Feel free to ask me comic related questions (I’m a featured original webcomic artist)

Kaydreamer · Jun '21

Cheers for the reply! With pitching, I meant after they initially come knocking in your emails and declare they're interested. I think at that point, you need to give them a rundown of where you're going with the comic, how long it's supposed to be, overall plot direction and so-on, right?

My plan right now is exactly as you stated; just make a really good CANVAS series, be consistent, and clearly demonstrate professionalism and artistic improvement.

I'm definitely going off to read your post about pitching, thanks!

im_sleepy · Jun '21

no it's no problem! I mention that is search-able online, simply because often webtoons will give out information about a topic online, but I don't know to what extent, and since it's on a confidential topic, I can't give out too much info on it, but it might out there online/I've seen bits on it online.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

I notice that it seems to be becoming normal for comics to 'pause' after a season. I assume this is because the artist requires the time between seasons to catch up. (50+ panels per week is pretty nuts. I can barely manage 25 every two weeks at the moment - I have a time-intensive style - though I am getting faster.) Is this the case?

Yep! We get a little break in-between seasons to build back up a backlog as well as just to rest our hands a little.

If this is the case, is it something discussed during the contract negotiations, or is it flexible?

Pretty much everything is negotiable. They are very flexible and understanding of artists, which I really appreciate.

Do you, or any other Originals creators you know, carry on other work on the side? (I'd want to retain at least one day of teaching work for stability reasons.)

I was also curious about this when I started Webtoon, so I asked around a bit and turns out pretty much no one else has a side job haha. Or at the very least, not a full time job out side of Webtoons. There's only 1 person I know who has a full-ish time job outside of Webtoon and I'm not sure if they are still doing that, but I guess it means it is possible. I myself, take on freelance side projects and various small commission jobs, but all short term.

How much of your comic and its plot do you need to have mapped out for a pitch to be successful?

The more the better, but don't be redundant. So aim to get as much information in there as you can without repeating yourself or saying things that aren't relevant to the story. These editors are sitting in front of pitch after pitch day after day and have to read all of them, so they get tired too. On the other hand, showing that you have a fundamental understanding of your story and where it's going gives them confidence that you will be able to finish a comic and know what exactly it is you're doing. You'll need your entire story thought out though, a general arc is fine, but if you have a chapter by chapter play, that can be included too as an extra side attachment.

Honestly, if there's something you missed, they'll ask for it. They are pretty clear with what exactly it is they want from you, and different editors are gonna have different approaches to how they want a pitch to look, so, just be clear and professional and efficient with your pitch and they'll ask for the rest.

If you have one Original series, are you better able to pitch a new series to them as the first one wraps due to having contact with the WEBTOON staff?

Yes. I mean, just in general, you know these editors now and I'd say you get pretty friendly with them. So you do have better opportunities to pitch new series you have. Definitely not while you already have a series though, it'd be as you said, near the end or after it's finished.

How much creative control do the editors have over the pacing and tone of the story? Are they okay with it 'meandering' a little, or do they push you to keep it tight and focused?

Again, it'll depend on your editor and what kind of working relationship you wanna take with them, as in any professional working relationship. If you dig your heels in at feedback, most people probably won't wanna give you much feedback anymore cause what's the point. but you might not be asked to come back if they don't like you haha. So you have major control, at the end of the day, it's still your comic. Editors in general are there to keep you on track, make sure you're handing in at deadline, check your grammar and bounce ideas off of.

They are gonna want you to keep efficiently on the story. Side stories and B arcs are fine but as you can see in most Original series, they don't like one shots are 4 coma spin offs of the story as people pay for fast past episodes and it isn't very fair for those people to pay for a story that's just a comedy skit.

hope that helps!

im_sleepy · Jun '21

That is correct Kaydreamer!
But thank you for that thorough pitch breakdown @ninjashira I'm sure it'll be very very useful to many people as a good pitch can make or break a comic's opportunities.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

Nope, I had worked on other personal comics and commissioned comics before that. Nothing for a company though. I started when I was 13 and I am definitely no longer 13 now haha.

2) What was your episode schedule while it was on Canvas? Roughly how many panels and how frequently did you post?

I've done once a week before and I've also done once every 2 weeks before. Both have worked for me in terms of gaining readership and Webtoon's attention. Consistency is a factor, as everyone has said. And since I worked on my comic while I was a full time student or when I was full time working, I did my comic on a rolling basis the week before it was due up, meaning, sometimes chapters were shorter cause I just didn't have the time that week. The never ever dipped below 27 panels though and I aim for about early to mid 40's.

However, I also think the pacing of a chapter is important, so if I have a chapter where lots of things happen, then I'm going to need to extend that chapter so it ends at the right time. Sometimes that meant a chapter went upwards of 70 panels. But that was rare.

3) Why do you think your webtoon got chosen to be featured? Do you know how that was decided? In my mind it's just a webtoon editor browsing through canvas, finds one, asks his higher-up if it's okay, then emails the creator...

I'll be honest, I believe my situation is a bit different from others, it took a long time for me to move to Originals. Take Lost in Translation for example, they are were in a similar situation to me in the sense that they had a huge following and had been posting for years before they went to Originals. Having a comic move from Canvas to Originals after more than 1 year is rare. Nevermind 2 years or more.

Most comics are going to be found by editors just reading through canvas. I don't think that was how mine was found... exactly. They didn't actually tell me the specifics, they just said an editor suggested my comic. But I also know my comic had been suggested before and not been taken on, because I've worked with Webtoons before and drawn panels as "one of the editors is a really big fan", and they said they'd bring up my comic to the others. I didn't get a contract that time.

Ultimately, the person who contacted me to offer a pitching opportunity was the Head of Content at webtoons.... which I don't think is usually his job (but don't quote me cause I haven't asked my friends who contacted them to be featured before, who knows, maybe he contacts all the new comic artists).

I can't reveal anymore without it being obvious which comic I might be, but there were other really weird factors too, and in conclusion, my comic's relationship with webtoons is a bit of a mixed bag and I have no idea what made them decide to eventually offer me a contract. XD

4) Why do you think some series get original offers really quickly and others take years?

I agree with all the points @ninjashira has made, and I've added some points below that generally just compliment what they've said since all of these things kind of feed into the points they made.

Uniqueness, Marketability, how confident the art style is, how clear the story progression is, popularity, how consistent they are. I think those are the major player in my eyes and I ranked them from most important to least important.

Uniqueness: if you have a comic idea that could be replaced by 10 other comics, they won't care to sign your contract. Especially if it's similar to a comic they already have. Webtoons does care a lot about story, good story writing and variety, it's not all about romance, and that's what makes them stand out from places like Lezhin and other similar sites, in my opinion. so you want something that's fresh and a unique spin on topics.

That's not to say you can't do a romance or a fantasy. But think about it this way, it just means more competition. If you put your comic into the horror pool, you're gonna have a much smaller pool of competent and marketable comics to compete with than if you had a romance comic. That might make or break your comics opportunities. But also, don't let that be the sole reason you decide on a genre, you definitely want to pick a genre you enjoy, but just be realistic about it.

Marketability:
If you comic is unmarketable, they won't take it because it won't make money and that's just hard facts. Or they'll ask you to change it to be more marketable. 18+ things are really not preferred and ads don't like that kind of stuff as well. Again, there are exceptions and there are loop holes, but if you're really looking to get signed, and this is the cast for many companies, they don't want to have to deal with the work of having to bring your comic up to mainstream acceptability.

Confident art style:
Webtoons want's established artists, not in the sense of popularity, but in themselves as an artist. and that is important. You need to know what your drawing, how you draw and what exactly it is that you as an artist brings to the table. They'll help you and give you suggestions, but fundamentally, you need to have stability as an artist. In both anatomy and in style. Because it's a lot of work to take on an artist that doesn't have their fundamentals down and that could mean a delay in getting a comic launched so overall, they won't bother with an artist like that.

Story:
Again same as confident style, they want to know they can trust you to have a story read and to finish a story. You don't need to have the entire story in your comic, but they need to be able to see that things are being planned.

Popularity:
This does matter only in the sense that popularity helps but not being popular doesn't hurt... if that makes sense. Because being popular means you're probably pretty marketable and you'll bring in people.

consistency:
I put consistency below popularity because I've seen friends get picked up after having the worst upload schedules or after only a few episodes cause they went big FAST, so really how can you even tell if they are consistent or not. however, for comics that don't get picked up 3 days in (haha ) consistency is again showing them they you know what you're doing, you are reliable, you are stable and you don't need them to prop you up in order to be a comic artist.

I think I digressed a bit... sorry, but essentially, those are some of the factors that go into how a comic is picked up, in my opinion.

Good luck!

im_sleepy · Jun '21

How popular was your webtoon on canvas before it got featured? (eg. subs or total views)

To be a bit vague, whenever I posted my comic, it would be in the top 5 in Popular by Genre and it was even on the Weekly Hot section a few times. I kinda wanna be vague to protect my identity but definitely 200,000+ subs. Nothing compared to the biggest comics, but decently high numbers.

How many episodes did you upload before you were contacted by webtoon?

Again... I kinda don't wanna say, but I was posting for over 2 year (at least), so that gives an idea.

How would you describe your art style? Similar to Korean webtoon style or a more western style?

Definitely more korean/eastern style. That was a conscious decision on my part when planning the comic as I personally like the eastern style more, but there is a bit of mixing, but also because I realised that was the audience I wanted to hit. (people who like anime and manga and traditional webtoons)

How long does it take to create one episode? (from storyboarding to adding dialogue?)

With assistants (4 to be clear), at about 40+ panels an episode, about a total of 25-30 hours when I was on canvas and working full time/studying full time. Now, the comic is my priority, so I spend extra time and take my time on it because I can It's the greatest joy for me to be able to take my time and I'm super grateful.

How strict is the policy regarding stuff like kissing + or violence?

Kissing is fine. Nobodies told me otherwise, but like 18+ seggsy stuff is kind of not preferred. Violence and for the sake of violence is also a no no. If there's a plot motive for having It in there you can negotiate for it but like, the real question is "do you need it?". Cause fi the answer if no, they'll want you to take it out.

I've read about 90% of webtoons on the site so it's possible that I've read yours too

and if you have, I'm eternally grateful for your support and for your support of all the artist.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

I realise you didn't ask me for feedback, but I thought I'd just nosily dump my opinion on here because I do have a similar opinion to you hahah. Let me know if you want me to take this feedback down, no hard feelings.

So overall, I kind of have an unpopular opinion in that I agree. There's so much scrolling, and I always thought it was to make the reading experience longer. IDK, I don't talk about panel distancing with a lot of artist haha. But I like to set up my distance based on what's happening in the scene. If it's a conversation, close together cause it's a back and forth. If it's a fight scene, close together to build tension. But if it's a romantic or a sad scene? Longer spaces, to give people room to breath and for emotional plot points to hit harder.

for example, I took a brief look at your comic and it's beautifully drawn! I enjoyed that panels were close together, but also in places like the example below, in my opinion you could have gotten more impact by having that landscape shot by itself. When you're scrolling on the phone, you'll be able to see parts of previous and future panels depending on how large a panel is, so if you have an impact shot, isolate it so that;'s all you can see, because the fact is that people scroll really really fast and they'll blow past it regardless of whether a shot is important or not.

You as the artist, control the pace they read (if only a little bit), so if you have panels stacked too closer together on a slow scene, they might blow past it way to fast.

Just my personal opinion though. Definitely not agreed upon by others. Lovely comic you've got there and good luck with it!

JeanGuillet · Jun '21

Thank you very much for your kind advice. I'm always on the lookout for advice, I sure need it. I'd initially made the decision to space things closer together because of lack of compute power to handle the large files, but I've upgraded so that's not holding me back as much as before. I never really thought about spacing things. I suppose I was economizing space because still think about webcomics in connection with a printed page, even though I've never designed CG for a printed page.

I did go looking on Webtoon's site and found a nice file that spoke very specifically on the spacing they want for panels. It wasn't up last time I checked so this was really good info for me, and I'm dropping it here in case anyone else hasn't seen it. https://webtoons-static.pstatic.net/creator101/en/pdf/Creators-Resource-Handbook.pdf?dt=202104080111 They mentioned what you did, that only two panels should ever be visible at one time so as not to get distracting, and I think that's good advice. I also looked up some original creators on youtube showing their process and how they layed out their comics and I was surprised to see that they drew it closely spaced, and then did an entire reformat phase to achieve the webtoons spacing look. A lot of extra effort, but it was good to recognize that they're facing the same sort of computer limitations I am.

And of course I spent today looking at my comic on both the Tapas and Webtoons apps and decided that I've probably got my font too small too.

Thanks for taking a look at my stuff and giving me the feedback, it really means a lot, and now I've got a lot of thinking to do about reformatting and how to accomplish it.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

Glad it was some help and yeah that PDF looks super helpful! it puts all my words together very concisely.

When I worked on a laptop I used to pre-slice my convas. I still do actually. I'd put maybe 5 panels into a canvas only. Now-a-days I just slice the canvas into thirds, but its definitely helped me.

Essentially what I've really learned from vertical scroll, is you wanna spoon feed your readers. Easy reading, easy pacing, easy following of the characters, easy to view colours etc etc. Everything should be as effortless as possible haha

Good luck with your reformatting!

Kaydreamer · Jun '21

That's so helpful! Thank you for taking the time to answer all of these questions with such well-considered responses. It's very appreciated.

starry-sea · Jun '21

Kind of a dumb question, but do you read all the comments you get / is it even possible to? I've noticed featured comics get so many comments so quick this is something I've always wondered

doublemelon · Jun '21

You had 4 assistants while you were a canvas artist? o.O

How common is it for popular canvas titles to be made by a team of people, to your knowledge?

Is there hope for a solo comic artist to make it big? xD

im_sleepy · Jun '21

I make it a goal to read as many as possible. It's actually a very enjoyable process because I'm lucky enough to have very nice readers. I almost never get mean comments, so I'll spend about 1-2 hours checking in on comments after I post an episode, replying to them, liking them etc etc and then I'll go back over the next few days and reply to ones I find interesting. I'll typically read almost all of them unless it's an old episode. I don't have time to go back to old episodes to see if there are new comments on those.

I do know, that not all artists will do this. It is quite time consuming, but I always find that comments are very sweet and it's the least I can do to read them and reply considering how much my readers support me.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

Well, I'm a bit out of the norm. I was at a point where it was either hire assistants to take on that work, or quit making comics because I just didn't have the time. Frankly I was at my wits end already even with assistants. So props to all those out there who do comics with a full time job, or full time study, cause I did and never again, I'm not even gonna try haha.

I think it's actually more rare for Canvas artists to hire assistants, most of them are 1 person comics, maybe 1-2 assistants here and there for bigger comics.

In fact.... I think all of my friends who were featured didn't have assistants. But they also got picked up within a year of doing the comic so they had to put up with work+education+comic for a shorter time than I did hahaha.

jgfelix86 · Jun '21

Hi there, just wondering, I like eastern/manga style as well, but since You are featured; what are the chances for black and white stories to become original??? I'am working my comic but I'm not fast when it comes down to colors. Can you tell us more on that matter, do stories need to be coloured or there's a chance for us, the ones how draw black and white to become original?

mlocik97 · Jun '21

How You draw 40+ panels per week, when I can't draw even 1 per week?

AwesomeSoFar · Jun '21

Violence and for the sake of violence is also a no no. If there's a plot motive for having It in there you can negotiate for it but like, the real question is "do you need it?". Cause fi the answer if no, they'll want you to take it out.

do you mean all types of violence here, or just gore? because if it's all types of violence, it sounds like most action stories are a no-go.

azzy-m · Jun '21

Looks like you're still answering questions! I want to ask too hehe:

How long was your hiatus before you launched the Webtoons Originals version of your comic? Do you still have to follow deadlines DURING that hiatus period?? Asking because I've seen comics go on for like, a full year between seasons or before launching.
Any tips on gaining viewership on Webtoon Canvas? Kinda having trouble over there at the moment....
How did it feel to get the email from Webtoon saying they wanted to feature you? (also i wanted to confirm whether it's true that editors are the ones that contact creators when they get featured hehe)
Lastly, what are your favorite Webtoons atm? For me I really like Muted, Suitor Armor, and Brimstone and Roses - those got to be my top three, haha.

im_sleepy · Jun '21

Much less. Webtoons doesn't like black and white comics very much. The most famous example of one that did make it though is I'm the Grim Reaper by Graveweaver. They started out black and white on Canvas but were asked to change it if they wanted to go to Originals, so they did and they now do full colour.

So it is possible to become an original as a black and white comic but a) it stacks the odds/chance of being an original against you and b) even if you do get taken to original, you'll likely have to redraw the entire comic in colour anyway.

And by stacking the odds, I'm saying that they'll have to find other reasons why your comic is worth the time and effort they'll have to put in to change such a big portion of your comic, compared to someone else who might be a straight reupload from Canvas to Original.

It's ok if you're slow, slow and steady is fine as long as you're consistent.

Hope that helps!

im_sleepy · Jun '21

I sold my soul to the demon. ....

But real talk, you get faster with experience. You learn tips and tricks for increasing the speed of your panels as you get used to drawing panels, and industry secrets get passed around to help become more efficient, I also had assistants as well so that helped a lot.

Do you not have enough time to draw more than 1 a week or are your panels taking you a very very long time?

Feel free to ask me comic related questions (I’m a featured original webcomic artist)

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