Does Your Comic Have A Timeline?

[Aspie_Gamer]

Ok. So just now, I was doing a little research for Life of an Aspie to get a date for an e-mail being read in the first page of Chapter 6 as the chapter starts with a flashback to an event that happened a few weeks ago in comic time showing what a certain character was doing during said event.

Anyway, for two years now, I've known that my comic takes place in 2015 (the year LoaA started irl) and until tonight, I never gave much thought to the actual dates for when events in LoaA take place within that year as so far within the 5 soon to be 6 chapters I've created for the first of many story arcs, everything has taken place with the timespan of roughly three weeks give or take. Again, with said flashback that takes place at the start of Ch. 6, it got me thinking to when the events of the first story arc actually take place in 2015 and so here's a guide I just though up in my head.

Sunday, March 29th, 2015

-Chapter 1: The Vow (first two thirds)

Sunday, April 5th, 2015

-Chapter 1: The Vow (last third)

Monday, April 6th, 2015

-Chapter 2: First Day

-Chapter 3: Manga 101

Monday, April 13th, 2015

-Chapter 4: Reflections

Monday, April 20th, 2015

-Chapter 5: Aftermath

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

-Chapter 5: Aftermath (end of chapter)

-Chapter 6: Birds of a Feather

Anyone else use a timeline in their comic to keep track of events as they unfold? I mainly use it to avoid referencing real world pop culture and world events that haven't happened yet in the time period LoaA is set in. For example, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild can't really be used as a pop culture reference in LoaA as the game wasn't out yet and wouldn't be for almost another two years back in 2015.

[joannekwan]

Oh yeah, Demon House is based around a college school year.
Then for Heavy Horns it's more vague, but I did have to come up with a quick timeline for certain scene sequences because they depend on when texts or e-mails are sent.

[KoreanTacos]

I think keeping a timeline is hard for a comic like mine. Because things are constantly changing and new stupid trends or things that happen around me are always happening my comic is constantly moving forward with what is happening all the time. The only issue with that is when I decide to talk about something that is currently happening (for example: my strip about oreo flavored oreos or the announcement of World of Final Fantasy) they're completely dated as the punchline only really makes sense during that exact time frame (hell I think they recently brought back oreo flavored oreos again, I mean wtf right?). As I'm working on my script for my new series I am more focused on maintaining a more linear timeline and just gathering all of my knowledge from 2016-2017 as a foundation for my setting (even though the context of the story will center around different dimensions). Maintaining a constant timeline can be difficult because there could be something interesting that is happening right now, but if it doesn't relate to the specific timeline of the story then the timeline becomes a handicap. I personally give kuddos to people who can contain a linear story while still being accurate to their time frame.

[sarrowsmith10]

We have a timeline for Goblins... but not in this sense with dates. More like years and they are fictional years as the setting is the fantasy world of Razard. But it was really important to have a timeline because there are flashbacks that are critical to the story. It was really important for our readers to understand about when certain events happened in the character's lives, for their motivations to make sense. Does that make sense?

[LordVincent]

Lolnope for the most part I only have a general idea of the big things that will happen. Details and in some cases even the order are fuzzy and can be tossed around as I wish.

I have ADHD and I suck at writing but I love it so I do it anywaysssss

[Kura]

Yes, since one of the premises of my comic is a count down to the main character's death, there is a timeline that the story follows. Though it's not super exact like hour to hour or day to day. I keep track of the days withing the arcs and story-lines, but not really between, and definitely follow the months and seasons throughout the year(s)

Surprisingly though, a few readers have assumed that I don't actually follow a time line, and I that I just present dates when it is convent. Thought I think the reason for that was because of the tapastic Christmas Special. Which, because it was a extra addition that wasn't a pert of the script and was made for an event, did not follow the story's timeline. Which gave me the unexpected situation of readers thinking that I don't follow a solid timeline.

[shazzbaa]

I have both kinds! -- a timeline by year so I can keep up with what events certain characters were around for or how old they were when certain things happened, and also a timeline of how many days have gone by in comic-time -- though both tend to be rough and scribbled in the margins rather than typed up all official-like.
There's a few reasons for the day-by-day timeline -- stuff like the stage of the moon is occasionally relevant, there's one character who's going to die if he doesn't get magical help within a few days so I have to keep an eye on his timer -- but also for the more mundane reason of just keeping in mind how long these folks have known each other. When a chapter takes a year to finish, it's easy to forget that the guy they met at the beginning of the chapter has only really known them for one-and-a-half days by the end of it.

[MelancholicOtaku]

I've never thought about a timeline for my comic, never popped up.

[Louistrations]

My comic's technically set in 2014 when it was initially written and it's just crossing into 2015 in the current chapter. The story spans a 2 year period. I don't really reference real-life events though, so it's not much of an issue. I guess it just means the girls won't ever have the latest mobile phone models, haha just like me! Anzu has the same phone as me actually, because I'm lazy finding refs.

[BitteRjelly]

I have both too ! Actually, the first thing I did before writing anything down was to research what major things happened during the timespan of the main character life, since there's a lot of very important changes between the 70s and the late 90s ( also, you kinda have to know where technology was when you choose to set a story in these years: if I hadn't done my research, I would probably have set everything in the 80s, without thinking that I absolutely needed cellphones to exist. whoops )
So I have a big year-by-year timeline to set up what happened in the past and also serves to pin point what happened in the lore, and a day-by-day for the actual plot of the story, since everything takes place in less than a week. Since everything happens in such a small span of time, it's not too confusing to stay at 'yesterday' and 'tomorrow' instead of specific dates. All I need to do is try not to reference musics or movies that were out after 1995, and I try to avoid referencing anything from too late into this year.

[punkarsenic]

i have like, a vague timeline, that i think i might have deviated from a bit. it doesnt have dates bc the comic is set Crazy Long Ago but it covers like primary plot points and how old my characters are at the time.

[Silerna]

My comic follows my own life. I have no idea if that counts as a timeline. But my characters haven't aged yet and probably won't age....

[XzynderVexymous]

Mines does, but it's not like that. For example, my story starts in the year of 2560 and chapter by chapter the years move up. It isn't specific MOST of the time.

Earth's Immigrants :: Incunabula | Tapas

[Tycade]

there will be by series. Arc 1 which, is what I am working on now, sets the scene for the next arc: arc 1 beginning

Arc 2 will take place eleven years into the future, and arc 3 will be 29 years after arc 1.

[Strontium]

Oh boy, does my comic have a timeline. It totally does, and it's come up multiple times in the comic.

The first page of the comic is Cyrus in his bedroom and if you look at the calendar on his wall, you can see it's late May. The actual date is obscured but not for much longer...

However in Chapter 4, Cyrus remarks that he arrived in Thantopolis on June 1st, according to Helene. He was there in the wee hours of the morning, and she was awake (since she's very busy at all times of day.)

Chapter 2 takes place 2 weeks after Chapter 1 on June 14, with Chapter 3 taking place directly after on the 15th, and Chapter 4 taking place on June 20th.

Chapter 5 takes place about two weeks after that, although on an unspecified date, and Chapters 6, 7 and 8 have and will take place on July 31st.

Specifying future dates may result in spoilers, but there will be a chapter taking place on Halloween, and the comic's story will end before December, meaning the entire span of the comic is about half a year. Webcomic Time, am I right?

[ZatchZ]

I organize my comics into 3 different timelines,
The Past -

The REAL Life Adventures of Vin +Wolfie | Tapas

The Present -
N/A (at the moment)

And the Future -
N/A (at the moment)

And they break off into two other time lines of their own.

Ancient Past -
N/A (at the moment)

Future Past -

Who the Heck Made You Cpt.?! (REDUX) | Tapas

Past the Present -
N/A (at the moment)

Future Present -

My Darkling | Tapas

Other World -
N/A (at the moment)

and the Alternate Dimension!

Pixel Bitz | Tapas

Super Stupids | Tapas

All Hail the King | Tapas

[Aspie_Gamer]

I think keeping a timeline is hard for a comic like mine. Because things are constantly changing and new stupid trends or things that happen around me are always happening my comic is constantly moving forward with what is happening all the time. The only issue with that is when I decide to talk about something that is currently happening (for example: my strip about oreo flavored oreos or the announcement of World of Final Fantasy) they're completely dated as the punchline only really makes sense during that exact time frame (hell I think they recently brought back oreo flavored oreos again, I mean wtf right?). As I'm working on my script for my new series I am more focused on maintaining a more linear timeline and just gathering all of my knowledge from 2016-2017 as a foundation for my setting (even though the context of the story will center around different dimensions). Maintaining a constant timeline can be difficult because there could be something interesting that is happening right now, but if it doesn't relate to the specific timeline of the story then the timeline becomes a handicap. I personally give kuddos to people who can contain a linear story while still being accurate to their time frame.

Yeah. That's the biggest problem with any medium really unless its specifically set during a certain time period.

For example. A Marvel comic might reference MySpace and in the early-mid 2000's, that would've worked since Facebook and Youtube were still in their infancy a decade ago. Now? A kid reading that particular comic might say to themselves "What the heck is MySpace?" Or an adult re-reading that same comic might go "Oh. They mentioned MySpace. That sure aged well!"

On the other hand, the Assassin's Creed franchise is well known for using various historical periods as the setting for its games and magic ancient civilization tech aside, it works.

Fortunately, for my comic, aside from hints I've dropped that it takes place in the New 10's, I don't think LoaA will run into the problem of becoming dated. At least not in the way a superhero comic or a gaming gag comic like Penny Arcade can have outdated jokes and references over the passage of time.

[Emma]

Yeah, my comic follows a timeline. It's kinda rough, but the whole story is around 2 months or so (starts in August, ends in October).

[Cielle]

My comic has a timeline, though it hasn't come up that often. So far, only about 5 days have passed in the story, even though it's been 2.5 years in real life. I haven't written out a specific timeline for every day that will pass in the comic, though. I'm not at that level yet!