9
votes
How do you introduce footnotes in a comic book?
American comics, especially more traditional comics (e.g. those published by the big guys, Marvel and DC) use what are called editor's notes.
These are typically drawn as straight-sided word balloons, ...
- 360
5
votes
Accepted
How do you distinguish robotic voices from normal human voices in comics?
I'm not sure if there's a universal answer. Questionable Content (beware, close to 5000 stripes) uses rectangular bubbles for robot characters (as opposed to eliptic for humans). So that's one ...
- 2,296
4
votes
How do you introduce acronyms in a comic book?
Or you could have a character say "I work for the FBI"* and in a box at the bottom of that panel, or the bottom of the page have a note: "*Federal Bureau of Investigation".
And for ...
- 2,469
4
votes
How do you introduce acronyms in a comic book?
Typically you do this with a newbie, a new recruit or somebody new to the team, that is basically standing in for your reader.
Then there is a story excuse for the new recruit to be confused by the ...
- 99.6k
3
votes
How do you shorten a long spell incantation in a comic book?
You might show the incantation in full the first time the character uses it in that issue of the comic book.
And the next time the character uses it the word balloon might say "O water, garden...&...
- 2,469
2
votes
Accepted
Is it ok to do a flashback to a scene that was never shown before?
I think it is quite common to do flashback to a time before the start of the story. You really don't need to limit flashbacks to skipped scenes (i.e. ones that fall on the timeline between other ...
1
vote
Accepted
Is there anything too important to "offscreen" in a comic book?
The problem with skipping dramatic and important scenes is that it requires more (if perhaps different) skills to suggest what happened in those scenes. The reader needs to know enough to follow the ...
- 8,652
1
vote
When should you include a shot of a character when someone talk about that character?
I think this is done primarily when the character in question has been introduced before, but it was far enough in the past that the audience may not remember.
In Episodic Series Television, we ...
- 99.6k
1
vote
Writing a character with amnesia
Meet cute!
Build the chemistry between your 2 main characters. Amnesia or not, establish what makes them click from the start.
If they spar comedically..., or one-side flirts..., or they share a love ...
- 27.1k
1
vote
What do you call a scene where you hear a phrase in a character's mind resonate in his mind just after he heard it and how do you do it in a comic?
The traditional answer would be that you represent speech with a speech balloon and thoughts with a thought bubble. In classic American comics these two objects typically have visually distinct ...
- 360
1
vote
Writing text bubbles for sign language
This question applies to a bunch of potential communication issues.
Person who only speaks and understands a different language than most locals do not.
Person who understands the local language but ...
- 1,653
1
vote
Writing text bubbles for sign language
I don't remember reading any comics where characters would be speaking sign language. I guess there probably isn't a standard for that... which means you can make any choice you deem fit. A specific ...
- 2,296
1
vote
Is it ok to do a flashback to a scene that was never shown before?
I'm not a comic writer; but I see nothing wrong with that; in any story, it is a good idea to cut unnecessary scenes and just show the crucial scenes. If panel 5 is the main reason to show the mission ...
- 99.6k
1
vote
Accepted
What are things you need to insure when using text bubbles for off-screen characters in a comics panel?
There's a few different approaches you can take:
Lettering/speech bubble appearance - using Marvel as an example, Venom, Thor, and Thanos all have distinct styles for their text and direct bubbles
...
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