by Matthew Russell - Posted 4 years ago
Welcome to our storyboard. In this special editorial, I wanted to bring a spotlight to a certain overlooked job in comics; Lettering.
So, a writer comes up with the story and dialog, the penciler draws it, the inker gives it definition, and the colorist, well...colors it. So, WTF does a Letterer actually do?
Put simply, they add the dialog into the comic as well as the sound effects. In the digital age, this sounds like any joker could do it, but as it turns out, there is a LOT more than goes into it. Trust me.
Before we begin, I only tried to Letter a single issue way back when I was big into the app “Comic Draw” and the lettering was a simple drag and drop. You had a single font. Nothing major. It looked ok, nothing I would send home to mom about.
For this article, I had to turn to my good friend Terry, a letterer from back in the day who felt so passionately about this, that he made it make sense to me.
Lettering by hand tends to give more flexibility and advantages than lettering via computer. This allows someone to have maximum control over the visual style and composition of your comic.
Trust me when I say that a bad lettering job will throw off the visual style of the comic and you won’t even be able to see what is off.
Yes, doing this by hand takes far more time and can slow down your workflow, but it can be worth it. The good thing is that the set up does take a while, but once done, you can use the same setup over and over again.
These are just guidelines, not rules. There are times that these should not be followed. If you are in this type of situation, be careful. Have a good reason.
How is this even a thing, you ask. Well, it happens more than you would realize. Sometimes the artist crams so much work into every panel that it is impossible to letter. Still, as the artist, you have full access to the script. The artist should make room for the lettering.
If you have an artist that refuses to allow space, think about getting a new artist.
We want the wording and lettering to fit evenly inside the balloon or word boxes. This means that the same space on the top, bottom, and sides. This is your margins.
If your words are too close to the top, no...bad. Keep everything centered. You can either shrink the balloon (this will help with guide #1), but it will make all the other word balloons look funny. The same padding all around, for all the balloons.
We will get more in-depth on this guide later in the post.
Well, we have 2 types of Uppercase I. there is a single line I that you see here. It looks very similar to a lowercase “L”. We also have an uppercase I that has a crossbar at the top and bottom. This is how most of us learned to write it in school.
With typical comic fonts, the crossbars (serifs) are not there on most letters. Here is where we have to change things up a bit.
The Serif I or Crossbar I should only be used when a character is referring to themselves. For example, someone says “I killed the man with a missing arm.” Yep, there was an old Fugitive reference there.
As you can see from the illustration below, I used the serif version of the I.
Now if the character says something like “It was the man with no arm.” (There I go again, I should just rewatch that movie and get it out of my system.) As you can see, no serif.
When you are using mixed case (lowercase letters along with uppercase), throw this guide out. The only other exception to this guide would be if a name looks like another word without the serif.
We talked about this a little with guideline #1. There is another critical component; keep the balloons in order. Yep, sometimes we are trying so hard to just fit the balloons that we don’t realize that they are out of order now, and your dialog in the comic will not make sense.
English, we read left to right, and top to bottom. Manga its’ right to left. Make sure that there is a flow to the balloons and that they make sense. Also, don’t have a ballon line up next to another hard-line if possible.
Try to also avoid stacking the word balloons between 2 characters. This creates an unnatural wall or a perceived wall between them. The exception to this would be rivals talking. If they are trying to get under each other’s skins, go for it, if not, no, no, no!!!
Think Superman and Lex Luther talking about how they will each defeat the other. Having the words between them will add to the sense of distance between them. You would never do this with Superman and Lois Lane, or Martha Kent unless Superman was under the influence of Red K.
The sad reality is that sometimes, that’s the only placement that the artist has left, in which case, you have to decide which guideline is more important to break. I can only wish you luck at that point because it will just be subjective.
Also, try to avoid crossing the word balloon tails. In the words of the original and only “true” ghostbusters, “Don’t cross the streams!”
Now there are times that we have to break this in order to keep the placement in order. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. Just don’t make this a habit.
We talked a little bit about this in Guideline #2. If you’re not consistent, then the flow of your comic will be terribly off, and the reader will generally blame the artist or the writer. Well, the good news is that you generally won’t be blamed by the audience, the problem is that the artist and writers will know exactly who dropped the ball.
Make sure your stroke (outline of the word balloon) is the same throughout. Yes, if the character is yelling, you can fatten this up, but when you are trying to convey a nice even tone, don’t start going crazy.
The tails should be roughly the same. Don’t worry if it’s not due to the necessary placement, just try your best to keep them as even as possible. If you are using swoopy tails, stick with swoopy, don’t add straight tails.
Stick with the same font and font size.
Now, I have added this great video from Todd McFarlane on how he sets up the lettering for the letterer. Input from the artist is a great way to keep you from breaking many of the guidelines listed above.
Now for a real treat, this last video is one of my favorite artist Gerimi Burleigh (creator of Morningstar) actually lettering his comic. You can see his entire process and watch him in action. In the end, he even recommends a great book on how to do it even better.
We haven’t even tried to delve into subjects like kerning, single motion lettering (don’t do this), font choice, majuscule, and when to use that, accents, symmetry, strength, or numbering. So, you guessed it, there will be more coming soon on this important topic.
Until next time, stay safe out there and much love. C-you soon.
