So I got an email from a fan this morning. I think he was asking me about my creative process. I thought I'd refine my answer for the blog.

First off, when I write a comic, I draw and write it at the same time. I make a very messy comic book in my sketchbook. I make scribbles to indicate composition and I write in the word balloons as I go along. This is my first draft.

My second draft, I type a script based on the first one. I fix the dialogue, sometimes I get new ideas and make notes of something else to draw.

My third draft, I draw a comic based on the lat two drafts.


I'll go back and forth between typing and drawing. I get different ideas as I take on the role of writer and different ideas as I take on the role of artists. Depending on how I feel about the comic, I'll go back and forth between sketching and typing. But the draft before I draw is always a drawing draft.

That's because I take my sketchy drawing page, pop it in photoshop, pop in perspective guides (somtimes its a grid, sometimes I'll grab a photo of a building and alter it to my needs. I don't like drawing a million lines from a vanishing point with my ruler.) I'll also do the lettering and figure out how to compose the word balloons. I will also edit the dialogue as I do this.

I print that out. All the lines in light blue.

Then with a blue pencil, I draw in the detail. Then I ink it.

Next it gets scanned in. I cut and paste the word balloons from the draft file. And I might do more dialogue changes. I also color it.

Then its ready for the web.

But that's the practical process.

The mental process is a bit harder to explain.

I try to go for a "feeling" in my first draft. I recently took a clowning class. Actually, it was more like an improv class for actors trying to do comedy. The heart of a clown is messing up but being funny. When I was making my class laugh, I had the same sort of "feeling" performing.

In that class, the coach was trying to talk about "the truth", and I don't mean as reason and fact, but he was saying how "the truth" was funny. And it was. It was a sort of poetic truth. When the actors stopped trying to act and stated to be truthful of their frustration, fear, and failure to not get a laugh, they became funny.

Some of the exercises reminded me of George Carlin. He once went up on stage. He didn't say a single word and made the audience laugh. George Carlin, stood there silent, just being George Carlin, just "being honest" with himself and to the audience.

I try "to be honest". I think real art comes from "being honest" with yourself and "being truthful" to yourself. And if religion is about "truth", philosophy is about "truth", tragedy is about "truth" and science is about fact (which is about "truth") then religion is funny, science is philosophical, tragedy is religious, tragedy is comedic, science is religious, etc. etc. It all blends and connects into the human condition.

I've spent my life trying to not lie to myself. Try to not lie to others (although that's really hard, and I'm honest with myself when I fail, and sometimes I remedy it, eventually.--although in some instances in my life, I have no choice but to bluff). And I try to be honest with my work. In the past few years its been starting to come together.

I don't know if the honesty thing makes any sense. Its sort of like wu-wei, doing without doing. It would probably make more sense to an artist or performer who puts their all into their craft. Or perhaps someone who has studied Zen.

But, according to my readership who've emailed me, this sort of think does make a difference.

Anyway, I got a freelance thingy to finish. The next page will be kind of a jip storywise, but I'll make that up with the next next part.

Labels: blog, Lessons in Cartooning, my work