On reading Panel One: comic book scripts by top writers for some information, I was reminded that I work on my comics diffrently then a team of writers, artist, inkers, etc. do. I would do what seems like a reverse Plot Style. What is the diffrence between Plot Style and Script Style writing in comics? A perfect example of the difference is by Marv Wolfman from Panel One: comic book scripts by top writers, edited my Nat Gertler.

I did all my Marvel work and much of my DC work plot style. When you’re working with someone who understands story telling, there is nothing better.

Plot style allows the artist to ‘play’ with the descriptions, to, one hopes, come up with a more powerful story telling, will pace out the material properly. They’ll know who focus the drawing on, and they’ll give the page cinematic, dynamism that you might not get otherwise. By nature the artist sees things visually and the writer things conceptually. Comics are a hybrid of the two. When you work script style the writer is telling the artist what to do. When you work plot style, writer and artist are a team.

Once the artist has drawn the page the writer gets it back to write in the dialog and indicate balloon placement. If the story telling is good, the writer can eliminate a lot of exposition and spend his time writing better character driven dialogue. I have found this works wonderfully when I worked with artist…

Writer and artist are working together as a unit to tell a better graphic story instead of the art merely servicing the writer or writer trying to explain the art. When story and art mesh as one the result is a better comic for everyone. Neither the artist nor the writer should be the star. The story should be all that’s important.

The book was excellent help when I started on this wierd journey of making comics, but I had not looked at it for some time. I call my process Reverse Plot Style, since I draw first, then add the words after..er…sort of.

For example. I just printed out my 215 page graphic manuscript at Kinkos for Beyond the Great Chimney. I brought together very roughly drawn pages into the computer (using Adobe inDesign and Adobe Photoshop), I added in dialog and rought word balloons. I edited some, but it’s always easyer to edit on the printout. So last night I sat for an hour and went through the printout script editing the dialog and sketching in notes of how the art had to change, to make it work. I know have the story close enough to get some feedback from others, and then begin the final art.

So the process is one of back and forth. Sort of how Mr. Woflman discribes, but with more interaction.

I have not worked with a seperate writer, but I imagine the work flow might be something like this:

- A writer creates a synopsis
- the artist draws designs and models of what the characters and settings look like
- the writer becomes inspired by the way the artist draw something and alters their words
- the artist interprets the story following the altered script
- and the writer alters their words after seeing the final rendered images

Tag(s): Beyond the Great Chimney|btgc|comics|Brian Kolm|Atomic Bear Press|AtomicBearPress|ABP|Marv Wolfman|Nat Gertler|Panel One|