(SPOILER ALERT FOR CHAPTER 001!)
The last two weeks I was busy creating a storyboard for the first manga chapter. A storyboard is basically a sequence of drawings, that can be used to lay out a story in simple sketches for a manga, animation or movie. A storyboard is useful to communicate the general idea how something should look when it is produced. As it is an early and simple stage, it can save you a lot of time and money, as it reduces the likelihood for bigger corrections later.
I went through my story, and with my humble drawing skills, I made simple sketches for the professional artist to communicate him my ideas how it should look like. I add notes using different colors to communicate ideas and such.
I then collected all these drawings in a PDF and put it together with the story text using the free design software Affinity by Canva. The ideas in the actual text are often more precise, as with words you can describe situation much more detailed than by creating simple sketches. This will help the artist to actually understand your intention better.
On the first page of my storyboard document, I add some information about the chapter it relates to, and some general information for the artist that will draw it. This looks like this:
ABILITY KREATA
STORYBOARD – CHAPTER 001 – Hospitality
IMPORTANT NOTE
I am not a professional when it comes to creating comics or mangas. I
consider you the professional who knows what he is doing and can create
better panels, more interesting or better fitting camera angles, enhance
the reading flow of the manga then either DO IT or SUGGEST IT!
I want to create the best manga we together can create, and I appreciate
every help I can get.
THE STORY TEXT is more important than my STORYBOARD
SKETCHES.
If you see ways to fit the manga better to the STORY TEXT please do so.
Keep EFFICIENCY in mind. You have FULL PERMISSION to draw things
so that they can be reused by COPY & PASTING AND ADJUSTING to
save time in later panels or chapters.
I also added some general information regarding the environment and the situation to give a general understanding about where the story plays:
Further the document contained some example images for facial expressions that I found on Pinterest. I cannot really share them here for copyright reasons, but have a link to some faces:
https://ch.pinterest.com/pin/639792690855959020/
This is how I create my manga storyboards, and I hope this article might help you if you ever decide to create your own manga! 🤩🥳