Pitfalls of the first time webcomic creator.
I have been creating comics for over fifteen years now and I have learned everything the hard way. More than half the time that translates as expensive and time-consuming. One of the hardest things to do when you start your adventure in the addictive habit of comic creation is remembering to avoid certain pitfalls that could ultimately result in its untimely demise. That’s not to say that all stories will succeed or that all people who attempt to create a comic will succeed. I just think there are ways to even the odds, giving you a fighting chance of getting there.
Success of a comic, in my opinion, is not about getting picked up by a publisher or making tons of money from your comic (though that sort of thing is most welcome). What I think of as success is bringing a story to life and maintaining it to its conclusion. This article is not about getting readers or upping your popularity. This is more of a friendly guide so you can keep an eye out for warning signs that you might be falling into a comic pit-fall.
First things first. Completing your story idea.
The creative process is not an exact science. It’s actually very messy and it’s also very easy to rush into an idea before you have a clear path set. I know you’ve got your basic idea and you’re really excited to dive right in. Stop right now! In my experience, not having your story mapped out can lead to slippery paths. A story that is not well thought out can lead to your downfall. You find yourself patching up and fixing loop-holes to make your story work. Suddenly, you find that your story is not so tight-knitted as you thought. There are gaps. Granted, with a webcomic, you can always go in and “fix” those things, but honestly it really makes your readers angry. Don’t force yourself into a corner where you have to change the very matrix of reality for your readers. Have a beginning, middle, and end mapped out for your story so you know what direction you’re headed. Also try to fill in as much detail as you can in the story and work out most or all of the bugs before you proceed. You can always modify your plans as the story unfolds, but at least you’ll know where you’re headed and what needs to be changed should you decide to take a different path with your comic.
You can start in the middle.
There is no worse feeling than being bored with your own story, especially when you are fond of it. There have been places in my own stories where I didn’t want to draw things out too long. I usually cut the scenes in question and elude to these details throughout the story. If the beginning is boring and you want to get right into the middle, start there. Don’t hold back. The start of your story needs to grab attention of possible readers and you don’t have many pages to do it. Readers judge your comic in the first few pages so make sure it’s catchy! If it’s boring to you, chances are that it will be to others. Start in the middle of your story and introduce the beginning through artful flashbacks and hinted references. It makes the reader have to learn about the characters and plot rather than having it all handed to them on a platter. It makes for a bit of a mystery and the characters intriguing. People will want to get to know your characters.
Be realistic about the length of your story.
Epics are tempting, very tempting. When I started my first comic, I envisioned three separate story arcs each running at least twenty chapter long. As time went on, at least half the chapters were cut for the first arc, making events in and between chapters choppy and almost random. Yeah, that was bad. If you are creating your very first comic, heed this warning now and save yourself a lot of pain. Start small. Try creating a story no more than one to four chapters in length (or even just a few one-off stories) and finish it. If you succeed, you then know you can focus long enough to finish a comic. Then move on to larger ideas if you like. Creating smaller stories first will also help in finding your specific style.
Redrawing older chapters of a comic.
Print only comics don’t really have this option, but in the world of webcomics, it’s happens. I am guilty of this….. really guilty. It’s in an artist’s nature to loathe older works. You look back and wonder how you ever did “something that awful.” If you keep redrawing older chapters, you’re going to wear yourself out, plain and simple. This can lead to boredom of a comic project. It happens. The only suggestion I have is to keep pushing forward with your current pages and try to forgive yourself for your older pages. That’s not to say you should never redraw old chapters or pages. In some cases it really is a good idea to rework your older stuff, especially if you’ve made leaps and bounds in your art and you want to go to print.
Dealing with the death of a project can be a terrible thing. It can leave you empty inside and guilty. You’ve tried to find the motivation to complete your story, but can’t. You find yourself overwhelmed or unhappy with your work. If you avoid some of the common pitfalls of creating comics, you might just save yourself the heartache. You might succeed!
I agree. I started three webcomic. None of them was boring but I after awhile lost interest. Mostly cause my chars needed certain backgrounds or action that they did and I wasn’t able to draw it. Now I am fixing them and the story itself.. Trying to make sense of the craziness I wrote back in 2001. Lol… I think I will follow ur advice. Thank you
Thanks for this. I can’t draw for crap, but I’ve been working on writing some stories and I’m excited to get started, but I will follow your advice. I really need to finish the projects I start, but I’m thinking that I could start in the middle of the story and that might kickstart some ideas to keep moving forward. Thanks for the advice this is great.
I could have used this advice back in 2004 when I started my first webcomic. Rushed the idea, got 3 chapters (30ish pages) in before realising I had no idea where the plot was going. Scratched all of that and rushed a rewrite. Got 2 chapters into the rewrite before hitting another wall and realising I rushed too fast once agian and the story made no sense. Took a two year hiatus to get my computer fixed and fix the story. Am now on the 5th chapter (74 pages), only putting out one page a week because I’m still constantly rewriting pages to make things work and the complete story has a planned 14ish chapters. The only thing driving me to finish this mess is the fact that I’m too stubborn to give up after all these years till I see that last page drawn. Luckily I have also learned from this and do have a second comic planned for when I finish this one and have been working on the story ideas off and on for about two years now. By the time I finish my first comic and move onto this second one I’ll probably have atleast 14 years of planning time so I can atleast avoid ‘rushing’ the writing of the story, haha.
YES, planning the whole story. There are some people who can just sit down and let te story write itself, but unless you’ve done this several times and are absoutely sure, DON’T assume you’re one of these people.
I really liked reading this advice. I’ve never tried to do a webcomic, but I am a writer, and an artist, and I am NOTORIOUS for not finishing projects. I overwork them to the point that I can’t deal with them anymore, and then put them away, even 90% done. It leads to frustration and feeling like I can’t finish anything, at all. I like the advice, too, about “start small.” It’s a very solid bit of advice even for people other than webcomic artists.
I also wish other people would follow it. Several years ago I started a really wonderful webcomic. It had a great story, interesting characters, and, although the art started out “only okay” several chapters in it had progressed to really beautiful. The comic was in its 3rd evolution, and was about 25-30 chapters in by the time I started reading it. The author only updated one or sometimes 2 times a week, and often would go weeks without updating, without any real explanation. The planned ending of the story was a good few years out. Eventually, the author decided to re-start the comic again, from the beginning. After weeks of no updates, and being pretty hooked on the story, I was incredibly frustrated. I didn’t want to wait years to get back to the point the story had already arrived at before finding out the conclusion. I just gave up on it. I didn’t mind a rough, initial art style, but I did very much mind the permanent hiatus that would take years to conclude. A few years later I saw the comic advertised again, but I didn’t go read it. So, yeah, as a reader — definitely don’t keep re-writing the old at the cost of the new. Readers will be patient with an art or story style that’s still evolving… but not a comic that never gets past a certain point.
P.S., Gina, thanks for never doing that to us. You’ve always been amazing about updates, and letting us know when you won’t. Thank you!!!!!
* 2nd paragraph: started READING a webcomic (by someone else), NOT “started drawing it”. In case that wasn’t clear.
Yeah, I started reading a webnovel that ended up doing the exact same thing. It went on hiatus for several months, and then I checked back and I guess she had started rewriting the story from the beginning. It wasn’t even up to the point where I’d read it before, which took months to get there to begin with. It wasn’t worth it to me to go through it again so I just stopped checking for updates.
I am fine arts student in college, but I love to write. My biggest problem is completing stuff so I have to have a deadline in order to get things done. I love this advice! I have thought about creating my own webcomic at times, so if I ever do decide to this, I will head this advice. I totally agree with the first one. It’s something I ALWAYS do with my stories. Come up with a beginning, middle, and ending. Of course I always make changes, but I always come up with major plot ideas. I don’t quite understand your ‘start small’ advice though.
Most people quit creating their comic/webcomic mid-way through. They plan to do dozens of chapters and decide they don’t like where the story is headed, don’t have time or interest, or many other random things. Point is, not everyone has the ability to complete a full-epic length story. Try creating smaller comics (one to two chapters) to see if you can actually complete something before jumping in and committing to a longer story. It annoys readers a lot less when you don’t just give up on a story they were really enjoying.
I am working on a short novel that might turn into a webcomic later on. I definitely need to hone my drawing skills though. I’m just a bit rusty (15 years rusty).
Also, I have re-written the prologue and the first five pages of chapter one about seven times.
Its good advice for most projects, really! I get the urge to do cosplay stuff for cons from time to time and spend most my time on props(working on some cool steampunk guns at the moment). Lots of people complain about making props but its the same sort of thing, start with something small, have a plan, and don’t constantly start over
I have to copy you adivice for you page and print out so i have it on file to read when i hit a road block. I have 17 chapter in one book and 15 chapters in the second book almost ready to start the three book before I even think about doing a webcomic. BTW thank you Gina for help use out.
This is really good advice and it was kind of you to post it. I know my husband’s run into some of these very same problems on his various web comics over the last few years and it’s good to see a successful artist and author publish something like this. So thanks for this, Gina!
Always good to see an article like this one.
It might keep some people from repeating mistakes you and I have both made (facepalm).
What I’d like to tell people is to actually study and practice WRITING the same way that they do with drawing. I hear people say “I’m still learning how to draw,” all the time. But I rarely (if ever) hear something like “I’m going to practice writing a little more before I try something serious.” Everybody thinks they have a great story, and it’s the drawings that make it suck. But writing requires as much knowledge and practice as drawing.
So many comics have godly art, and the writing is horrible. Or, the comic would be enjoyable if the story was good even despite sub-par artwork. But more often, even if the story underneath the surface is interesting, it is bogged down with exposition, too much internal monologue, subplots that go nowhere, and scenes that end before any payoff is achieved. You can’t learn how to avoid these things if you don’t know how to identify them.