Writing humor into your webcomic?

[jayorten]

Here's the thing: I don't consider myself a very funny person, nor do I think I have that great of a sense of humor. Then again, other people may say otherwise, and I am my own worse critic. The point is, I've been struggling as of late to make my webcomics funny. I have a hard time coming up with good jokes or funny storyplots, and anything I do come up with sucks. I was wondering if you guys have any tips or advice on how to make a webcomic humorous. How to you fit humor into your comics to make them funny?

[UzukiCheverie]

I don't think any of the jokes in your comic "suck" per se, just that your episodes are very small per update so you have very limited time to create any sort of build up followed by a punchline.

I'm probably a terrible one to speak on this, because my humor gets DARK, but there's always comedy to be found in something, even the worst of scenarios. Sometimes the joke is staring you right in the face, sometimes you have to mull on it for a bit before it hits you. If it's the latter, don't let impatience ruin the joke - much like setting up any good joke, it takes time, and if you have to redo a joke's writing several times before you get it just right, then it really makes all the difference

Either way, your jokes aren't as bad as you're saying they are. If you feel like you're constantly coming up short with your jokes, then maybe find a person or two you can share them with and get a second opinion on? Having other people read your work is the best kind of certainty you can get when it comes to these things

[WakaXO]

Its sort of hard to pin down a sure-fire way to make anything funny as humor is subjective. But I guess in my Webcomic I try to achieve humor through forcing my characters into weird situations, my comics humor then relays heavily on the characters reactions to situational humor. Also I always keep an eye out IRL for situations or conversations or jokes I find funny that could be included in my comic.
It might help if you to study things you personally find funny, like watching sitcoms or stand-up comedy and comedy sketches, to figure out exactly what it is about those thing you like/find funny, then employ the same formats of humor in your own comic.

[jayorten]

I think the main problem with my comics is that my character, Fez Boy, doesn't have that much of a personality. Without a strong enough personality, it is harder to come up with good jokes and storylines. Now if I had more characters with different personalities, or if my character had a more defined persona, it would make the humor process a lot easier.

[AnnaLandin]

Now if I had more characters with different personalities, or if my character had a more defined persona, it would make the humor process a lot easier.

So give them some personality! There's absolutely nothing stopping you from doing that whenever you want.

[jacintawibowo]

Hi there! Some advice from your friendly neghborhood funny artist. I started out comics by doing gags and I'd love to help!

I don't consider myself a very funny person, nor do I think I have that great of a sense of humor. Then again, other people may say otherwise, and I am my own worse critic.

You gotta have faith in yourself! Enjoy the work you do and think about how you get to make others laugh. Being a gag comic artist is awesome!

I was wondering if you guys have any tips or advice on how to make a webcomic humorous.

A beginner mistake I often see in humor comics is the lack of comedic timing. Your dialogue is snappy and witty but you're not fully utilizing paneling to get laughs. Comedic timing is a hard thing to wrap your head around, so study other artists! Nedroid, Hark a Vagrant and Kc Green's comics are a few off of the top of my head. Study how they stylize characters for humor, how many panels they use, what size the panels are and how the pause before the punchline works.

You got close with the page where Fez Boy hits the skull against the door, but try to vary the way skull hits the door so that you have the drama built up nicely.

Also-! Always remember to show your comics to others to test the joke. I always get a friend to check my comic if I'm worried about the clarity of my jokes.

I think the main problem with my comics is that my character, Fez Boy, doesn't have that much of a personality. Without a strong enough personality, it is harder to come up with good jokes and storylines. Now if I had more characters with different personalities, or if my character had a more defined persona, it would make the humor process a lot easier.

Yes, strong personalities are important when it comes to humor. Your comic is unique when you have reader interaction, but it puts you as an artist in improvisational comedy. So having multiple characters to bounce off of can help. I highly recommend using opposites/foil characters. They're the most fun.
I'm the kind of person who likes situational/ bouncing off of others with my humor, but I can understand how that can be hard for a less confident gag artist because it's like being put on the spot and being told to "be funny". So practice a lot. Improvising can get fun!

[shazzbaa]

(I didn't have time to write a short answer so I wrote you a long one, SORRY FOR WORDINESS)

Back when I made a strip that was primarily a funny comic, it was because I had ideas that I thought were funny, and I fiddled with the timing and the wording until it sounded as funny to me as the idea had been in my head. Sometimes I'd post something where the joke didn't quite land because I just couldn't get it right, and other times I'd be giggling at my own jokes for weeks afterwards, but the guiding light was always to try to tell a story that made me laugh!

Overall I don't feel like your stuff is tiresome or unfunny as it stands! It's subdued, but it's also just getting going; it's mostly goofy commentary on what's going on, and playing most of the suggestions straight.

For the kind of thing you're doing, the natural source of humour when you don't have a lot of elements in the story is playing off the suggestions -- e.g., for a suggestion to not do what people expected, teasing an obvious suggestion and then misinterpreting it every possible way, having a completely ridiculous suggestion somehow Work Out Perfectly in an unexpected way, etc etc. If you want to look to other examples, the most obvious comparison is Jailbreak Adventure, which gets a lot of its (weird, occasionally gross) humour from making every suggestion go horribly wrong in an unexpected, over-the-top way.
Obviously, being very sadistic isn't the, uh, only option, but I think playing with the expectations of a suggestion could be a good direction to think in.

It's like improv, right? Everyone gives that advice in doing improv of trying to respond with "Yes, and" --- you want to agree with the scene your partner sets, and then add something of your own to it.
So like, in improv acting, if Person 1 starts a scene saying "Good morning, everyone, welcome to space camp," and Person 2 just says "Yup, we're your space camp instructors," that's, fine, but it means Person 1 has to reach for a new idea since Person 2 didn't take it anywhere. If Person 2 responds instead with, "What, no, this isn't space camp," then that just shoots down the scene. BUT, if Person 2 responds, "YEAAAAHHH, definitely space camp, where you'll definitely go into space and you shouldn't ask any questions about our credentials please we are definitely astronauts," that builds off what Person 1 started but adds something new to it, so that it's easier to make new jokes!

So to apply that idea to you, if someone says "pull the chain out of the wall and make a skull flail," and you respond, "okay, I made a skull flail," that's fine! But it means the askers, your improv partners, now need to think of new ideas. If you say "I am definitely not strong enough to pull the chain out of the wall," that's okay to do, but it makes that suggestion a dead end. If you say, "I pulled the chain out of the wall and now part of the wall has crumbled?!?!? also how do I attach the chain to the skull." -- that kind of thing gives your askers something new to react to! And if you play off the suggestions in a really unexpected way with timing or wording that makes you smile, there's a good chance it'll entertain your readers, too.

I think it would be a mistake to give Every Single Question that kind of "Yes, and--" answer. But it might be another direction to think in when you're trying to think of an entertaining place to take your readers' suggestions!

[MissMagicGirl]

I think your comic is really funny. You are good at the characters expressions and there are plenty of great lines. I think you are probably being to critical.

I make a comedy series myself https://tapastic.com/series/magicadvisor and I think contradiction is can be really funny. Like for instance I use a unreliable narrator which I think can be funny. ^^ I also try to create some really odd or weird characters and / or situations. Usually a strange character or storyline leads to more craziness and humor. I try to go on what I find funny myself like slapstick things (LOVE the marx brothers!) and tries to watch and read funny things to get into the right mood. I hope that helps! And I hope I am as funny as I feel like I am in my own head ^^;;;

But I think your comic is way more fun then you give it credit for So keep it up!

[isaacfriedman]

I have a satirical comic, but that one is comedy centric. The way I use comedy in normally non-comedic comics is usually through simple misunderstandings or misconceptions the characters have being fact checked in the middle of tense situations. For example:

They are in the middle of combat, and one of them was under the impression that all of her teammates were as blind as she was while her team thought she could see. Now the truth is revealed and the joke comes about through the absurdity that none of them already knew these things about their teammate(s). My sense of humor is usually absurdist shock, word play, or casual façade in the face of a situation in which most people would not be casual. All of these types of humor still serve a purpose even when the joke falls flat, allowing for the story to remain fluid while also having a potential comedic bit.

[antimekii]

I usually go for the "what" factor. Most people can predict a punchline of sorts and if they figured how it would unfold it would be unfunny to them. So, whenever I make a comedic scene. I try to keep the scene as serious as possible then pull a twist hence the punchline. Or! I'll try to make fun of a cliche scene; example: A hero trying to save someone but then he'll fuck up and accidentally kill that person...depending on the execution, paneling and such it'll most likely appear to be unexpected hence funny.

[Kamikaze]

The work that I do on my comic doesn't really 'serve' the genre of humor, but adding humor into such a dark story is kind of important for adding some cathartic release. By creating distinct personalities within our characters, we've managed to well...inadvertently create funny situations. Most of it is through staging too.

I feel like a lot of people forget that humor comes from a place of "I've been there before!" They rely so much on the gag line, that they don't think as much about the staging and how they can use it in clever ways.

For more on creating great humor I really suggest watching these two youtube videos from Every Frame a Painting. Ultimately comics are a visual medium and by using the visual side of our medium to make our gags we make people laugh!

Every Frame a Painting - Buster Keaton

Every Frame a Painting - Visual Comedy

[KSlinger]

I see your comic is reader interactive? Would it be possible for you to provide some kind of running commentary that pokes fun at the choices being made? For example, I see in your latest page that Fez Boy has gone down a hole that's a little too small for him. Perhaps a quip like 'who's bright idea was this?!' would be amusing, or 'whoever thought of this was genius...or 'whoever thought of this clearly wasn't claustrophobic'. Whatever works.

You could always add elements of humour into the script based on character quirks. Perhaps one character always murmurs "perfect..." before doing anything that's suggested by the audience, regardless of whether it's a good idea or not or if they even succeed in what they were trying to do. I kind of like predictable habits like that. It makes things all the funnier when characters do exactly what you knew they were going to do, even if it is wildly inappropriate.

Have you tried experimenting with different kinds of humour, as well? Like body language as opposed to outright jokes or inappropriate comments vs wit? Certain kinds of humour suit characters/a comic more than others and trying to shoehorn either into the wrong category can leave things feeling a little off-- not that your comic did, but some creators seem to take a while to get to grips with their particular brand.

I know for a fact that, in my story, Serge would never crack a joke like Morris would. His humour is largely unspoken, visible only in the way he holds himself or looks at someone. Jed, on the other hand, is all about taunts and subtle jabs while Jorik is never intentionally funny, rather his gruff, volatile anger is a source of comedy for everyone else.

Don't be afraid to go with your gut when it comes to writing. And if you're going to be funny, be brave about it. Timid humour is disappointing for everyone. Make yourself laugh! I guarantee someone else will find it funny too.

[jayorten]

This is all great input and advice. Thanks everyone!