exchange on a revision, and suddenly there's chunks of art missing. I also like to save textless versions for promo purposes, it's an illustraton after all!

[im_not_pixie]

In the first sketch pass I always include where the speech bubbles will go, because I think they should be considered an important part of the layout. HOWEVER, when I write my dialogue in the script I don't consider it a fixed decision, because maybe something looks awkward on the "page" or a joke needs to be rewritten. Plus, speech bubbles might need to be rearranged for easier readability.

[rmdooley]

I always draw behind the speech bubbles. It makes small edits with text placement easy rather than world-ending and is worth it in the long run.

[Kura]

I didn't when I started out. But I do now.

I do speech bubble placement before I do the art. So at first it made sense not to draw behind them, until it didn't.

It mostly started when my work started getting translated it would sometimes require word bubble to be moved or made smaller.

Honestly, going back and touching up old pages to clean up for translation was just way more work and much more frustrating than actually drawing the whole picture and then having it go under a bubble.

Now though I don't have translators for my work, but I've still made a habit of doing this, as it also comes in handy when I'm reformatting for long form (you have a lot more space for that, so when reformatting I can usually move the bubble out of the way of the drawings because I have the space, unlike a condensed page for print. It's also useful for if I I have the opportunity to reuse a background. I can grab it from a previous panel and not worry about pieces of it being missing.

Another plus is that you can use you panels for promotional art easily by just hiding the text layers. I don't have time to draw extra images to promote my comic, but sometimes a comic panel will turn out so nice that I can use that to help with promotional images.

[ajcrwl]

I go even further than that: I actually draw all the art behind the characters. Mostly because I add animation to pages, and characters can move.

But I just finished an episode for a comic that I make with lowest effort possible, and some speech bubbles were semi-transparent. I didn't bother with shading or colouring behind them, only sketch lines can be seen through the bubbles. It saved a ton of time.

Obviously I wouldn't do this if I needed to move the text, or change format between print or webcomic.

[IndigoShirtProd]

I usually plan the speech bubbles with the art so I don't draw behind them. I have considered changing it, but it's too inconvenient. If I do need to move a speech bubble, I'll fo so and draw in what was behind it previously.

[sarrowsmith10]

I go even further than that: I actually draw all the art behind the characters.

I don't do this all the time but I do it fairly often. Probably because I find it easier to draw the background, then place the characters in it, rather than vise versa. I also reuse parts of those scene setting backgrounds over and over again to save time.

I do speech bubble placement before I do the art.

This is also a good tip. More often than not I get very mildly angry messages from the letterer about how I didn't leave appropriate room for the text bubble.. so I try to leave a little bit of space if I remember. But like I said in my previous post, when I do leave space she usually doesn't use it, but at least I was courteous enough to try haha..

[Likri]

I sketch out the main characters first, then do the text and bubbles to see if I need to rearrange the panelling or the sizes of the characters - or the text. Only after that I start the lining process - this helps me not to waste time drawing unneseccary details in the back, also making sure the dialog amount works with the panels.

[indagold]

I specifically make room for the bubbles and draw around them cause Ive realized having it cover a character looks bad.

[vothnthorvaldson]

From the earliest stages of sketching, I decide roughly where I'll put my bubbles. I draw the exact outlines of speech bubbles just after sketching, to have a precise idea of how the page will look.

Then I do like the bubbles don't exist. I draw and paint everything. For a while, I tried to save time by not drawing under the bubbles, but in most cases it actually makes me lose time (eg. Time lost if I want to move the bubbles a little bit, or resize them because I changed the text a bit; if I want to reuse background for another panel or a banner; plus I recently started to use painting methods that require the whole surface to be painted).

The only thing is that if I struggle too much with a specific part of the lineart and it's under a bubble... well, I allow it to look bad. Hands under bubbles are usually mangled

[jcmraz]

I do everything without speech balloons. I keep them in mind but I put balloons in on top of the art and make it 75% opacity

[ButterflyEmpress]

I always draw behind the text bubbles since they're on a different layer and in case I wanna tweak it's location slightly. Now I'm training myself to do a better job incorporation them into the illustrations so I'd have that problem less

[Awesomeness_Studios]

I do all of the art as 1 sketch layer first. Speech bubbles included. That way, I'm aware of how everything can fit together before I actually start inking. So I guess that means I don't paint behind speech bubbles because I know nothing will be there.