Things I Learned While Drawing Doujinshi

An excerpt from one of my doujinshi.

 It's a few months since started drawing doujinshi and fell in love with it. As much as I liked reading manga, I never felt confident in drawing my own. It was until I developed an idea of creating one with an idea that I didn't see many people have. It started off with an odd sense of humor and some quick sketches ...

Plan Out Your Story with Thumbnails

After your ideas have been formulated, it's best to have it planned out in the form of storyboards or thumbnails. I happen to choose thumbnails, because it's more convenient for me. What I do is think about how each panel should be placed so that it flows nicely as a whole chapter. I also take into consideration how these panels may look like once they are enlarged. Are the frames interesting enough to convey the information I want? For instance, I choose angled shapes for action scenes or breakthrough scenes to create more impact. The thumbnails and/or storyboards will serve as a template that you can follow. It happens quite often that I will deviate from the original thumbnails because it doesn't work out on a larger scale.

Have a Script Written Out

One of the major things I neglected was the dialogue for my characters. Even if you look back at your thumbnails, if you can't remember what your characters are suppose to say, those empty speech bubbles will just become awkward spaces. I always have a script prepared in my head, but always forget to write it on paper. In the end, I have to waste so much time trying to remember what characters are suppose to say.

Get Appropriate Materials

Invest on some good supplies because they will make a difference in the final production. Depending on the nature of your comic, you may want to explore a variety of mediums. I started off with Microns and permanent markers on sketch paper. I found that it's more interesting to work with pens of varying thicknesses. Sometimes I use an extremely thin weight for details and use a contrasting thicker weight to create contrast. I also began to work with nib pens and India Ink seeing that the continuous purchase of Microns is expensive. Nib pens still allow you to create a variety of weights and I discovered that poorly manufactured nibs can disturb the ink flow. As a result, I would create a line I did not want. Working with ink created surprising results. I didn't waste as much time filling in spaces with a marker when I can use a brush. I even started working with brushes because they created more shortcuts for me.

The paper you work on is also very important. You can draw all you want, but if you have crappy paper, it'll ruin the quality of your drawing. It also influences how you scan your work. The sketch paper I've been working with has a more yellow tone which I do not want and more tooth on its surfaces. As a result when you scan, you don't get that bright white and smooths surface you commonly see in comics. It also means more time on Photoshop cleaning up your work and adjusting colors.

Working With Screentones

I am drawing manga and I use digital screentones. Unfortunately I don't have a manga software so I have to edit my work in Photoshop which is still the same, minus a lot of shortcuts and convenience a manga software would have. I collect a lot of screentones from various users and in many cases, I have to do a lot of cut and paste especially if the screentone I got is really small. Overlapping two different screentones can create patterns and add dimension to your work.

Finding a Good Platform

It's really no good if no one reads your stuff. Getting feedback shows how good your work is being received.  I originally posted my work on deviantArt, but it proved very troublesome because they didn't have a multi-upload option.  Tapastic is a great platform for uploading all sorts of comics from strips to vertical formats. Tumblr is very effective for sharing images, but my biggest peeve is the limit of image files you can upload which is currently 10. I like using Pixiv which is predominantly a Japanese audience, but they have a comics option which I like. The now defunct MangaMagazine.com was a really good tool for uploading comics.