Tao of Guerra

Short stories may give you a new lease on your imagination. Since they don’t require the commitment of a comic or a full graphic novel, it’s easy to let your imagination run wild. That’s true both for the story and the art style. Get as crazy as you want since it’s not a big investment or your time. You can work on your story telling and plot development (keeping it short and to the point isn’t always so easy), expand on your art skills (get out of your comfort zone), and give yourself the sense of accomplishment when you’re done.

It took almost two years to complete the first two volumes of my graphic novel series, Samurai Elf – a mammoth undertaking. It sucked a lot of energy out of my creative juices, so during the break in between, I wrote and illustrated a 4-page short story called, “Bed Bugs” that was published in Heavy Metal (July 2007). It felt great to finish something so quickly and the style was something new for me.

Since then I’ve realized the major benefits of short stories, which I’ve listed here:

1. Time saver.


2. Keeps you sane.


3. Might bring in some extra cash.


4. Some ideas as too short for a comic series or a book, but they’re still good ideas. Don’t you hate reading something that has a great idea, but they drag it on too long?
   
5. 
   It’s a huge challenge to write not just a prose short story, but a sequential short story in 1-8 pages, where every panel is prime real estate.


6. Helps you to grow as a writer, storyteller and/or an artist.


7. Immense sense of fulfillment once you are done.


8. A chance to break free from the usual. Experiment with everything, even your sequence or looking camera shots.


9. Try different genres.


10. Different methods of coloring to suit the stories.


11. Improves your storytelling for both small and large projects.


12. Opens your mind up to new ideas. From every short story I do, a new river of ideas flows.

For every story, the author must create a world that the reader can get lost in. Fantasy or speculative fiction worlds need even more detailed work to be convincing. Easier said than done. It’s sort of like building a car. You can play with the design, the purpose (make it fly, swim, hover, travel through time,..), what it’s made of, the color, etc., but you still need a solid engine that lasts. The strength of the engine depends on how much effort you put into building the world around your story.

How do you take your ideas and give them structure? This was the foremost question on my mind when I first thought of “Samurai Elf®.” I had the idea, but there’s a world of difference between a figment of my imagination and a fully developed concept. I turned to my old friend – books. Whenever I need ideas or inspiration, I flip through books to get my creative juices flowing. Here are some ideas to help you build your world so it doesn’t seem so overwhelming.

Anyone interested in creating a world should read George MacDonald’s essay, “The Fantastic Imagination.” If you’ve never heard of George MacDonald, he’s the guy J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis looked to for inspiration. What’s some of his no nonsense advice? Make a world that is grounded in common sense. Once you’ve established a rule, don’t break it. If only Hollywood followed these two simple rules! If you think those rules sound familiar, many have repeated them, but not given credit to MacDonald who lived from 1824-1905. Here are a couple of excerpts:

“The natural world has its laws, and no man must interfere with them in the way of presentment any more than in the way of use; but they themselves may suggest laws of other kinds, and man may, if he pleases, invent a little world of his own, with its own laws; for there is that in him which delights in calling up new forms--which is the nearest, perhaps, he can come to creation…

His world once invented, the highest law that comes next into play is, that there shall be harmony between the laws by which the new world has begun to exist; and in the process of his creation, the inventor must hold by those laws. The moment he forgets one of them, he makes the story, by its own postulates, incredible. To be able to live a moment in an imagined world, we must see the laws of its existence obeyed. Those broken, we fall out of it...

A man's inventions may be stupid or clever, but if he does not hold by the laws of them, or if he makes one law jar with another, he contradicts himself as an inventor, he is no artist.”

“How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy” by Orson Scott Card and “Worlds of Wonder: How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy,” by David Gerrold helped me to think of all of the details that a world needs to successfully draw in the reader. Card discusses the mechanics of the story, such as plot, pacing and characterization. But most importantly, it helps you understand how to edit your own work and give it a formal polish. Card’s book focuses on science fiction writing, but it’s really a book on writing good fiction. Gerrold discusses working within a logical framework when you're creating your own world. He emphasizes that, "you have to write each moment as if you lived it yourself." This book is not a specific checklist on what to cover, but it helps give you inspiration (always welcome) and encourages you to stay within the logistics of your world.

The Fifth Dimension
Back in the day when I sat down to read Michio Kaku’s Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension. Wait a minute! What do parallel universes have to do with art? Art and science share a great many things in common, but you’re right, I’ll get to the point. Kaku described the early decades of the 1900s as a time when people were fascinated with the fourth dimension. Artists were obsessed with how to portray multiple dimensions. Ever thought about what Picasso was doing when he painted all of those disjointed looking people in his “modern art” pieces? He was trying to illustrate how images without a set fixed point would appear. If we can’t see into the fourth dimension, then higher dimensional beings would look like blobs or disjointed beings. When you understand what Picasso was trying So next time you think Picasso was smoking something, you might think twice and realize that he was trying to do something most people today still cannot begin to conceive. Picasso was brilliant in his observations and mixing that with his imagination. Here’s a great quote from Hyperspace:

“Picasso was once accosted on a train by a stranger who recognized him. The stranger complained: Why couldn’t he draw pictures of people the way they actually were? Why did he have to distort the way people looked? Picasso then asked the man to show him pictures of his family. After gazing at the snapshot, Picasso replied, “Oh, is your wife really that small and flat?” To Picasso, any picture, no matter how “realistic,” depended on the perspective of the observer.”

Drawing Realistically
This may seem like a strange introduction to a post on realism, but it’s an important place to start. Many times, artists forget that we’re drawing on a flat surface. We’re not re-creating reality like a photograph, we are interpreting reality and then creating a representation of it through a series of dabs, lines and scratches. Perhaps every artist at some point wants to achieve an ultra realistic style. Although this poses its own set of problems for comics, seeing that there aren’t big bold black lines outlining living things. So, trying to achieve realism with an ink line is next to impossible.

Balance
I like having my own style that falls somewhere in between realistic and cartoony. Drawing realistically is an important skill and helps you to hone in your craft and challenge you. But when you choose a style in which to draw, more often than not, the more realistic art is the less emotion it can express. In general, the harder you try to make a face look real, the more dead it appears. Emotion comes from the exaggeration of the eyes, eyebrows, mouth and body language. I think that’s why artists who are completely in the realism camp like to draw things more than people. Cars, buildings, everyday objects…things that don’t express emotion.

Curiosity Makes an Artist
Parents often push their children into adopting a realistic style. This is especially true in the west, where we have the perception that the more realistic something is, the better it is. The drawback to realism is that you don’t get to fully exercise your imagination. If you’re too busy developing your skills as an artistic stenographer, meaning someone who’s concerned with drawing things exactly as they see them, that can be frustrating and unsatisfying, especially for young artists. It’s like taking a left handed child and forcing them to use their right hand.

People need to choose their own style (or multiple styles) and develop that, not what someone else imposes on you. As individuals, there are certain tendencies that we naturally gravitate to. If not, all art would look the same and what a boring world that would be. Even among realistic artists there are differences. The important thing for growing as an artist is to try new things. The best way I know to do this is to switch up your style. Get out of your comfort zone. If you are more drawn to realism, try drawing cartoony and vice versa.

People have a tendency to pick the path of least resistance. How many artists do you know whose art never changes? I don’t mean that their publisher only buys a certain style so that’s what you see most of the time, but their overall portfolio looks almost exactly the same, year after year. How boring! As an artist, you should be hunting for new ways to do things; hungry to improve. Why? If you’re not curious and constantly developing new and better ways to do something, then you’re not an artist. It’s that simple. It’s what drives you.

Comics has to be one of the toughest mediums on the artist, mainly because they have to be ready and able to draw just about anything. Understanding perspective is a must, and in my view, the most important skill because if things appear “off,” the reader instantly notices, even if they can’t put their finger on why.

I remember many years ago waiting in line to get Will Eisner’s autograph at my local comic store. At the time I was studying film and debating whether I should pursue my dream of drawing comics. While I was dead last in line, I could hear the guy in front, who was getting his books signed by Will, say something about film and comics being the same. Will seemed to find the topic amusing. He chuckled and politely disagreed. He said they’re more like cousins than brothers. I understood exactly what he meant, although the guy in line didn’t seem to get it. Anyone who has read Eisner’s Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative would understand his point of view on the subject. Another good resource is Scott Macleod’s, Understanding Comics.

This memory popped back into my noggin when I read an MTV interview with Alan Moore about his thoughts on films and comics. He raised some very interesting points. Here’s an excerpt, “In comics the reader is in complete control of the experience. They can read it at their own pace, and if there's a piecalan moore, art, books, comics, digital, film, graphic, graphic novels, Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative, medium, miguel guerra,paintine of dialogue that seems to echo something a few pages back, they can flip back and check it out, whereas the audience for a film is being dragged through the experience at the speed of 24 frames per second. So even for a director like Terry Gilliam, who delights in cramming background details into his movies, there's no way he'd be able to duplicate what Dave Gibbons was able to do in Watchmen. We could place almost subliminal details in every panel, and we knew that the reader could take the time to spot everything. There's no way you could do that in a film.”

Since I studied film and have pursued art, I can appreciate the strengths of both mediums. A book has the advantage of limitless length (short, long, multiple volumes). It ignites the imagination since the reader is an active participant. The reader decides how the characters look, what they sound like, and fill in all the missing details. Have you ever read a comic, then looked at it again years later and said to yourself, “I thought this was more detailed.” Your mind filled in all the extras and made it seem more real.

Film on the other hand is recorded, edited and played back to a captive audience. The visual elements of film give motion pictures a universal power of communication. People can instantly be educated (or indoctrinated) by the recorded images that are whizzing past them. Film is powerful because the message of the film is instantly transmitted to the audience, who passively sits, watching and listening. That doesn’t mean no one thinks while they watch a movie. Some movies provoke though and discussion. But whether you think or not is up to you. The movie will continue, regardless of your brain wave activity.

Then there’s animation, which bridges the gap between film and comics. In my opinion, it’s closer to graphic storytelling; like detailed storyboards. Animation is like the crazy half-brother to comics. You want proof of the close relationship? Windsor McKay and Osamu Tezuka were pioneers of both comics/manga and animation. Hey, that’s a good topic for another post, but I digress.

What really makes movies fabulous is motion. Good old 24 frames per second. I’ve always thought this lack of motion in comics is a hurdle. Japanese manga artists are great at this, and can teach us a few things about a good speed chase or fight scene. Motion in comics is in itself a skill to be mastered. Movies can also pan in and out. Comics can do a good job of this, although it’s not quite the same. The reader has to fill in the motion between the key frames. The artist has to have superior page layouts to give the impression of motion. Music is the other huge difference. It can get you mad as hell or tug at your heart strings. I’m afraid comics can’t offer that (although animation can).

What are some of the limitations of film as a story telling method? Hollywood movies are almost always plot driven. One of the biggest drawbacks to movies is the time constraint. The entire movie is constructed not around the story or character development, but how it can all be told within a set time limit. The script, directing, cinematography, acting and editing are all done with a fixed boundary. Movies also have to deal with astronomical budgets. Even an independent film costs tens of thousands of dollars. It’s hard to afford anything.

Where do comics fit in? Comics are basically books with pictures (graphic novels, ah, now I get it!). They use the active and passive parts of your brain. A twilight medium if you will. They eliminate the need for both excessive text and excessive detail. They also have the strength of not being constrained by time (although comics are only 22 pages, while graphic novels end when the writer/artist decides). The reader gets to imagine voices and some details, but still gets to see what the characters look like. And let’s not forget that you need to be literate in order to enjoy them. My mother used to say if there are comics in the house, there will eventually be books.

So what else makes comics different than movies? You don’t need a massive budget to create a comic or graphic novel. There are no limits to the story or the character designs. The reader can start and stop whenever they have time and even take them wherever they go. While comics can be limited by a cliff hanger at the end of every comic, they can compensate by writing as many issues as they want…or as many as the publisher wants. My experience is with graphic novels, so I have the luxury of ending my book as the story dictates. I don’t have to worry about a fixed length and then work backwards from there. As my co-writer Suzy Dias says, “It ends when it ends.” A book (graphic novel) should dictate its own story and its length. This even allows you to meander away from the main plot, something you never have time to do with a movie. You can use this technique to impart the history of a place, delve into a side character, have a flashback, or anything else. That’s not to say that you forget good storytelling. There’s no point in veering from the main plot if it hurts the overall story, or worse yet, bores the reader. However, it can be a useful tool when used correctly.

A good comic artist and writer understands the strengths and limitations. Looking back, I agree with Eisner’s assessment. Today I understand more deeply what he meant. Know thy medium!

Post by Miguel & Suzy

Many people have asked about my workflow and what programs I use, so I thought I’d cover the workflow part this week and the programs on another day. The best example I can think of is taking you through a typical day when I was working on my graphic novel, Samurai Elf.

Samurai Elf (vol. 1): Set Apart was completely done in shades of black. Most people think I did it in colour and then turned it to greyscale. I purposefully chose grey because I wanted to use it as though it were a gauche. Digital gauche, if you will. I even experimented further with using pencils instead of inking my pages. I made my pencil work as pristine as possible, then scanned them in, and darkened the line in Photoshop. In retrospect, it wasn’t the best idea, but it was a good try. As I mentioned in my last post, I discovered Manga Studio EX and digitally inked Bull’s Eye (vol. 2). It was a turning point that allowed me to speed up my production time and play with perspective and speed lines. But I’m jumping ahead.

Pencils/Inks
I begin the old fashion way, with a pencil and plenty of paper. I draw all my pages (I’m a stickler for a clean line) and I scan them in. Then I import them into Manga Studio Ex, where I ink over the pencils, make corrections (did I draw 6 fingers on that hand? I need some sleep.) or even additions (that guy’s missing an eyeball!), add speedlines, use rules and French curves, yada yada yada (refer to my last post, “Digital Inking. Why I Like Manga Studio EX”).



Export High Res
Once the inking is done, I export the file as a .tiff at a high resolution, usually 300-450 pixels. Keeping pixel counts as high as possible comes in handy for printing at various sizes. You never know if you want to republish it in larger format.



Photoshop
The next step is to bring it into Photoshop and save it as a .psd. I set the ink layer to multiply so that the white background becomes transparent (usually a layer is set to Normal by default. Choose Multiply from the drop down menu). Add a layer beneath the ink layer for your flats. I then choose my colour palette and paint bucket or pencil the colours quickly. I then pass it to Suzy, who begins the tedious work of adding the flats. I don’t do this for illustrations or short stories, but when we work on a book, she does color assists. Suzy makes sure everything is coloured, without any white spaces so that each colours butts up against the next. She also adjusts the palette if she thinks something else would work better. The colours must cover the entire page so that upon printing, there are no nasty white spots appear.



Corel Painter
Once that’s done, I open the .psd file in Corel Painter. I would spend hours rendering the shade and highlights to the pages. I save my file as a .riff so I can continue to work on it. Painter has very natural looking brushes and fantastic paper textures to choose from, allowing me to make Samurai Elf look as close to a painting as possible. Photoshop just doesn’t compare to Painter for looking natural.



Gutters/Special FX
When the painting is all done, I flatten it and save as a .tiff, then open it in Photoshop again. Suzy then cuts out the gutters between panels and resizes it for the final print size. If we need to add special effects, we do that in Photoshop too. In this example, the lights on the hover-cycles are a special effect.

Text
Now it’s time for word bubbles and text. You can do this in Word, but Suzy prefers Illustrator so the text stays a crisp as possible for printing. She adds the bubbles and all of the dialogue, often making edits along the way. So, in the end, we have the final .tiff created in Photoshop and the final text only .ai file created in Illustrator.

If you prefer to just use Photoshop, just add the text as new layers and away you go. Illustrator is a vector based program, so no matter how you resize the text, it stays sharp and in focus (Photoshop is pixel based). Illustrator is also much more malleable for special text effects and wacky bubbles.

Getting Ready for Print
Suzy and I created a template for the final Samurai Elf book in InDesign. You have to include the crop area, bleed area and the type safety area, beyond which you shouldn’t add any text in case it’s cut off by the printer. I then add all of the.tiff image files and .ai text files in the right order, just like it should appear once it’s printed. With the front/back covers, the spine, and all the internal pages. Once everything is set and sized properly, then I export as PDFs and send those off to the printer.

I just received the latest issue of Image Fx and what did I find? An interview with and a tutorial by David Gibbons, artist of the Watchmen. In the tutorial he talks about using Manga Studio to ink. What a coincidence. It ties nicely into my current blog posting. Here's the link
http://www.imaginefx.com/