Making A Mini-Comic Part Two: This Time It’s Personal!

The last thing I wanted to do this week was make a sequel to our “How To Make A Mini-Comic” video. It’s our most popular video, so I could see the benefits of milking that subject again. But, honestly, I felt we’d covered everything the first time. However, as Michelle pointed out, the long list of questions in the comments section say otherwise. So it was back to the drawing board again for part two.

The original video is very informative. The issue stems from the fact that from any one subject, an infinite stream of questions can branch in infinite directions.

Let’s say I show you how you play a G-chord on guitar. Done deal, right? Wrong. Are there other ways to play it? How do I play it in a different octave? What brand guitar do you use? What strings do you use on that guitar? Where do I buy a good guitar?

So yeah, we went back through the comments and picked the most asked questions for part 2. We’d hate to leave anyone hanging. And while I had to be dragged kicking and screaming back to the drafting table for this one, it turns out that, as usual, when you try to teach something you also end up learning something.

One of the things I had to do to answer some of the questions was open up my rarely-used copy of Procreate and figure out the best way to get the classic 8-page layout down on a layer.

My solution — turning on Drawing Guide puts a grid down on your canvas. If you’ve done your math, you know how far each of the gridlines need to be to form the structure of your 8-page layout. You can use Edit Drawing Guide to place the gridlines there and you’re set!

We even figured out a way to lay down ink lines on those gridlines so that the layout was more visible. I don’t know why I avoided Procreate for so long. Just doing the research to answer this one question led me down a path of learning that makes me want to use Procreate much more often.

We also ran through all the different paper sizes you could use, and ways to add pages if necessary. But app research and paper folding weren’t the only things I got to do. I also spent time doing some quick comic writing and cartooning so we could have some new examples of the form for this video.

Sure, one of these is just a horribly insulting collection of goony Michelle caricatures, but it had been a while since I’d just let loose with digital inking tools, and it felt good to get back into it. Plus, it serves as a warm-up for the mini-comic about Public Domain cartoon characters.

I even found an excuse to draw the bad guy/wrestler from the first Spider-Man movie.

Poor Bonesaw. Gone too soon.

So far, the new video’s getting a good reception and I think we answered most of the lingering questions from the first video. Will I have to do a third video in another two years? A week ago I’d have spit in your eye if you even brought up the subject. But now that I’ve been reminded how much we can learn by teaching, I’m kinda’ looking forward to it.

If you’re interested in making a mini-comic, the link to the video is down below.

And just in case you missed the first video from a few years ago, here’s the link to that as well.