Do you prefer vertical or normal comics? Where do you read them?

[nathanKmcwilliams]

@DNoble that's a perfect explanation of how I feel as well. There's only so many panel transitions you can do in vertical.

[allenT]

Old school page format lover here.
I read on PC and also mobile app, but mostly-- on PC.

[BoomerZ]

As a person making a comic, the vertical scroll adds lots of great things while taking away some things too.
Pros:
1: You can control the narrative better when scrolling. There is very little chance of the reader looking forward or down so you don't have to worry about reveals. You control when the reader sees something.
2: Long dropping panels are available to show someone falling or the like.

Cons:
1: No splash pages. The format doesn't allow it and specially at 900 px across.
2: Most panels have to be square or tall. With the limitation of the 900px across, wide panels just become small panels. It's hard to show action in the horizonal plane. So the trade off is tall for wide.

I would say as a reader, I don't mind either if done well. Scrolling comics tend to be slide shows, where you see lots of dialogue and a picture every once in a while. You can't get away with that in a normal formatted comics. The inverse is normal format comics with lots of portfolio style pieces with dialogue telling me what's going on.

[kitschensyngk]

When I joined Tapas, I thought about uploading NCC in a vertical format, but it ended up being too much extra work for me.

I've come to appreciate full page comics over vertical. No endless scrolling, I can read through pages quickly, plus I can always turn my phone sideways and zoom in and out if I need to.

[VersusVII]

So you start drawing your comic in a page then split the panels in vertical to make it more appealing for phone readers. Does it improve the numbers of readers you can achieve?

[VibrantFox]

Even tho i'l always read on desktop coz it's easier on my eyes I've grown to enjoy both formats.

Like I've definitely grown up on the page format reading comics and manga throughout the years and I have a great amount of appreciation for all the things that can be done with it but there's also a level of creativity I've seen brought out through the vertical format that I think has earned itself a little respect

I'll admit i can be picky about how a vertical scroll comic looks in terms of how it uses gutters and panel borders and so on but I like both formats the same overall

[VersusVII]

I'm following people that analyse both comics and manga pages and also webtoons: when you create a page you really need to take in count a lot of elements as you say, even the last panel before you turn around the page.

Another limit in the vertical format is that you can't do a long establishing shot, some people end up rotating the scene making me flip my phone or turn my head when it happens on PC.

[VersusVII]

You're right about the pros n2, some artists find mesmerizing way to exploit the verticality (pgs falling, changing from one scene to another ecc)

I saw some artists try to put the splash pages rotating them 90° into the story but it just breaks the flow, you have to flip the phone to see what's happening.

I've never put too much attention on how the two type of comics deals with wall of text/dialogues because it's something that different authors do in different ways according also to their drawing skills (some just do "portfolio style pieces" while others try to change the camera angle to not bore the reader)

[R.n.P]

i prefer vertical on pc and normal book like reading on mobile

[powerplantanimations]

Scroll style. I also love stories that take advantage of this method. It takes advantage of the online medium. I don't remember this story but it was like "SCROLL FAST!!!" during an action scene and it made the fight scenes more intense.

[nathanKmcwilliams]

I haven't been posting my stuff for a while now. Still writing and making things, but just in general it's a good idea to make your comic as accessible as possible.
I say that it doesn't necessarily means a boost in readers immediately, but it does help with reader retention if they can read the comic easily on their phone.

[river121693]

I like a lot of what you can do for pacing in scrolling format, but I'm all for standard pages.
There are a lot of limitations for scrolling format. You can't have epic splash pages and sweeping landscape scenes. There arent as many opportunities to use panel sizes and placement to control the storytelling and evoke feelings in general.

Also, as a reader, my fingers gets tired from scrolling, and I don't like being forced to get to the end of a chapter before I stop lol.

[Clay]

As a mobile reader, I prefer traditional page format aesthetically. I just really like how they look and I also appreciate not having to constantly scroll. My main complaint with them is that a surprising amount of people use text sizes or fonts that are hard to read on a phone, even with a larger screen. Handwritten text is extremely hard to read unless the artist can write like a machine, and at that point a custom font would make more sense timewise. I like using tapas and comicfury to read page format webcomics, since webtoon does this weird flashing thing when I flip thru pages and that makes my eyes hurt.
I do read scroll style comics, but if the panels are too spaced apart I will drop it since I don't like constantly scrolling. Scroll comics tend to have much more legible text overall tho.
Drawing wise, I have a mixed opinion. I haven't really been posting anywhere since I don't think I have anything finished enough to share.
I kinda like scroll format since it's very easy for me to just slap things wherever and hack together a composition quickly. The file size gets annoying fast, and navigating the canvas is annoying. It's also really easy to forget a layer is used higher up on the page and move it around and not realize that messed something up until later.
Page format requires me to put in a lot more effort composition wise, but I like the end results way more! Even the super wonky pages are fun to look back at, while I find that scrolling pages are not very fun for me to look back at since I can't just look at the whole scroll at once like I can with a page. The initial amount of effort needed is very offputting tho so i don't get past the planning stage for most pages.

[TheLemmaLlama]

No preference as a reader, but as someone who didn't grow up reading a lot of comics, panel layout confuses the heck out of me and I thank the flying spaghetti monster every day for vertical scroll format and how it lowers the barrier for entry into creating webcomics XD

So vertical scroll with enough horizontal pixels to accommodate cool scenery shots is best

[VersusVII]

I feel you when you say your fingers hurt while scrolling too much. I hate when webcomics have a really long chapter that takes me 5 minutes to read them, sometimes I read them at work during breaks

[VersusVII]

About the text size you're right, I try to don't get lower 13 as a font size as I read in the past it's the best size to keep it ok on a printed manga tankobon. But on phones sometimes it can be tricky since the lower quality and size.

I've never tried to draw in a webtoon style, I've never considered that a layer takes all the vertical page

[river121693]

ya, the worst is when you stop halfway to take a break or look at something else, but when you come back to it, the page reloads and I have to rescroll lol

[Zugaikotsu]

tbh both can work well, or not. It depends on more on the page layout and fonts size. But seems vertical format is taking the space by assault, I know no strong platform where print page format is relevant. If anything, vertical format comics are being converted to print and getting good space even in penguin random house.

[Mr-Gretto]

Since I've been reading mostly classic page format comics and manga my whole life (my favorite anime always ends at the most interesting point haha), so as a reader I'm more used to this format and started sticking with it in the first place when I started my comic
However, after noticing that on Tapas, vertical comics look much more aesthetically pleasing and convenient to flip through on phone screen, I thought that simple page comics could also be adjusted to this format. At least if the actions on the pages are united by a common plot and the narrative doesn't suffer, even that way you can come up with something. Of course, it won't be a full-fledged vertical comic as the frames are still arranged as for regular pages, but it does look more appropriate on the phone. As has been written in other comments: the important thing is that the font is readable. Otherwise, it just depends on the personal preference of the reader or author

[VersusVII]

Thank you for your reply.
When the vertical format was rising I remember authors with page-format comics converting them piling up the panels to have both a printable version and an online one. I don't know if some people do this way anymore.