My understanding is that a lot of the formal structure of screenplays/teleplays disappears in other scripts. Plays don't have a universal script structure. Neither do comic books (from my understanding). It seems like writers have many different approaches to laying out a script for artists. So the questions are really how well does a script writer conceive a story visually AND communicate that vision to an artist?

The limits on a writer/artist are the same for anyone else. They are limited by imagination and skill. The one limitation that cannot be overcome is imagination. Still, if that's your only limit, it's a pretty unlikely to effect what an artist does too much. The neat thing about collaboration is the chance to get outside of your own imagination, which has advantages and disadvantages. Tezuka didn't seem to find many limits to his imagination, although his drawings retained their Disney influence up to the end of his life.

The fact is that comic books, like films, are a visual media. Whether that relates to reading words or looking at pictures is irrelevant. The point is to present a story in a cohesive, interesting manner.

And I'll be darned if the definition of cohesive isn't "working together".

So, yeah, ultimately, I'm with Joe. My favorite comic book-makers tend to be folks that write AND draw, because there's no disconnect between the two. Scenes are written the way they can or will be drawn, and drawn the way they were written. It is inherently more unified.

It's like trying to decide whether and actor or a writer is more integral to a play. Or whether a writer or director is more integral to a movie. Or whether hydrogen or oxygen is more integral to the air we breathe.

"In contrast, today’s dominant American comics aesthetics seem to be “widescreen” work for the majors and “quirky cartooning” with nonetheless linear and cinematic staging for the higher profile indies."

I don't agree with that last part. Chris Ware and Kevin Huizenga, for example, are not what I'd call linear or cinematic. They both employ a wide range of layouts and panel shapes, and they often tell stories in nonlinear sequences.

Nice to see a thread about this sticking to the topic as opposed to the personality clashes.

Personally, I've hung out with both Jesse and Mark, and they're both swell guys.

Any way, I wrote an intro for a recent 100 Bullets trade that discusses this...thought I'd dump it here. If it gets cut off...oh well. I'm kinda bad with the internets.

Regards,
Darwyn

Decayed TPB Intro

This whole thing started, as many things do, in a bar in New York City. Present were Bullets editor Will Dennis, fellow artist Cliff Chiang and myself. Amidst all the usual conversational gas that passes between friends, Will threw something out there that got me thinking.

“Who do you consider the key creator; the writer or the artist?”

It’s the kind of bait I can’t resist. I took a drink and settled in for a good time.
“The artist. No question.”

This led to a rather lively discussion that we finally had to back up. We had to define the arena of discussion. It was put forward that comics are inherently linked to literature, because they are a form of book with a written narrative. Therefore the writer was prime.

Literature is generally a singular achievement relying on prose alone to make its connection. I suggested the comparison to literature was erroneous; a blind installed by creators who were eager for literary recognition and credibility. It also ignores the collaborative nature of comics. I find the comparison to film far more apt, as both comics and movies are collaborative mediums that use words and images to tell a story.

There was much good-natured back and forth over this assertion, and as a new round arrived, I played my trump card. Y’see, I’m a cartoonist. I do both and I have no natural bias to either side. It is a dispassionate observation based on the experience of writing and drawing comics.

In literature, the writer is prime, and his words are at the mercy of the imaginations of the individual readers.

In comics, as in film, the writer’s words are “translated” through a series of visuals created by an artist or director.

If we buy the film analogy, then let’s take it a step further.
The writer has constructed a plot that is used to explore a story idea, character, and hopefully a theme or themes, which help the work, resonate past pure entertainment.
The writer gives voice to the people within the drama, and describes the basic locations and physical action of the narrative. He presents a rhythm and pace and perhaps a compositional approach to the panels. In comics, as in film, this job is handled by a single person (excluding the clusterfuck of notes and rewrites that may lay in wait for you on a film).

Once the artist has read the script, he must assume the role of an entire film crew. Locations have to be scouted, casting has to occur, props are sourced and/or created, sets have to be dressed–and this is all before production actually starts. Then comes the real work– cinematography, lighting, staging, blocking, acting all the parts, wardrobe, sound design and editing.
If we’re really going for it, the artist is also concerned with lacing the work with visual symbols and motifs that reflect the work’s themes, as well as striving to present them in a fresh way. In film, a Director leads an army of people to accomplish these goals. Dozens of key creative people work with him to achieve this living breathing translation of the script. In comics, it all comes down to the artist, with art direction and lighting assists from the color artist.

Now, ‘cause this is a hard-boiled kinda book, let’s stare unflinchingly at what’s just been described.

In film, a picture’s overall success or failure is attributed primarily to the director.
Don’t take my word for it: check the opening titles to any film made in the last twenty years. Now, despite the fact that he was supplied the script, and had dozens to hundreds of people assisting him, it is still understood that it is “his” film.

In comics the artist handles all of the responsibilities of an entire film crew, including the Director, with perhaps postproduction work by an inker and a colorist.
Good script, bad script, the overall success or failure of the comic is in the hands of the visual storyteller. It is up to him to either realize the potential of a great script, or find an engaging way to visualize a mundane one.

Now before all the writers in the room start calling me a low-down motherfucker, let me explain. This screed isn’t meant to knock the writer down, as much as clarify the process and recognize the importance of the artist.

Flash forward to last year. Another bar, this one in my hometown. Present were Bullets cover artist Dave Johnson, artist David Lloyd, cartoonist Jill Thompson and her husband, Brian Azzarello. I decided to float my theory to Brian, in an effort to spark a little lively debate.
Brian reminded me of many things regarding the process of creating comics. Without the writer’s script, there is no book. He gives voice to the players. A good writer provides substantial description and reference with his script that guides the artist. Most importantly, and I know Brian was speaking from his experience with Eduardo, the writer collaborates with the artist to create the final product.
I agreed wholeheartedly, because what Brian said was true. Speaking directly of this book’s writer, I would add that he also provides the most compelling array of characters and twists of fate that crime comics have ever seen. His dialogue is second to absolutely none, including personal faves like Jim Thompson, James M. Cain and James Ellroy. Brian Azzarello is one of the best crime fiction writers today. Period. But it doesn’t change the fact that it is the artist that translates the script into a story. If a film director works closely with the screenwriter, that doesn’t lead to shared directorial credit. It’s still his picture.

Now your honor, I may not be some fancy, big-city lawyer, but even I can see where I’m going with this. As prime as the writer is, it is the visual storyteller, or artist, or director that actually brings the story into the form in which it is viewed.

Which brings us to Eduardo Risso, one hell of a director. Bullets was my first exposure to Eduardo’s work, and it made an instant impression. I remember being suitably wowed with his skills, but even more astounded by the overall sense of reality he wrapped the stories in. I’m not speaking about photo reality, or real real, I’m talking about cartoon reality.

Risso has achieved something here that many attempt, but few achieve. I see it in Gould’s Dick Tracy, I see it writ crude and large by Howard Sherman on the early Doctor Fate, Ditko’s Spider-Man and Mignola’s Hellboy. It is what I often refer to as a fully realized vision. A stylized manifestation of the work’s themes that is so total, it becomes it’s own reality. It’s as if Brian’s zeitgeist is somehow hardwired into Eduardo’s creative self-conscious. Every pose, every composition, every lighting choice feeding the dark paranoia of the narrative.

As the story has gained muscle and history it has begun to seem more like
An endless stage strung across some tragic cosmos where spotlights snap on to reveal the passage of its troupe of doomed players. Eduardo uses these lights with virtuoso skill to select the moments that define the narrative and its hapless cast, first-billed or walk on alike.

Eduardo uses black so strongly, his design sense is so immutable and graphic, it allows color artist Trish Mulvhill a far wider range on her palette than you’d expect in a crime comic. Whether the team sees it or not, Trish’s note-perfect and inventive color is what balances the book and keeps it from becoming too harrowing. Honestly, these things would simply be too much for me in black and white.

As is often the case in crime drama, Eduardo’s reality is as much defined by what is unseen as what is. Whether it’s a back alley, a Chinese restaurant or a high-rise penthouse one always has the sense that unknown horrors lay just outside the graphic pools and slats of light that frame our players. Speaking of which, we’re one Dave Johnson cover away from dropping back into the sea of black ink that circles Brian and Eduardo’s dark, dirty world. Join me now, as the curtain rises on the fall of the house of Axel. And keep it down. I can’t stand talking when the picture is this good.

Darwyn Cooke
East of Croatoa
2006

For the record, Derek's a great visual storyteller (but anyone who's read his comics doesn't need me to tell them that). In the book we did, if he wanted something specific, he'd thumbnail it in detail and thereby avoid the pitfalls I described on my blog.

But that project wasn't the only experience I'm drawing from. I share a studio with over 15 other artists and writers, the majority of whom are working for Marvel or DC, and our collaborative activity is plainly visible to each other on a daily basis. I've also collaborated with writers and artists on various small press projects, I've written and drawn hundreds of pages of my own comics, and I've done 'ghost' work on numerous books, including various mainstream titles.

I haven't been in the game nearly as long as Mark Waid, but I gather what he objected to in my post wasn't the technical advice, anyway. That much, he seemed to like.

Joe said: "what seemed to me to be a pretty obviously innocuous post livened up with ranty humor."

Glad to see you're on my wavelength!

Some of what bugs about this discussion is there's sort of an assumption that dialogue can be handled by an artist who knows how to lay out a story, and that's clearly not true. or that it's not as significant or important a story element in comic books. Which is unfortunate, because hackneyed slap-dash dialogue can drag a book down just as fast as a stupid-ass layout or idiotic plotting.

Gaiman lays out every story he writes in small chapbooks.

An example is in the back of one of the Sandman trades.

So while he isn't an illustrator by any means, he certainly draws every book he writes.

I think the rumour was Frank gave Bill a loose plot and he rearranged the pages in an order that made sense to him and scripted it."

The story I heard was that rearranging the pages was what Neil Gaiman did with the Endless Nights story that Sienkiewicz drew, and when Gaiman told Miller about it, Miller said, "I never even thought of doing that!"

I think there's a lot of veracity to it. Writers without artistic backgrounds can still write well and some of their comics come out fine (and some writers without artistic backgrounds, as I said, totally are exemptions from this and just kick ass anyway), but in general the absolute best comic book writers are people with art backgrounds. It just seems to help them write FOR COMICS.

I think you'll be really hard pressed to find a non-artist writer of the quality of Moore, Morrison, Clowes, Eisner, or Schulz.

"I think this is all indicitave of how cartooning is really a art of synthesis and that comic writing is unlike writing in other media. Visual storytelling in comics is as important (if not more so) than the dialogue, the pacing, and the characters."
- Joe Rice

What about movies? Television? In both cases, images convey story based on a script: a process very similar to comics. In fact, writing for TV and movies is a lot like writing for comics, although not exactly the same.

I know you said this isn't a hard and fast rule, just a concept you're putting out there, but I don't think there's any veracity to it.

I'm not saying that at all.

But I think someone giving advice ought to at least have *some* experience in the area they're giving advice on.

So I was just asking what comics writing experience this guy has. And, as it's hard to tell online, I'm not being smarmy.

I can't find much through Google aside from a book he drew with Derek Kirk Kim for DC's Minx line. I see some mention of webcomics and mini-comics. What else has he done?

(He's not complaining about working with Derek Kirk Kim is he????)

He also said that working with Sienkiewicz and Darrow was like riding a bucking bronco, they'd keep to the basic narrative, but he never knew what he'd get.
I read that in that great CBJ interview book

I think both Elektra:Assassin and Hard Boiled are criminally underrated( As is Elektra Lives Again, talk about a great Writer /Artist)

I think the rumour was Frank gave Bill a loose plot and he rearranged the pages in an order that made sense to him and scripted it.

Frank Miller is pretty laid back about how he scripts stuff for other artists. He gives pretty broad directions and lets the artist do their thing.

Matt Wagner is apparently the same way.