After seeing the preview, I’m really excited for Scott McCloud’s MAKING COMICS, the third book in his UNDERSTANDING COMICS and REINVENTING COMICS trilogy.
Along with Dylan Horrocks’ essay on world-building, I count UNDERSTANDING COMICS as one of the biggest influences on the way I now think about not only comics, but storytelling in general.
Here’s what McCloud has to say about his new book:
“The book starts with a radical new look at the process of comics. I just blow past the layout, penciling, inking thing (which I really think only applies some of the time nowadays, when we have all these new tools).”
To me, technique is the last thing to worry about when starting to think about making comics. Maybe that’s because I never learned how to draw comics “the Marvel Way,” with brush and ink, and like McCloud, I use a computer and Wacom drawing tablet to make mine.
It sounds like McCloud is structuring the book around the choices (shown above) that have to be made during the creative process. What I’ll be interested in is whether he assigns a particular chronological order to these choices: whether, say, choice of moment must always come before choice of flow. (For me, sometimes choice of flow comes before everything.)
Regardless, I think it’s going to be a great book, and I’m bummed out that we have to wait until September to read it. Hopefully he’ll hit NEO as part of his 50-state tour.
* 23 years on the planet. Not to be confused with Bloomsday. Maybe one of these days I’ll spend it in Dublin…
