How Many "Issues" are in a Mini Series (That's also a Webcomic?)

ToxicRamen 2019-01-04 01:01:51 UTC #1

I want to do a mini series but I wonder how many "issues"/chapters count as a mini series? I've seen plenty of mini comic book series are between 4-6 issues. I was thinking of doing 6 20-25 page issues or for the case of a webcomic, 6 20-25 page chapters.

So what's the limit of a mini series?

kip 2019-01-04 12:08:42 UTC #2

I think it really depends on what your see as an “issue” or “chapter”, and by what standards you’re working?
Manga, western and webcomics all vary pretty wildly from eachother.
Also, those mean two different things. A chapter is, like in a book, more of away to seperate what’s going on within the context of the issue- the issue is the physical book you’re holding. Theoretically, there can be different chapters in one issue.
Also as far as I’m aware, the 22 pages per chapter thing is definitely more of a western thing.

For webcomics, I think anything under 100 pages is considered a short comic, anythjng above is average, and then the longer series can pass 300-500 pages.

To be fair though, the thing that’s so nice about webcomics is that there really isn’t a limit to anything. You can do whatever length your comic needs and it doesn’t really matter if it’s a ‘mini series’ or not at the end of the day? I haven’t even really heard that term before (oneshots are really as far as I’ve seen used as a term, incl. regarding to my 40 page comic, so I’d say you have some breathing room)

Glasgwyn 2019-01-04 14:47:05 UTC #3

Just wanted to say, a lot of webtoons on line webtoon are under 100 pages, at most varying around 50 to 70, and a lower count isn't all that unusual as well. The most extreme is 20-ish/under 30 one.
Regarding the 50-70 pages, i don't think it's short at all @_@ Especially the 70 pages ones, if anything it's perfect for one chapter/episode/whatever you call it.
I don't understand why do you think that way @_@ Are webcomics on tapas reach that 100+ count?? @_@ Because if yes that's shocking @_@
Or do you mean the total pages?
As a clarification, i'm not attacking you or anything, it's just i never know that 100+ pages is the average @_@ And so, if it's true, it'll be a clarification from what i thought all this time, and a useful knowledge at that for me.

kip 2019-01-04 18:25:33 UTC #4

I’m honestly really confused about what you’re asking.
I’m talking about overall page count, since webcomics don’t traditionally have separated chapters.

It’s also not so much the actual average as much as the popular comics average + the amount people strive for. The vast majority of comics aren’t completed, after all.

Glasgwyn 2019-01-05 00:11:04 UTC #5

I'm actually very confused too @_@
Overall page count? Won't the overall page count be like thousands, like a lot of webcomics with 50 pages each chapter easily have 50+ chapters @_@
And what do you mean they don't have separate chapter???? @_@ Don't every official/payed webcomics separate their chapters?? @_@

I got even more confused now, "popular comics average + the amount people strive for"?? What did that meant?? @_@
Isn't it a separate thing, why combined? @_@
And that's why i'm saying why the overall page count is so short, if the webcomics are not even complete yet @_@

If you're talking about the short series here on tapas that end in like less than 10 chapters, with each chapter having the creator random own desire of pages, then why do you say it's the "average"? @_@ Because isn't it's not thn average? @_@ Like on line the average is 50-ish pages @_@

kip 2019-01-06 16:32:45 UTC #6

chapter = a certian amount of pages, up to the author, that discuss the general arc/topic
like chapters in a book

in older webcomics people would seperate their works to chapters (see comics like monsterkind, the property of hate, paranormal, etc)

popular comics average (are usually) around 100+ pages
most people who are doing comics want to finish around 100+ pages

is that any clearer?

Glasgwyn 2019-01-06 22:20:34 UTC #7

Of course i know chapters mean "pages", "a certain amount of pages". I know that it's up tf the creator as well. And that's why i said, there's no paid webcomics these days that touch 100+ pages, on tapas, on line webtoon, on spottoon, on naver, on lezhin, like probably even on all sites.
As i said, if there is i'd like to know too.

You keep talking about "webcomics" "webcomics", and yet, it seems you talk about printed comic books or something else. And what, you also mentioned "older webcomics", but didn't your first post here referencing the "present webcomics"??? If not, then why did you did that? Isn't the question is about the "present webcomics"??

You keep talking about something that's different with what i'm talking about.

kip 2019-01-07 00:10:42 UTC #8

sorry, i’m really not trying to argue with you in any way just trying to phrase myself as clearly as possible since i’m im not sure where the misunderstanding is coming from

a page is traditionally 7 panels.
featured webtoons update roughly 40 panels per update, let’s round that down to 5 pages worth?
just looking at the top 10 popular ones each one of them exceedes that by a fair amount
Webtoon’s top 5 according to site:
True Beauty - 23 updates = 115 pages
Let’s Play - 62 updates = 310 pages
unOrdinart - 92 updates = 460 pages
I Love Yoo - 92 updates = 460 pages
Lore Olympus - 48 updates = 240 pages

Lezhin has more or less the same numbers, tapas has a much more dynamic range but still a lot of the popular comics fall under the same numbers
You’re more than welcome to check that yourself if you don’t believe me, I guess?

What I said was
Older webcomics used to have chapters
Newer webcomics don’t have chapters (usually)
I said that because you were talking about chapters when they aren’t something that’s used anymore in webcomics these days. It was an example of what a chapter is, in regards to webcomics.
I’m really surprised you bring that up because that’s so wildly out of context? Maybe you’re not reading my responses right?

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 00:52:08 UTC #9

No need to apologize since no one's wrong.

Ahhh, now i understand, you "count" "pages" as "panels". Whle i "count" "pages" as "resolution".
A lot of webcomics contest have X px x X px "as" 1 page. And that's what i'm counting. Whle you count the "panels".
Anyway, for you 7 panels is 1 page.
For me even 1 big panel or 2 very far away with each other panels count as 1 page since they fit the average resolution.
(I don't count the "exact" resolution since that'd be crazy, that's i always said "around x" instead "x" specifically)
That being said, i don't understand why you said traditional page is 7 panels. I think that's too much, some pages might reach that amount, but some other pages could have 3 or 5 pages, why take the most bigger number?

And what do you mean again here by "updates"???? You mean "all their realeased chapters"???? @_@ O_O
If yes, sigh all along i'm talking about "each" your-so-called-"update" or 1 chapter, not "all" of them

And here's to another confusion, what do you meant by "chapter"???? Since my definiton of chapter is also that, certain amount of pages like what you previously said. Why would nowadays webcomics don't have it????????? O_O
And what did people used if not chapters????
I think you're the one who don't read my responses right?

Jenny-Toons 2019-01-07 00:56:43 UTC #10

I really think the overall confusion on your part is that you're thinking updates are chapters, and that's not true. While an chapter could be an update, an update is not a chapter.

Let's break it down.

Each update can differ in the amount of pages it has. An update is not a chapter, but it can be the BEGINNING of the chapter, the MIDDLE of the chapter or the ENDING of the chapter.

Like, you know how a manga is just a book that comes with all of the chapters? Webcomics can't do that because they're posted in updates. Updates break up the chapter. Example for my case:

I have a chapter for my comic titled "Her Name"

It's one chapter, but it will be split up into 4 or more updates.

Think of it as "Part One of Chapter X" or "Chapter X (Part 3)"

Those updates hold the amount of pages I have in there. And I count pages based on my panels as well. So if I have 49 panels in total for my chapter, I have 7 pages in total. And those seven pages are split up throughout those 4 or more updates.

kip 2019-01-07 01:05:45 UTC #11

yes, you're calling updates "chapters" because like 2 sites use that word to mean the same thing but they arent the same thing.
almost no one online uses updates as full chapters- for example tapas calls updates "chapters" but most people only post 1 page per update. that doesn't make it an actual chapter, just what the site calls it. Update is just an umbrella term.

"my" definition of chapter isnt just "a certian amount of pages" it's, qouting my earlier comment-
"a certian amount of pages, up to the author, that discuss the general arc/topic"
it's the dictionary definition,

chapter noun
witten abbreviation chap.
Any of the separate parts into which a book or other piece of text is divided, usually given a number or title.

you're calling updates "chapters" basically
those aren't the same thing.

i re-read your comments and i think maybe you've misunderstood the original question?
the poster was asking about how long a full, finished piece is. i answered how many pages are typically in a full, finished webcomic. i think you mistook that to mean how many pages are in a single update- that's not what i meant

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 09:20:17 UTC #12

I understand that some people post 1 page as their update especially on tapas, but most people on line webtoons aren't like that, and i mostly read there, and that's what i'm referencing.
And even though the amount of pages per update is up to the creator, it don't work like that for official webcomics right? Or even official webcomics update as they wish/1 page? And that's what i'm referencing to, the original question asked how many issues mini series is, and you answered a really huge amount that i don't think is right, that's why i said it's not true.

Honestly i still don't understand. You said update is not chapter, i get it if it's unpaid webcomics on tapas, but paid webcomics and most unpaid line webcomics aren't like that, their update is a chapter.
But i don't even think that piece of information is correlated. Since i count per each/1 update, not a "collection" of update.

I also don't understand why you count pages "as" x amount of panels. Isn't that 2 different thing? Page is page, and panel is panel.
Why did you "convert" x amount of pages as a page?
That's why when you said such huge amount "anything under 100 pages is considered a short comic", that really confused me, because as i said what i think as page in webcomics is resolution, not a fixed amount of panels, which means something above 100 pages will have like around 150++ panels, and that's crazy to finish in 1 week.

I think you never see korean webtoons in print, each of their page seriously really resembled their webtoon, one page can be like 2 panels with a lot of space in the middle. Which means, it simply make sense counting page as resolution.
Now i'm not saying the way you view it is wrong, but my way of seeing it is not wrong as well.

Anyway, once again i stated, my problem is you(@kip) said such a huge amount of pages as short, and i'm confused by it, and i'm asking why is "that" short?

Jenny-Toons 2019-01-07 10:00:24 UTC #13

Here's the thing tho. OP didn't say they were trying to post on Webtoons and Tapas. They just asked for an amount. You're going off of Webtoons and Tapas, only two comic-hosting sites alone, and two sites do not make up the general sense of what constitutes as a page.

We're not being specific and talking about "comics only from webtoons" or "only unpaid comics from Tapas". We're talking in a general sense with no specifics. We're talking about a general sense used by people who have been in this business for a good while.

You're trying to see numbers that are set in stone, but there are no numbers set in stone. We can only do estimates. It's why no one mentioned pages with a single panel because generally, comics have more than one panel on a page. Single-two panel pages are mostly left for spreads, for revealing a big clue, etc.

This is a page. On this page are seven panels. Hence, if I were to use this as my basis in converting my panels into pages, I would use seven panels for one page.

For our estimate, seven panels on one full page = a page. So if I have 14 panels in one update in scrolling format, including long panels, I would still have 2 pages worth of panels.

And I do this because I do not make my comic in this traditional format. I make it in scrolling format, as do other people. With the scrolling format, you don't see traditional pages. You see panels. But if people want to convert the number of panels they make per update, they use some type of basis conversion to do so.

And of course, this number can and will change. No one is saying seven is the number of panels you need to have for this. This is only an example, and Kip and I just wanted to use seven. Nothing more, nothing less.

Some people go off the resolution requirements for the uploads. That's all well and fine, but a lot of people go by the amount of panels they have for one update.

This just takes some time to look over, and a lot of people get confused about it because the scrolling format is new. But, there are plenty of other threads that talk about this :

aaladadonis 2019-01-07 10:38:13 UTC #14

Not sure if this will help any of the confusion, but

is as much a page as

both constitue the exact same panels but are just in different formats.

I think what you are thinking of as a ‘page’ is more so an ‘image’. Webtoon requires creators to slice their ‘pages’ (or in this case ‘strips’) into ‘images’ of size 800px by 1280px.

Example of an ‘image’

The printed webtoons you read are formatted the way they are, with only one or two panels per image, because it is a hassle to convert an already drawn long form strip comic numbering in hundreds (even thousands) of panels into page format.

But traditionally, comics are formatted in page format, in which case the number of panels are generally between 5-7. This is the reference kip was using because it’s more universally applicable than just basing off webcomics of webtoon and tapas, which hasn’t been around for as long.

The OP asked in regards to comic books rather than specifically webcomics of long form scroll format, so for estimating sake, counting pages gives a better picture of length rather than number of updates (because updates length is up to the creator).

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 10:56:25 UTC #15

OP don't talk about webtoons, but they talk about webcomics. And just because i keep talking about LW doesn't mean what i said have no value in the discussion, since other webcomic sites like spottoon, lezhin, comico, etcetcetcetc, also very similar.
And i'm not trying to divide things into two, beetween "LW" and "tapas", but everyone keep saying on things "that only work on tapas", which one of them is "posting only 1 page as an update", on other sites with publish feature most don't do that, so i can't help but referencing to those sites majority.

If you said what all of you are saying are the general, why it's not the general for me as well?
If your so called general sense coming from someone who have been in the business for awhile is indeed the general sense, it should have been for me as well, and that's why i'm confused.
And by "in the business" you mean as traditional comics? And ones that's not originally a webcomic? While the question is on the "webcomic 'business'"?
And that's why i said "above 100 pages is the average" like what kip said would be crazy, since i'm talking in the webcomic business.
And while it's true i'm not a webcomic creator, i'm an avid webcomic reader, and that's enough to understand and know how the "webcomic business" work.

I'm not setting a number in stone, i'm just making an average number out of webcomic sites just like what the original question asked. And when someone said a crazy number as the average, i simply confused, that's all.

Again, double spread usually isn't on printed webcomics that generate from popular webcomics sites (if you self-published there's a high chance you follow the traditional comic, so i'm saying "adapted popular webcomics from popular sites").
As i said, the panels are exactly how it appear on the webtoon.

Or you could see the resoulution requirement for that site, as example "maximum resolution for each chapter is 15000 px", there's also another requirement that goes like "maximum resolution for one page is 1000 px" which usually are said in the same sentence along with maximum byte size.
You can't expect other people to be same as yours or claim yours as "right" since it's not really.... or "general" since illustrators i talk to in my country think that way too.
As i said, your way of thinking is not wrong, but so is "mine".

And yet all of you use 7, the biggest number when we talk about pages, the deal is, had you use 5, then the numbers won't go so high, i feel like you're dramatizing the pages count.

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 10:59:11 UTC #16

Uhhhh... Then why in comico's contest it specifically called what you said as image as "page"? @_@

And isn't the original question asking the webcomic format? It said there in the header "that's also a webcomic".
So i'm surprised when such huge amount is the average and thought that the person who asked would feel discouraged, so i asked since i never think it's that huge of an amount.

Jenny-Toons 2019-01-07 11:06:36 UTC #17

You've kinda answered your question here. The OP asking this question wants to know how many issues are in a mini series. They're looking for a ball park. People who are actually making webcomics are answering based on posting experiences and based on what we've also seen other people post.

This is just a ball park. No one ever said that the OP had to make seven panels for a page, that they have to have 100 pages or more for it to be a comic.

It's really not discouraging at all? Just because 100 pages seems like a lot to you personally doesn't mean it's not feasible. Like...this is just what we've seen around. And we've also seen people not do 100 pages because the story just didn't call for it.

You don't have to take it to heart, but don't assume we're dramatizing things just because, based on experience, it's not far from true.

Anyhow, I'm just gonna agree to disagree and just leave it at that.

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 11:19:32 UTC #18

If you think so, then why webcomics sites that i go to actually count page as resolution? And why artists in my country understand and not surprised at all when i count page as resolution?

And so am i. I'm saying things based on experiences and what i've seen, why am i exciuded?

Of course they don't, but do know people ask because they want to consider the answer they get? And so there's a high chance they will really do as suggested.
Well, that's your experience i guess, i've been in a lot of forums as well, and some people could find things like that discouraging.
Who said it's not feasible? I simply said it's crazily a lot, just because you view that as short or no big deal, you can expect everyone will feel that way.
And what's wrong with me asking anyway? I only ask "why do you think that's the average" "the average that i know is nothing like that at all".

I'm not assuming, you make appear weird to use "7" as an example, when you said it yourself, "it's just an example", means it can be any number.
So i can't help but feel like you're dramatizing. That doesn't mean that you are, don't feel attacked, but that's simply how i see it, and thus that's why i responded in the way i did.

aaladadonis 2019-01-07 11:23:59 UTC #19

Sorry, not really familiar with comico or the contest, so I’m not clear on what you are referencing.

In any cases, all of the images I posted above can technically be labeled as an image. Once printed, the ‘image’ can be counted as a page because it is printed onto a single piece of paper of a certain dimension that you have to flip through to read.

I used ‘———‘ around certain words because they are terms used specifically for understanding the situation, through differentiation. The actual definition of the words in ‘———‘ can vary based on context.

A webcomic is a comic posted on the web. In that case, if the OP is posting it on tapas (online) then their comic is considered a webcomic regardless of whether they choose to create it in page or long strip format.

100 pages does sound like a lot of pages if you just think of them in terms of the work that goes into creating them. But if you were to look at it from a reading perspective, 100 pages doesn’t take days on end to read and can be read in one sitting, maybe a few hours at most. That’s why it’s considered “short”.

For example, say a manga volume have 5 chapters consisting of 25 pages each, the over all pages would be 125. The volume is the whole series. Because there’s no other volumes to this series, it could be considered a short series. If the series have 10+ volumes (of same caliber) though, that could be considered “long”.

Glasgwyn 2019-01-07 11:43:32 UTC #20

Of course you're not, since it don't have an english site, www.comico.co.id
That being said, it's originally from japan, one of the popular creation from it is relife, yeah that relife. Also have korean server, fyi.

Just like everyone else, i'm also talking from experiences and what i've seen.

The contest in online though, so i'm sure it's still on the same page.

I don't quite understand what you mean, though in any case I think it don't make any difference anyway? And i don't see the "---"?

I never said anything that it should be page or long strip format, i think you started to head in a totally different direction.

But that's not the case with webcomics that i'm talking about?

That, you said it.
Each chapter consist of "25 pages" each.
And the total is 125.
As i said, i don't understand why each chapter will have to have 100+ pages in order to be average in kip's thinking.
And so i asked.
It appears as you can see from some posts ago, that i think kip meant 100+ pages each, while kip talk about the total.
And so, i said it for the xth time, i asked.
But i don't quite get the obvious answer from the get go, that they aren't talking about each chapter but the total chapters.