Page Layouts and Thumbnails - How I Started
Planning out pages has been the most challenging aspect of creating reMIND and when planning a good set of pages, I always start with thumbnails. I’ve mentioned it before in the past assuming everyone knows what I’m talking about but since every artist is unique with their workflow I figure I should show the early stages of mine. I also noticed many young artists visiting here, trying to make heads or tails on how to start their own comic or graphic novel so hopefully this can shed some light on the subject enough to get the ball rolling.
After I finish a loose script (and I mean loose. No dialogue. A script with the main plot points. About a chapter per page) I started my thumbnails. Thumbnails are super small drawings just to get the initial ideas of composition and page layouts out of my head and on paper. Sometimes I have a clear idea in my mind but most of the time I don’t. If I have absolutely no idea where to start I force something out, however crude it may be, and this usually gives way to ideas that eventually start to gel.
I usually don’t like to show my thumbnails because they are so sloppy and bad. In the case of the pages above, you can really see where I struggled to figure out what to do. There are a few rehashed versions of the same things. Now days I like to draw my thumbnails with ink. This forces me away from little details. If I mess up then I have to start another one. It keeps the ideas fluid and loose.
Thumbnails can easily get really messy and scattered here and there and lost on small random pieces of paper. To battle this bad habit I’ve learned to keep all my thumbnails in nice tidy sketchbooks. I learned this working with many commercial directors. Many would keep similar hard bound sketchbooks clearly marked for each project in which they could collect all their random thoughts.
I started doing this for reMIND long before it was a graphic novel. The top book with the Fuel sticker is full of storyboards and concept art when I was planning on making reMIND an animation called “Vittles”. Most of these pages are full of clipped sketches and thumbnails, taped down to keep organized. I’m glad I did this otherwise I would have lost track of most of it.
This is the first image of Victuals (Vittles at the time) that I liked. I cut it out and taped it to the front page. Yeah, that says Tender Vittles 3.2 for some dumb reason. I just like that cat food name. I don’t have a cat…really. I don’t even really like cats. I just like drawing Victuals.
Above are some storyboard thumbnails for the animated version in it’s extremely early stages. The yellow panels were sticky notes that I later taped in the book. The lower left page is the first sketch of a lizard man. Sonja was going to be a boy at one point and above is a sketch.
Anyway, that’s my way to develop ideas. I’ve got to keep it all organized or I never get anything finished. And hey, it’s fun to look at later on…or put in a blog.
incredible post Jason,
I find this one to be the most helpful. Being a first time graphic novelist, It's always very encouraging and guiding to see how others approach the same material. Your sketches, ideas, and design are full of life and energy! I really appreciate the post!
Jason S.
You've got some killer sketchbooks yourself. I can't wait for you to start sharing some of your pages online.
Nice sketchbooks my friend!!
Thanks again Rawls!
Hmm, interesting… I normally start out with a dialogue and verbal description of scenes on a piece of paper or computer and then split the dialogues out after imagining the scenes for it…
Your process is completely opposite from mine lol. Once I have the general cuts laid out then I start drawing in the scenes. The roughs you’ve seen of mine were done without thumbnails. Maybe I should try the thumbnail method, since I seem to the issue of having things too packed in one page. Useful info!
That's interesting. It seems like there are many ways to approach it depending on the end result you are going for. I've read that lots of comics are planned out with the dialogue placed first but from what I can tell, it's because that use to be the only way to plan your page and leave room for it. (pre-photoshop days) I know lots of professionals still teach that method though.
I bet if you start with thumbnails and do your sketches with dialogue based on that, you'll find it useful.
I know lots of artists who love to sketch big and full size though and there's nothing wrong with it. I just have the worst time keeping my eye on the whole page if my sketches are giant.
Don’t be afraid to show thumbs and sketches – everyone’s books are full of crap they think is scribbles, but in all of our eyes, its gold. I absolutely love seeing the conceptual portion of people’s work.
It makes you feel like you’re not as bad as you think you are, talent-wise. Everyone has to start with chicken scratches, right?
Keep up the good work, and show more of your preliminaries. It’s a great way to see how the artist ticks.
I'm glad you like seeing them. I'm the same as you, as I love to see the rough sketches to see how the artist thinks. Nothing tells you more about the artist then the sketches.
Then there are the artist who's sketches are pure gold. Every scribble is a masterpiece.
Post-it notes, man. They've been an incredible boon to me. But speaking of thumbnails – have you ever had a situation where the thumbnail sketch is actually better than the final formal drawing? I'm getting that right now, and I wondered whether it was just me, or what.
In any case, the art is going from strength to strength, here, so keep it up! And incidentally, I'm starting to test out your "boosted pencils" theory for avoiding ink (on a side project of mine) so it'll be interesting to see how it works out! (So far, I'm finding trace to be very unforgiving of the soft sketch pencils I normally use – smudges and smears galore! But perseverence, as ever!)
–M
"Have you ever had a situation where the thumbnail sketch is actually better than the final formal drawing?"
This is one of the biggest reasons I try to hold true to my thumbnails AND why I don't ink my work anymore too. Whenever I ink my stuff it just sucks the life out of it. The sketches are almost always more what I wanted then the final as far as the feeling. Maybe not the thumbnails but the next stage where I do the rough pencils.
In traditional animation, the animators would always be upset at the bad clean up artists because they would 'suck the life out of the characters' when they would put them on model. The clean up artists would hate the animators because they could never draw the characters 'on model'. Finally you'd get that special animator who would draw exact lines on model and with life in it. It's super rare though. But since working in animation, I learned to let my characters slip off model a bit more to convey an emotion or something. It's similar to letting them be more of a sketch then a perfected piece for me.
That's a really tricky thing though and it seems like everyone experiences it so you are definitely not alone.
As far as the Ink free art, I generally don't use anything softer then a normal #2 pencil. I think that equals an HB in mechanical pencil led. When I am tracing my final lines on a light table, I try to start from the top left and work my way down to avoid smudging but it still always happens. But you can clean it all up in Photoshop later.
Fantastic advice, as ever, Jason. I plan to put it to use. Actually, I've been using "F" lead in my tech pencil, but it depends a lot on the weather – it's been damp here lately so the lead and the paper have been really soft and muddy.
You are spot-on about inks and sketches. I had simply never managed to put my finger on it until you articulated it. And that is what I love about your work, that it actually does look more like a sketch than a piece of inked work. Ink is so easily labored these days, and on the other hand, you see pencils that are so desperate to put every line in for the inker that they lose their "voom." You balance it out so well that I can't help but want to emulate your process.
–M
You can eliminate a lot of the 'fuzz' you get from your pencil smudges by playing with different image adjustments. Generally the Levels command works well at removing subdued greys.
If you want some specific info, just let me know and I'll give you a hand.
Great post as usual. Thanks for being that smart kid in the class who doesn't mind letting us look over your shoulder. =)
I'm basically following your X's and O's for starting my graphic novel project.
Ha, I was the dumb kid who would always draw in class and get barely passing grades… except for in art.
I'm glad this is helping though. Let me know if there is any specific steps you want me to elaborate on. Eventually I'll hit on everything I hope.
I like where the story is going… But I'm really anxious to see how this connects to everything.
It was interesting to know that you work with a really loose script. I've reworked my script so many times that I have enough to make it a full fledged novel. I'm still adamant about making it a graphic novel so I divided it into 2 books.
I always enjoy see the "behind the scenes" artwork and the building up to process. Keep up the good work Jason.
Thanks! A tight script with everything figured out is harder to make work for me. If I have the bullet points figured out that will usually be fine although I do like to make a few passes at filling in some information and write a page for every chapter to make sure I'm not missing anything. But the dialogue always comes last so I can just focus on the visual storytelling. Thanks for the comment.
Hi everyone.. Well, actually I rarely read comics in my life (even though I bought 2 when I was a kid, one about fighting comic TWIN, and one again about funny Ninja kid – I forgot the name..) But dunno why I start to read your graphic novel. It's awesome! :) After read this one, I'm now thinking to have my own sketch book. Thanks again. :D
It's an honor to me to hear that I am attracting someone to reMIND who never read many comics growing up. That's so funny,"funny Ninja kid". Well, whatever it was that grabbed your attention I'm happy that it did. One of my original goals with this book was to attract an audience that didn't visit comic book stores. So as you can imagine, this makes me really happy to hear.
I highly recommend starting a sketchbook to keep all your ideas in. It's really fun to look at later on too. Thanks for the comment!
I've always been obsessed with everyone's pre-production work. Particularly in pencil. Your sketchbooks are delicious!!!
you re the best ARTIST DAT i”ve ever seen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
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