by Matthew Russell - Posted 5 years ago
Welcome, my faithful Vigilantes! Today we will be tackling a very common problem in the comic world; page size. This happens to be the most common question that we run across here at Crypto Comics.
In this post you will see some images of our site. I also wanted to point out that the background of the pages as well as the general structure of each page does not have the actual look and feel applied to it YET.
ApogeeINVENT (our glorious partners) always builds everything to function and then worries about the cosmetics later. We have some create computer cosmetologist so rest assured it will look so beautiful before it we are done. Please ignore the more strange looks.
Let’s begin with the simple numbering of the pages. This will mostly play into how ads are placed within the comics. Publishers, writers, and artist must be aware of this in order to add things like a spread (an image that requires a full 2 pages to showcase).
In order to combat this, I like to utilize this simple image. I have one sketched out and on my wall whenever I am working on a new comic. It also helps with pacing. On mine, I have sticky notes that help me decide some crucial plot points. Having it on a sticky note make it easier to move it around in the planning stage.
Personally, I always label the cover as page 0 (like the ugly mock-up to the left). This way, when you open the book you are faced with page 1 & 2. Some people (and this is recommended) have a single page that gives an indicia or a “Story So Far”.
Don’t be tempted to save this as anything other than page 1. It will throw off your game later on.
Just as a reminder, in order to ensure that each comic on our system is original to the blockchain, we will insert a page as page 1. The image below will show you exactly what our system will look like.
Once you have all the pages laid out (an average of 26 pages) keep track of where you are in the story. You can place a splash page (a full-page illustration) anywhere in the story.
Super-Man #75 from DC Comics (Death of Superman by Dan Jurgens) was single panel/page story, so don’t feel constrained in any way as to the number of splash pages. Remember that the more you have the more it can distract from the actual story.
The average amount of panels per page is roughly 4-6. As I stated above, don’t get hung up on it. I have seen pages that have over 20 panels and it worked perfectly. I have seen others that felt crowded with 4. It all depends on the artwork and wording.
If you have a 2-page spread, only begin this with an odd number. Save the first part as page 5 for example, and the second as page 6. This will keep them together and make it so that you don’t have to start a picture and turn the page to finish it. Just sloppy storytelling if you ask me.
The industry standard is typically 2 X 3 ratio. This is why the typical comic is about 6 X 9 inches. The comic pages from a comic sketch pad follow this rule although they are typically larger for a reason. This is your safe zone. This is what will appear on the printed page as well as on our screens. Our system displays your comics at 900 px height and 600 px wide at a minimum of 220dpi. When scaling to fullscreen upload your images at 800x1200. A 2 page spread is 1600x1200.
The safe zone is precisely that; any artwork that will appear in the comic, itself. Almost every print job is imprecise, this margin of error has created some difficulty in the past.
There is always a chance that the paper won’t be cut perfectly and part of the content disappears because of it. The safe zone is the section that typically will not get cut away. If it does, ask for your money back from the printers.
On a typical 11 X 17 artboard, this is about 9 X 13.5 inches.
If you are drawing a comic by hand and using a scanner to get a digital version, you will still want to pay attention to the Safe Zone until you get really good at scanning. Remember that in order to get a perfectly straight scan is VERY hard. You might have to crop some edges and resize.
Shifting and alignment of the paper sometimes get out wack because printing is an imperfect process. If everything worked out perfect every time, you would have a safe zone and that is it. Think of the Bleed as a border.
This border isn’t for the artist, it is for the printer. The artist should keep all of the essential artwork inside the safe zone. The letterer should do the same.
Now, the artist should still draw outside the safe zone, all the way through the bleed. This will allow for some degree of safety.
It is your “fall back plan”. Although you should never add essential artwork in this section (a spoiler of some sorts or any game changer), this little strip gives you the room to finish out your image.
Think of this example: If there is a table on the page and it is near the edge of the safe zone, don’t put down your pencil when you hit that light blue mark. Keep drawing and finish all the way to the end of the paper. This gives whoever is printing your comic a chance to be human and leaves a margin for error.
On a typical comic drawing pad from earlier (11 X 17) then the bleed extends out to 10 X 15 inches.
This is your no man’s land of the comic page. This is the spot that is guaranteed to be gone so drawing past this point would seem to a pointless feat unless you needed a reference point of some kind.
On the comic template that we have provided, it is the hard outside blue line.
Lots of luck to all my comic creators out there and remember to submit your comic to us for publication!
