CAG! 87 – What Makes a Story Scary? With Eric Orchard and Jon David Guerra

Horror! Thrillers! Bera the One Headed Troll, Nightmare Pro Wrestling, and more! How do you make a horror story in a static medium like comics? What are the tricks to building dread and suspense? And how does visual style contribute to creating images that are unsettling or frightening? I’m joined by cartoonists Jon David Guerra […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:11:53 — 33.6MB) | Embed

CAG! 85 – Your Compositions Tell The Story with Nicolas Bannister

Elsewhere Chronicles! Bande dessinée! Famous Shoes! Nicolas Bannister, and more! What are the secrets to designing a world that your readers will believe in? How do you compose panels that communicate tone, tension, blocking, and character? If the “camera” in comics can be anywhere, how do you navigate the nearly infinite choices to create moments that tell […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:11:24 — 32.4MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 84 – Should You do Free Work “for Exposure?”

Working for money vs. working on spec, Ryan Estrada, and more! Is there anything wrong with agreeing to do some work for free? After all, it might catch on with the Internet, and you can cash in later. And this is the webcomics model, after all! You put out consistent and professional-quality work for free, […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 51:08 — 23.2MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 83 – Drawing Dynamic with Tony Cliff

Character Design! Delilah Dirk! Tony Cliff, and more! Comics may be a static medium, but the best cartoonist create an illusion of movement so convincing we’ll often forget that we, the readers, are creating the movement in our minds. How do they do they pull off this trick? And what’s the “secret” to writing engaging […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:03:03 — 29.3MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 82 – Funding Your Kickstarter with C. Spike Trotman and Laur Uy

Crowdfunding! Kickstarter! Self-Publishing! Getting the Word Out! Hooray! Thanks to services Kickstarter and Indiegogo, we finally have a mechanism to fund our dream project! But is it as easy as just asking your friends or audience to support your thing? It sounds like a lot of work. And how do you avoid annoying everyone with […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:11:41 — 32.1MB) | Embed

KCR! 10 – Comics Make Readers, with The Nerdy Book Club

Nerdy Book Club! Kid Cartoonists! Comics in the classroom! & lots more! We’ve all heard someone say “well at least they’re reading,” as a defense of kids’ love of comics. And it’s true–comics can be a great inroad to developing a love of reading. But is that all comics offer? Or can we celebrate them […]

Podcast (kidscomicsrevolution): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:12:50 — 33.4MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 80 – Public Domain Comics with Barry Gregory and Kim Holm

Copyright! Public Domain! Fair Use, and More! What is the benefit of working with public domain characters and stories? Is it just fun to play in “someone’s sandbox,” or is there a larger cultural benefit to authors building on and expanding the works of those who came before? What might happen if more creative works […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:11:27 — 27.3MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 79 – The Final Superhero Discussion with Dan Mishkin and Dean Trippe

Superheroes! Batman! Superman! Dean Trippe! Dan Mishkin, and more! Over the past years we’ve seen more and more summer blockbusters featuring superhero characters and stories. Are they just fashionable again, or is there something to these kinds of stories that connects us to them? What characterizes an effective superhero story? I’m grateful to be joined […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:06:41 — 51.9MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 78 – Cartoon Appeal with Chris Giarrusso

Designing characters with appeal, G-Man, writing from life, and more! It’s hard enough to learn how to draw, but things get even dicier when we start talking about what it takes to create appeal. Fortunately I’m joined by Chris Giarrusso of the eminently appealing G-Man series and Dave Carter of the University of Michigan comics […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:08:01 — 53.7MB) | Embed

Comics Are Great! 77 – Action and Comedy with Tony Cliff and the Houghton Brothers!

Chris Houghton! Shane Houghton! Tony Cliff! And more! How do you design awesome action sequences? What’s the secret to writing scenes that make the audience roar with laughter? I know I couldn’t answer these questions on my own, so I’m grateful to be joined by the perfect roundtable for the job: Tony Cliff, author of […]

Podcast (comicsaregreat): Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:07:19 — 53.2MB) | Embed

Next Page »