Comics 101: Scripting

In this series of articles, I will give you nearly everything you need to know to effectively create a comic book. We will discuss the art, the writing, the purpose and the advantages that are specific to the art form itself. During this adventure, we will cover the following topics in order”

Defining comics

Story form

Art forms

Scripting

Layout/ paneling

Lettering/ art of words

Printing/ publishing.

At the end of each article will be a series of activities that will eventually get you to do a story from start to finish. Along with ideas to help you find good reading and reference material.

Scripting. It’s a secret art that often goes unsung (much like inking but that’s a subject for a later installment). The trick is that with scripting there are almost no rules, yet there are hundreds to follow. With that said, let’s get started.

The purpose of scripting goes a lot deeper than just writing down the story. Scripting is where all the elements of the comic come together in a safe space before you have spent the many hours drawing the thing out. Jim Lee has stated that he will usually spend a day per page for a comic. Could you imagine if he got halfway through the book and then the writer found a plot hole? #thatwouldsuck.

The things to pay attention to when scripting are twofold: the artist must be able to understand what you are saying/doing and you as the writer need to be able to understand and see what the end product looks like. Outside of that, the rules are really up to you.

To get you in a good place to start, there are two big methods in scripting that are really popular amongst professionals.

The Marvel Method:

The marvel method was developed by Stan Lee back in the early 60’s when he was working on Fantastic Four. And Spider-man. And Hulk. And about another dozen or so books. This method is helpful if you have a great artist already set up that knows what they are doing as well as a heavy workload. What will happen is that the writer will jot down his basic ideas for the direction of the story and then hands it off to the artist. The artist will spend all night writing the story and meet with the writer occasionally through the week/ month to co-ordinate.

Straight Ahead:

The idea behind this one is that you write out the comic book like you would write out a movie. The writer expresses each piece of the story from what the picture looks like to where the camera is to where the bubbles are. This method is best for writers who like to have more control over the story as well as Artists who are scrapped for time.

Every writing method from what I can find is a combination of these two extremes. The biggest thing is to make sure you co-ordinate with your artist before scripting begins to find what each other’s preferences are for scripting and creative input.

Application Activity:

Take your story and script it. I would also recommend that you check out scripts from professionals. After you see what other professionals are doing, go ahead and script your story as if you are writing it. Place your finished project in the comments below!

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