Pet peeves to avoid when making comics?

[sartinjacqueline05]

With character design being my bread and butter, I love comics with lots of emotion and expressive faces. I try my darn best to get those into my comics. Not enough emotion makes it feel boring to me. Also while I do prefer color in comics, I do enjoy the black and white ones.

[gempompadour]

I don't like it when some creators overuse sound effects to the point that everything that a character does is accompanied by some weird sound. It's distracting and often unnecessary.

[sartinjacqueline05]

Oh boy. I used to do that with my old animations. In a couple of my college films, I would put the Wilhelm scream over a character being flung away just cuz I thought it was funny.

[gempompadour]

Lmao, the wilhelm scream is a classic and everyone's allowed to use it once in their work. But only once!

[Iris-Grimoire]

I'll rarely if ever knock a comic for those points if the rest is amazing, but long stretches of talking heads and unsound effects. I need a bit more background every now and then and some beautifully drawn comics just become a colored void in my head if 3,5 episodes just don't have anything to ground it, and I can't enjoy it as much. Alternatively, nothing breaks the immersion more than "awakens" or "opens door" or other sounds that aren't actually sounds. More often than not the scene doesn't even need the accompanying text, they're doing a good job with the effects.

[silverjackie1]

Well, for me I like when comics focus a lot on characters and stories! I hate gramatical errors and also when there's too much text on the page its confusing.

[vothnthorvaldson]

I'd like to add on the grammatical (and spelling) errors.

First, I'll admit, I make a lot of them (English is not my first language) and I should really get an editor. So, I'm not in the best position to complain.

BUT I really dislike reading comics with easily fixable errors (like 3 times the same word in a page, but one time it's spelled wrong; or comments nicely pointing out a mistake the creator often makes, but they don't bother listening..etc).

I have the feeling it often does not come from total disinterest, but rather, wanting to get the page out on time and rushing through things. I personally prefer that the page is late and finished more carefully.

[PaulDevers]

Font sizes and styles for me over here. I cannot stand it when font size isn't consistent between pages, or even whole panels.
That, and no backgrounds. When characters spend whole pages in a blank void, with nary an establishing shot to be seen, I just can't bother with the rest of it, even if the writing is good!

[silverraven0]

I think I have several.

1. Weird placed panels and dialogue bubbles where you can't tell where to read or look.

2. Too overly packed chapter panels and dialogues on webcomic. Like, seriously, make some space on scroll comic since its better for your eyes, jesus.

3. Weird a*s pacing. (not sure how to explain it)

4. I forgot the rest.

its all my opinion and personal preference so take it with a jar or salt, yo

[Lummy]

If I open the first chapter of a comic, and on that chapter I find 10 paragraphs about the way this world/magic works, then I don't even bother reading it and I just leave the comic.

Comic villains that have no brain/motive.
Person z sees our protagonist and it is hate at first sight and then person z is willing to die to harm the protagonist -_-

When the words are too much words in the bubble. Or when the letter are too small to read.

[user400]

I don't like it when some creators overuse sound effects to the point that everything that a character does is accompanied by some weird sound. It's distracting and often unnecessary.

My pet peeve is when the "sound effect" is written as a regular word.
Character sitting down? "SITS"
Character drinking water? "DRINKING"
It's like yes, I can see they are indeed drinking. Thank you. xD

[darthmongoose]

My pet peeves are:

• Too many panels that only show one character at a time in a scene where multiple characters are talking. I start to feel like they're actually on the phone to each other or talking via telepathy especially if...
• The backgrounds don't have enough detail to make out anything about where the characters are. They're just standing in like... beige or blue voids with gradients, or these gigantic, empty rooms with no clutter or furniture to give scale or character to the space.
• Too many busy patterned screentones with too high a contrast in dark and light.
• Characters who all have the body of one of those little artist marionettes, especially if they're all the same height and they all have the same nose.
• Too many dudes and no female characters, or no female characters with any importance to the plot (especially if their only role is to get jealous of dudes or cheer on their m/m romance from the sidelines). Like, I'm not saying this is always bad, it's just a pet peeve. Sometimes it feels like a lot of female creators... don't like women?
• Non-fetish comics that are still drawn like they're fetish comics. You know like... it's supposedly a story about an adventure or something, but the art is like... everyone's shiny and blushing like they're all sweaty and their faces look like they're about to orgasm and they're standing with their chests or groins or bums jutting out dressed in this really skimpy clothing that's sort of falling off them like... just make a fetish comic! Or at least a romance or something! I have no problem with that kind of thing, but if it's an adventure I'd like it to look like an adventure, not like some kind of ecchi.

[Pandastrophic]

Sometimes it feels like a lot of female creators... don't like women?

omg right?! One of my top pet peeves usually happens in romance comic, the female rival character written in just to make sure that the main couple doesn't get together. She has no other ambitions other than getting the main guy and you can tell the author has written her in a way to make sure that the audience hates her? I feel like this trope is so common that it conditioned the audience whenever a new female character appears to hate on her right away.
A male rival is almost always written with redeeming qualities sometimes being better than the main guy character.
Of course there is a way to write rivals in a way that's compelling and fun, but I've rarely seen it done well.

[Shanny8]

"Stupid" sound FX like "point!" "thinks!"- that type of stuff really irks me.

Grammatical and spelling does kind of kick me- but only when I see it coming from some of my peers that proclaim to be writers; spellcheck please. I'm a little more lenient towards webcomic creators, but like @vothnthorvaldson states- slow down...dont be in a rush to post your stuff that you dont proof read it.

USE REFERENCE. Even if it's to draw trees or a forest scene...I see too many starting creators drawing scenery without A) using reference and B) not even using tools like straightedge or line tools and I grit my teeth...dont wave it off like, "I cant do backgrounds/cars/rooms"- LEARN; that is the only way you're going to get better at doing these things. Dont know how to draw a dog? Look at pics of dogs...dont know how to draw a bicycle? Look at pictures of a bike and practice drawing it until you get better.

Lettering is a VITAL part of the comic: I look at comics and see HORRID lettering, like the creator just didnt care about the fonts they used, the size, the placing...lettering is one of those things that can make or break the comic/page; whether readers look at the comic and be like "this looks like it could be a printed book" or "this is okay- the speech bubbles look wack though". Experiment with font styles and find one that "fits" your art- dont be dead set on "I'm gonna use THIS one" and it doesnt look right.

[rajillustration]

I figure most webcomics are a process of learning so I don't judge too harshly, but keeping that in mind, these are the things that I see over and over, and I'm saying all of this with a grain of salt because one person's pet peeve is bound to be someone else's favorite thing ever:

1. Bad font: Don't use comic sans. Don't use papyrus. Use a comic font. Don't use more than 1 font unless you have to or there's some artistic meaning to it. And finally, only use a serif font if it makes sense for your story (and even then, please don't use a serif font). That, and the font has to match the art style, which takes some experience to figure out. Not everyone can use the same font.
2. Japanese words and when you don't know Japanese. Please get a linguist to review your work.
3. Reading from Right to Left when you're clearly Western. It's fine to mimic a manga, but manga is more than just reading right to left--you also have to guide the panels, the action, and the flow of the word bubbles to direct the eye in the manga way. Western comics rely more on the just reading strictly left to right on a grid, so you can't just flip it. It doesn't actually work that way, and if you have a more western layout style--just do Left to Right. Do what you know.
4. Huge voyeuristic water-balloon Boobies. They just kind of scream "I give up. I don't know what you people want. Here's some boobs."
5. Episodes that are way too freakin long. Premium comics need to be like 30 panels an episode but no one else needs to do that. If no one is paying you to do that, please do me a solid and make it less than 30 so I don't have to devote so much time per episode. Plus, you get more ad revenue because you have more pages for me to see and more chances to accidentally click an ad. Everyone wins.

[hushicho]

Overwrought visual style at all tends to put me off. Have some sense of balance! Whether it's black and white or color, it doesn't matter; it's easier to do with color, because a lot of people are bad at color, but they think they need to use it to get an audience. It's honestly a lot harder to make a color work look better. It's very easy to get it wrong and make already-overwrought art look positively beleaguered. Most people either need to be a colorist or have a colorist on the production staff, and most people are, as it happens, neither a colorist, nor do they have one on staff.

I'm also not a fan of people tossing in ridiculous amounts of angst and "tragedy"; I especially hate when people casually kill off characters (which is largely because they think it's somehow dramatic or motivating, when in reality, if someone has to die to motivate your character, they're not a good person), but they also tend not to do it well at all, and frankly, it's been done to death, ironically. Try something better. Most writers aren't good enough to justify something like that, and it just makes them look like desperate teenagers trying to be "epic".

Censoring the bejeezus out of your work is also a huge pet peeve of mine, especially when it's needless. If you don't have to do it...don't do it! It just makes your work look puerile, and it is almost never amusing or entertaining in any way.

[DiegoPalacios]

A personal pet peeve for me is Same face syndrome in black and white comics. This specific combination makes it hard for me to diferentiate characters from each other. Specially when they have the same haircut.

[Lillumae]

For me, a couple that stand out are when all the characters have the same faces to the point where if they change hairstyles, you can't tell them apart.

In terms of storytelling, you can have a lot of panels in an update but it'll feel really short if there's no story progression. There's a few comics I've read, where they're been sitting in the same place for probably a month or more worth of updates, only to stand up for the next two, and then go sit down somewhere else for some more updates? A lot of panels just feel copypasted and... I don't know, I just want to feel like I'm reading a visual story, rather than a slow-roll of text with a nice backdrop.

Also, when stories disregard that there's masters who have dedicated their entire lives to something, only to push them aside for the new, younger, main character, who only started practicing said craft three days ago, and is now more op than everyone in the entire story. On the same note; when all of the main cast becomes op, protected by plot armor, but we have forced deaths of background characters who were never developed in the first place.

And lastly, where everyone's loves are requited and every single main character ends up in a relationship, at the end. It just feels too forced and inorganic.

[Eageali]

I'm also not a fan of people tossing in ridiculous amounts of angst and "tragedy"; I especially hate when people casually kill off characters (which is largely because they think it's somehow dramatic or motivating, when in reality, if someone has to die to motivate your character, they're not a good person), but they also tend not to do it well at all, and frankly, it's been done to death, ironically. Try something better. Most writers aren't good enough to justify something like that, and it just makes them look like desperate teenagers trying to be "epic".

Censoring the bejeezus out of your work is also a huge pet peeve of mine, especially when it's needless. If you don't have to do it...don't do it! It just makes your work look puerile, and it is almost never amusing or entertaining in any way.

yes, THIS!! You put it into words! I absolutely agree here.

[NickRowler]

My pet peeve is art that looks like this

It makes your comic look bland and it sucks all personality out of your characters. Plus I have seem multiple comics with this art, so more or less your series is not really standing out. I know this is common for people who say they are not good at drawing however, it is not hard to draw cartoon noses, ears, hair, clothes, etc.

On a writing stand point, being readable.
Be this having readable font.
Or being able to know where your characters are and who is talking and not relying too heavily on extreme close ups.