Writing
Choosing a Story

Haze Studios Tutorials


So you've decided to be a manga artist.  It's more tricky than you think.  You can extend alot of effort and get not much in return.  One way to maximize the effectiveness of your manga is to make sure you have a good story.

Here I will outline how to select a good story for your manga.  Now, I know what you're saying, "Hey!  What do you mean 'choose a story'?  I should be able to manga-tize any story I want!".   Well, yes, that is true.  Because the MEDIA of comics uses both prose and pictures, any narrative story can be illuminated with it's communicative power.  However, it is a well know fact that different media.  Let's make an example:  take the movie "Die Hard", a classic action picture.  Now, lets take that same story and transmit it to another media, say, a radio play!  Cozy up to the fire and swith on the hi-fi to have a narrator convey the tale of this terrorist takeover!  Seems silly, doesn't it?  What point is an action story if you can't see the death defying stunts and explosions?  It can be said that Action stories, while they may be transmitted though any media, are best left to the theatres where the surround sound and larger than life picture can entice the audience.

Likewise, there are certain stories that work best in comics format.  It doesn't take a massive leap of intellect to discover an example:  Super heroes.  Now I know many of you readers may not be fans of Super heroes, but for the sake of our learning adventure, lets disect why superheroes have become so popular in out media.  

First, the stories are Character driven.  That is to say the the characterization is the most important part of the story.  Super stories tend to revolve around conflict and personal lives and decisions rather than having complex fact-driven plots like a murder mystery.  The characters are most important because they are re-used in other stories.  

Comics are also good for illustrating action.  Even though the pictures do not move, techniques have been developed to show the reader the effects of action.  

Another strong point of the media is that much of the exposition is done with pictures.  This means information that would take a long time to relate in novel format, can be communicated instantly.  This gives comcis the ability to endure storylines much longer than pure prose.

The most obvious thing to note about comics is that they are a visual media.  That means things like visual symbolism can be incorporated into a story.

Perhaps the greatest asset of comics is the "infinite Special effects budget".  As you may have realized, the movies "Titanic" and "Blair Witch Project" had very different budgets, but if you were to do comic adaptions of them, they very well might take the exact amount of currency to produce.  In the comics MEDIUM, you are completely free to use any imagery you care to make the effort to draw.


With that said.  We should also be fair and not the weaknessess of our medium.  

First, comics have a hard time illustrating complex movements, such as a robot transforming or some dance steps.  Imaging a comic showing two people communicating using sign language only.  It would take MANY panels to get the dyad across to the reader.

Also, comics are silent.  There are tactics to substitute for sound, but you can't make up new sounds, or use music.  Unlike movies, the images are soley responsible for setting tone and mood in your story.


So now we have a running list of pro's and con's:

Pro:

Can illustrate action sequences
Allows for strong characterization
Able to use any imagery you choose
Incoporate visual symbolism

Con:
Cannot use complex movements
Cannot use sound


So, now we have a list.  Now what?  Well, now you use your imagination.  Perhaps you should leave those story ideas about aspiring tap-dancers on the drawing board; and pick up a story about a girl struggling with an abusive family, or a story concering a hero traveling through a land of dreams and dragons.

This chart was not created to dull your creative spirit, but to help guide it so that you can make you manga medium work for you and not against you.  You should try to make the advantages of manga your advantages.

Learn more in the "writing for pictures"