Your comic's banner

[keii4ii]

How did you decide what to put in your comic's banner? And icon, too, while we're at it.

I will be uploading my first series here soon, and I'm faced with the challenge of creating a banner that not only looks good, but also conveys the tone/ essence of the series as a whole. Any advice with the second part?

[jessiepolfliet]

What kind of comic do you have?
Makes it a bit easier to give advice.

[keii4ii]

It's a longform fantasy comic. I'm interested in hearing responses from all kinds of comic creators, though.

[Dranif]

That reminds me, I only just today made a banner for a comic of mine(The Randomness of Chibi Wognif ) that desperately needed one.
I basically just put a few of the characters from my series on it though.

However, the other comic of mine that has a story, Legend of John the Parakeet, I planned ahead and already made a banner for.
Again, it wasn't much and could be better, it just shows the main character, the title, and update time.

As for the icons, I used a portrait of the main characters in each.

Only advice I could think of off the top of my head is use a scene with the main character of your comic in it.

[jessiepolfliet]

Showing your protagonist is always good. Maybe in the way he is most throughout the comic. If it is a fantasycomic maybe some features of the world.

[PotooGryphon]

conveys the tone/ essence of the series as a whole

What is the tone to your comic? Is it light-hearted, slice of life, adventure, drama, comedy, horror? Fantasy is kind of an open concept that couple be any of those tones. I have a light-hearted comedic adventure fantasy comic targeting 9 and up.

There are many way and methods to creating a banner for your webcomic. I find that it's very much a trail and error process learning what works and doesn't, because what works for one comic may not work for another. However, a good way to start maybe to to look throughout Tapastic (maybe the more popular series) and take a look at their banners, find your top 5 or so favorite banners, and apply some of their methods to your banner.

With my banner ... well, I just changed it for Halloween, but my most current one, I have a sneak peak of issue 4's cover, with the name of my comic, the logo, and an announcement of how often I update. I also have a couple different versions of my banner, and I test their effectiveness on ProjectWonderful.com . The banners that get the most clicks, I know are more effect.

Here are some of my banners that I've used:

And for icons, I recommend keeping those simple. Some nice artwork of a character's face. For icons, keep in mind that they are small, so you want something that will be easily seen at a small size. A character's silhouettes might also do nicely, or just your comic's logo.

[jessiepolfliet]

That website sounds very handy. nut you have to log in to use it. Is it not.

[keii4ii]

Thank you for the responses so far, everyone!

What is the tone to your comic? Is it light-hearted, slice of life, adventure, drama, comedy, horror? Fantasy is kind of an open concept that couple be any of those tones.

Of course it will depend on the tone of the comic. I wouldn't slap a grim and gory looking banner on a lighthearted comedy! But even for comics that are vastly different from mine, I could learn from hearing about why the creators chose to do what they did with the banner. Let's say it's just a picture of the main character, for example; why that specific pose, angle, crop, expression? Even if the comic's completely different from mine, I could at the very least learn a "don't do this because that would be totally misleading" kind of a thing.

I realize, though, that sometimes either the decision is just obvious, or there's a lot of semi-subconscious reasoning behind it that's hard to put into words.

[PotooGryphon]

Let's say it's just a picture of the main character, for example; why that specific pose, angle, crop, expression?

Well, all that is decided based on dynamics. With your banner your trying to make a first impression, so something with energy and is interesting to look at will, hopefully, get people excited to see more.

So the pose, for example, Mickey (letter A) is in a more dynamic pose than Fred Flintstone (letter C). Mickey has a very strong silhouette, where you can easily see what he's doing even when blacked out, he has a curved line of action, and the pose is full of life and energy. Where Fred, on the other hand, seems pretty dull in comparison. He has a very straight line of action and that's about it. Spongebob (F) also has an awesome dynamic pose on this chart. The dynamic poses are more memorable at a fleeting glance than the non-dynamic poses.

As for angle, sometime angling a shot or even forcing perspective can add more energy to the composition. It's the same reason why sometimes in movies they'll shot something at an angle (dutch angle).

This is because leading the eye around the screen/image is more interesting to look at than something in the center of focus.


Both the man and the ball are on star points in the Rule of Thirds. The viewer's eye moves from the man to the ball in a diagonal motion keeping the composition interesting, even if the subject matter might be boring. (ugh, tennis )

Expression: well you can base that on tone or the mode you want to convey. Most of the time you see happy smiling faces, and this is because the banner is offering up a first impression to the viewers. Smiling happy expressions can be more inviting than negative expression. Even horror villainous banners can still have creepy smiles or smirks.

Basically, in general though, powerful expressions, emotions, and energy are what will leave a lasting impact on viewers. And all that come back to dynamics. It's like the art version of the power cord on a guitar.

There's a lot of physiology mumbo jumbo that plays into art and the viewer as well, like the physiology of color, but that's a lot more to explain.

[keii4ii]

Thanks for the detailed response! Those are things that make a great picture, but perhaps not particularly specific for banners.

I've made quite a few sketches that would fit the banner size, and while I like most of them as just pictures, none of them really does a good job at representing the comic as a whole, haha. Are they visually interesting? Yes. Do they fit the comic? Yes, but only a part/ parts of it. Do they REPRESENT the comic well? Not quite...

Maybe I'm being too critical about this.

[PotooGryphon]

Thanks for the detailed response! Those are things that make a great picture, but perhaps not particularly specific for banners.

No problem.

These points are principles of art, so it does in a way also apply to banner design... actually, I explain how each one applies to banners, in my big rant above.

Without knowing more about your comic or seeing thumbnail sketches, I don't think I can offer much more than that. Just have fun and be creative with it. Don't get too attached to the results because that banner shouldn't be your one and only banner. You should have more than one anyways and change it up often. Keeps things fresh and new.

[yuliusefferven]

Hey nice to see you keiiii.

Perhaps the best method would be to look at banners others have made for their longform story comics that you have felt really reflected the essence of their story and study them for a bit of inspiration.

I think quite importantly if you've figured out what the most important "tone/ essence of the series as a whole" that you want to convey for your story, whether it's the a specific character or some kind of event or abstract idea, and really funnel them down to one or two major focuses, the perfect combination will be pretty obvious to you.

[DinoChuri]

Hi keii4ii
It was really hard for me to decide what to make as my banner and thumbnail for the whole comic. My first series are even missing banners I believe. One because I didn't understand the pixel requirement and because I was just confused However, the way I decide now is what will appear in my comic such as an important information would be in my banner such as in my new series The Big Dipper the banner has a meaning to it. The Icon for that series is just basically the title drawn out. For my other comic it revolves around the main character so I choose them to be in the icon and banner. =]

[coconull]

For the banner, I just made something I would like to wear in a t-shirt

[Drazard]

I just picture the sum of my works and it came like this but if I didn't like the outcome I would definitely not to upload this banner and would wait until I could come up with a very satisfying banner.

[Zanreo]

Well, this is my banner:

I wanted the "big 3" characters, the logo, and the tagline. The background is just a simple-plain colored one, I kept it simple because I felt like too much background detail would just get in the way. Kinda would want something more "exciting"-looking, but that might be harder in that size if I'm gonna include all 3 + logo, and some sites have limits for uploaded banner sizes... Might want to try out a bigger, more exciting banner later

[alakotila]

I once heard to never make book covers (or perhaps even banners) like movie posters, with clusters of characters posing action-y. The reason? Readers don't know these people and don't care -- give them a mystery, a question that needs to be answered, a taste something you offer (art style, themes, mood, etc). Pique their fancy! I still do find it difficult to do, but someday I imagine it will get easier.

I have also test-driven banners on projectwonderful.com in my advertising experiments. Draw up some ideas and run it by some people if you don't have the funds to explore their appeal through such means. You will be able to hit on one that reflects your work best, and you will probably have several … and they may change over time!

Here are two of mine that do well and I'll talk about why I think so. I hope that helps!

This was a fairly early one. (Above.) Maybe my second or third attempt. I think it works because people who are looking for a fantasy comic with a bit of comedy are more drawn to it than those who are not, and the clicks often end up as follows. It also shows a sample of my art and costume design, and kind of what you may expect character-wise (He is wearing all black, is he a rogue of some sort? His ears are pointed, so there are fairy folk in this comic? Perhaps also magic?). I also chose to advertise it with is great hair, which tells you I or the comic does not always take itself seriously. This guy's hair has likely got its own fan club.

This is a bit of an older illustration. (Above.) I very quickly learned that everyone loved the ambassador, which is a bird-like magical summon, and I decided to feature him more. It's a weird picture, but it's quiet, with calm colour scheme, no action poses. That all speaks for the comic on some level. I think it also tells a story or brings up questions -- what are they talking about? What even IS that thing? Why does the elf look so calm sitting by it? Are they friends? Their clothes also show it is fantasy (if the bird-creature hasn't already told you!)

Catching curiosity and story-telling are powerful tools for your banner! Good luck in creating yours

note: I also do a long-form fantasy comic, and the tapastic banner is not either of these. My tapastic banner is a collage of all major characters that have shown up -- or soon will!