:: Introduction and Reading List ::

Okay, let me get this blog started. I'm not creating this blog because I am an expert in the field of comic book creating, however I feel I'm rather advanced. View any of my published works so far: Ill Conceived, A Day in the Psychosis of David Price, Catching Lucifer's Lunch (coming soon) and Sinn Fien (also coming soon). Most of these books are through my own company SUMM Publications. I am a partner with my brother in this endeavor (SUMM) and I hope to have his assistance on this site in regards to writhing, assuming I get into the more creative aspects of comic creation.

First I want to start with understanding how a comic book is put together. I have found working with a many different 'green' editors, artists and creators that many people don't do their reading before deciding they are going to self publish. It's not something you want to just jump into. I've been in that situation and I hope to help people out with advice I've learned from my failures. So! To start, let me just recommend some of my favorite books. This is where learned most of my publication knowledge, as well as asking many of my design friends for help.

No particular order here.

Panel Discussions by Durwin S. Talon
ISBN 1-893905-14-4
This is a must have. You need to buy this one. If you don't believe me, go to Borders and thumb through it. It's many fantastic artists from ever media in comics talking about pacing, writing, drawings, panel layout and more.

Digital Prepress for Comic Books by Kevin Tinsly
ISBN 0-9675423-0-8
This is a great stepping stone to learn many facets of the comic book process. Some of the information is outdated, but it gives you a general overview of the assembly of a book.

Perspective for Comic Book Artists by David Chelsea
ISBN 0-8230-0567-4
Wonderful sequential art style explanations of simple and complex perspective information.

The DC Comics Guide to Penciling Comics by Klaus Janson
ISBN 0-8230-1028-7
Just a general good book on penciling. Take it or leave it. There are many books out there on penciling.

The DC Comics Guide to Coloring and Lettering by Mark Chiarello and Todd Klein
ISBN 0-8230-1030-9
I guess I left it upstairs. I love this book. Great help with colors. If you don't understand comic colors, this is the book to get. Todd Klein does a fantastic job in the lettering section. There's just no sense in spending hours trouble-shooting if you can just read this book in an hour and use it as reference later.

Understanding Comics
My brother has this right now and I"ll try and get you the ISBN, but it is a must read.

Understanding Comics II
Need I say more?

Now that you've got a partial book list year, go out to you local comic shop, library or Borders/Barnes&Nobel/Waldenbooks and check them out. Read them and start to understand comics. Granted, you may not get much from this Blog if you read them all, but I'll give you an idea of what's in them I guess.

You may be sitting there thinking to yourself, "I plan I writing/editing my book and I'll let the artists deal with that stuff," Yeah.... well good luck with that. One huge problem I see working in this industry is that not many people have a basic understanding of each facet of putting a book together.

Why is that a problem?
Communication is key for a production line to work. Creating a comic is a production line. Writer-pencils-inks-colors/letters. Now that's just the standard. People work in different ways. But if you don't start out your production line with the whole book in mind, you're going to run into issues.

And that is why I have decided to start my next entry with, "Templates! Who Needs'em and Why do I Need Them!"