Sound effect guides?

[Aloredd]

I've absolutely no training as far as comic making goes, and google can only get me so far. Does anyone here know of any good guides/tutorials as far as sound effects and word art goes? I'm not even sure if I'm calling it the right thing, but if you know what I'm talking about, could you help me? I'm good at the onomatopoeia part of the sfx, but not so much the word art aspect of it.

[PotooGryphon]

I like using WrittenSound.com as a springboard for some Onomatopoeias. Some sounds require some tweaking or my own personal take on it, however, it's a good site for when I'm stumped.

[Aloredd]

It looks like a good site, but it's not quite what I'm looking for.

I need something to help with the word art aspect rather than the actual word. I'm pretty good with getting the word, but trying to make it look natural is kicking my butt. For example:

A snippet of the page I'm trying to work on....A prison door being unlocked. The word is the one I want, but I can't make it look good

[winglesscomic]

It's too horizontal, try making the word curve a bit to make it less boring. For example if you arranged the letters up and down, it would give the effect of a reverberation or ringing. In my honest opinion I don't think clang represents a prison door unlocking as much as a creaking noise of an opening cell would.

Here's one from google, this fits the reverberation/ringing feeling. It doesn't have to be this elaborate but removing a text's static position on the horizontal axis makes onomatopoeia much more interesting.

[Aloredd]

Well, it's not quite supposed to be the door opening so much as the person opening it missing the lock with the key and hitting the metal rim of the lock. It's supposed to be a short, sharp sound, not a reverberating ringing sound.

Gah! I'm not meaning to be so difficult! Sorry! DX

btw...what did you search to get that result? I searched just about all that I could think of and couldn't find anything remotely similar to that

[winglesscomic]

That's fine. Context always complicates things. Clang I think is a good word for that then. If it's a short sound then I suggest clumping the words tightly together to give that illusion (also, I would capitalize it):

I searched "clang sound" but that was pretty much the only sfx word art. Searching "comic sounds" gives a much larger array of onomatopoeia arrangements to get inspiration for many different sounds.

[Aloredd]

Alright...thanks for your input and help! Once I'm done with the panel I can upload it so you can see if you'd like me to. If not I won't worry about it.

Second question...would you color it? One guide I looked at said the lower pitched sounds should be colored in reds and the higher pitched sounds should be colored in blues. For something like this would you color it?

[scythe]

Google's only going to get you so far. What you really need are some proper references, be that existing comics or tutorial books that deal with comic/word art, and to put aside the time to trawl through that content to find examples of what you're looking for. Take what you want from those examples and give them your own spin.

I actually feel I've done pretty well with this. I use a mix of hand-drawn and existing typefaces, but I almost always distort and work the text to fit the sound/action I'm trying to portray. But I think the point is, be creative and unexpected and have fun with it. This is one case with text where readability comes second to the aesthetic.

Here are some of examples of what I'm talking about.

[abbastudios]

You can check my blog which covers sound effects in the Lettering section

[AnnaLandin]

@Aloredd Whether or not you colour it depends entirely on what the rest of the panel looks like. If it's an overall dark panel, you might want to colour it to make it stand out enough for the readers to actually see it. If it's an overall lighter panel, you can get away with having it be lettered in black.

As for whether to go with bluer or redder shades - again, that depends on context. I personally don't "hear" a difference in pitch depending on whether it's red/blue; I tend to pick my colours depending on the surrounding colours, and what the sound is actually representing. If it's a loud explosion, for example, I might go with red - because red implies heat. If it's ice cracking, I might go with more blue shades. If it's a rustling in a forest, I might go with green, etc., etc.

And remember that sound effects aren't just text; they're design elements, too. Where you place them, and how, makes a difference to how the entire panel is read. @scythe''s examples are excellent for this; look at that "Whoooosh"; it's readable, and clearly a sound-effect, but is laid out in such a way that it looks like it's part of the spraying water, and emphasises the "noise" it represents.

I mostly go with hand-drawn sound-effects these days. I have a hard time finding existing type-faces that look the way I want them to, so it's easier for me to just hand-draw the letters. I'm pretty sparing with sound-effects anyway, so it's not a very time consuming part of making comics.

[jessiepolfliet]

I always look at the Marvel comics I have. They are great references.

[UzukiCheverie]

This isn't a reference of the same kind that other folks are providing, but this is sort of a neat PDF list of common sound effects I found online. They have Japanese sound effects, however they also have the English meanings and the sounds they make, so if there's a sound effect that you want to portray but you're not sure how to actually write it out (or at least need a general idea to go off of), check this list out, and just use the English translations instead of the Japanese ones. It might not have everything you need, but it's still got a pretty good list of most commonly found and commonly used sound effects, including the usual sources of the sounds (ex. human, mechanical, nature, etc.). Some of them are a little iffy (ex "slide", which can't really be called a "sound effect" lol) but some are good too. Dig through it, see if there's anything that you can use!

Hope it helps you!