What's your writing process for creating a new comic?

[redmancomics]

Title is pretty self-explanatory. When you devise a new comic, what steps do you go through to make it realized?

[Jenny-Toons]

If I have the basic idea, I always start with drawing out characters and gestures. I like to get a feel for the mood I'm trying to go with, and usually for me, quick 1-2 min gestures help. I get character expressions, interactions, conflict, and then I start to form a simple plot from that.

Music also helps with this process, especially when I'm writing the script. Once I have characters and conflict in mind, I create playlists that I think helps with the mood I'm trying to convey. For instance, if I want to write a horror story that has kinda of a hippie vibe to it, I get songs that were made around the 60s, 70s, even modern songs with a psychedelic feel to them.

[AVG]

I just look for or remember some meme or experience in a video game and I summarize it so I can draw it in 2 or 4 cartoons
For example
,

in this comic of the game civilization, for a strange reason Gandhi is the most aggressive character and I just have to translate it in a simple way in my comic, although now I will try to practice to make drawings more realistic or better worked
if you want to see other examples, this is the link: https://tapas.io/series/If-I-Lived-In-A-Video-Game

[punkarsenic]

i start by just scrawling down the 'spark' notes, yknow, the things that flood to you at first. then i start thinking about motifs, characters, structure, and themes - i do a lot of mindmaps.

for example, for the horror comic im working on this summer i did

• a diagram of all the characters and how they relate to eachother & their motivations
• a mindmap of imagery, details, and concepts related to my storys conceit and themes
• a timeline where i placed various events, lines, and images that i already had in mind within the story - i use postits so they can move around, and divided this into three acts and a midpoint (not always necessary, i was just using a three act structure for this particular piece)

from there comes lots of bulletpointing plot and character designing, drafting and redrafting - i often work in a way where i do my research before getting my idea, but if im not doing that ill research some works like what im tryna create

[elyss]

I draw characters and come up with stories around them. After I'm content with a path, I write the whole story, knowing that I'll end up changing it a lot as I learn more about the characters it's centered around. Then, I draw the comic based on the 1-3 times edited novel.

[KrispyKremeBits]

I have a ton of characters and ideas for worlds so I tend to match up which goes best together and go from there. Then I just start developing the plot, world, characters, ect

[skicoak]

First... we find a virgin lamb to sacrifice to the art gods.

Then we protect the lamb from suitors until the planets align in our favor.

[GamerPrincessXI]

That's actually pretty funny. XD also, hella accurate!

[Allyx]

My reply has to do with a project I'm currently working on with 2 friends that will be released later this year.

1. We decided we were going to make a comic just for the fun of it.
2. Asked ourselves what it was about like 50 million times.
3. Came up with a plot idea that was one sentence long.
4. Fleshed out plot idea further with details like characters (including backgrounds and relationships)
5. Created character profiles (we did all the minor characters in great detail first, but that was a mistake so I don't recommend it. Do the major characters in great detail first, guys).
6. Once we knew who was in the story very well, we kept fleshing out the plot in more detail (our current plot synopsis is 7 pages long)
7. Wrote some random scenes as well as Episode 1 to get a feel for how we would do things
8. We're all new to this whole comic drawing and writing process, so we all have independent projects right now in an attempt to figure stuff out.
9. Next, with a solid plan in mind, we will write out and draw the story one episode at a time. After we have a decent buffer, we'll start releasing stuff.

[praelia]

Start with the ending and work backwards from there. I've always had trouble with progression, so this has helped me out. Basically, what happens at the end (of each chapter) will help with determining sequence of events.

For example, someone dies. Why? Well, it could be from fighting in battle with someone too strong. Why are they in that fight? Perhaps this killer is an assassin. Why does this assassin need to kill this person? Maybe this person is of nobility. So what? Could be that the noble family has done something evil and must be stopped. And so and so forth.

[awesomefeelsman]

I got this technique from a youtuber, forgot her name but I cam across her when I was searching for tutorials on making comics.

The method is creating a buffer so that everyday you can upload one comic page. I start by making a rough sketch on an idea, after that I just leave it for tomorrow, then I ink it. Only lines first, no dialouge or color, then I would making another rough sketch for the next one.

By next day I color and put dialouge on it, ink the next rough sketch and create another idea to continue the cycle. It makes things consistent so you can upload daily.

[ble]

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