Formatting for comic?

[CttMaurice]

Hey everyone, I was wondering recently if there is any noticeable difference in the particular formatting for a webcomic. I have two different formattings for my particular comic, Heress and Choko both on webtoons and on tapas.

The tapas is a traditional "manga" with page style paneling.
The webtoons version is one with the vertical scrolling that is common among webcomics.

Is one better than the other for webcomics? Does either one affect the enjoyment and performance of the comic in question? And what is the version that you personally enjoy more?

[VibrantFox]

this is actually a pretty common and long winded debate here and elsewhere in terms of which is better but it's really up to the creator.

The webtoons/scroll format is pushed pretty often since a lot of webcomic readers are on mobile devices so it's a more readable format leaving space for artwork and text to be clearly visible. The same can be achieved with page format if done well but either can be used.

Ideally regardless you want to focus on readability and clarity, can your readers see and read the text/font without squinting or having to zoom in, is the art easy to read in terms of what the characters are doing or what's going on in a panel/frame.

No one format is really better than the other but lately scroll format is the one that's seen as most recommended

[HGohwell]

dusts off my standard rant on this

There's no "better" format for you comic here on Tapas, both are pretty common and pretty popular. While Tapas itself encourages vertical scrolling, there are plenty of popular comics that are page format. As long as your text is readable and clear on mobile, people tend not to mind.

Certain people will try to tell you certain things can't be done vertical style (no interesting paneling is the most common one) and this is a lie and a lazy cop out of people who don't want to take the time to figure out how to do these things in vertical scrolling so declare it impossible (because no one likes the new style of anything, ever, no matter what the industry).

If you are willing to put in the time, you can do creative things in either style. If your story and art are solid, your popularity won't be hugely effected either way (at least on Tapas).

And personally, I don't mind either way to read, but prefer a vertical scroll for drawing because I like doing big scrolling vertical scenes like of my giant robots to give a sense of massive scale.

[PaleOcra]

I prefer vertical scrolling. Oftentimes, i get overwhelmed with the traditional layout even with professional series.

Vertical scrolling is easier to read. I also personally think vertical scrolling is easier to 'layout' if you are making the comic as well.

[Rhonder]

Generally speaking, the reason that vertical is recommended for platforms that have large amount of phone app readers is for legibility. Not only of the text but also the pictures. Since the images on Webtoons and Tapas are restricted to 800px/940px wide, any rows of panels where you have more than... say 2 panels side by side get to be pretty small and hard to read without zooming. The text factors in too though- you can increase the size enough to be readable on mobile, but usually at the cost of covering up more of the art in a traditional page layout.

Vertical solves both "issues" by allowing each panel to be as large as possible and giving more freedom to move the speech bubbles around (including above/below the panel altogether since you can just space them apart farther if you need to- something that has much less flexibility on a page- altho again, a page if read on desktop or physically can afford to have smaller text too).

That said there's no harm in making and posting pages. As others have said there are lots of successful comics like that too. I personally made my first tapas/webtoons comic as a page format one, but am swapping to vertical scroll for my upcoming project after weighing the above factors.