Creating a Web Comic on Xtreme

[NeoGreen]

I am trying to create a web comic using Xtreme. The type of Web Comic I am trying to create is like the Sunday Comics. The one with the squares that show events in sequence. What I wan't to know is, is there a way in Xtreme to create a template somewhat like that? I don't want to keep adding squares for each event. Any advice will help.

[bcire68]

My guess would be to create several boxes on a seperate layer or layers and make them visable but not editable. This way you have them pre-created but you don't change them unless you want to. You can then save the xar file and use that as a template each time you create a new comic.

Hope that helps.

Eric

[NeoGreen]

I think I can give that a try to see how it works. As far as layers, I want to create the boxes then be able to draw in them. This wont affect me drawing in them?

[Big Frank]

No not at all. It's just a handy way to have your empty boxes tucked away until you want to use them.

[MarkMyWords]

For speed you can create templates with one, two three and four boxes.

You might want to create the boxes as cut-outs from a rectangle that covers the whole page, on or above this you can have your Titles/logos and Copyright text.

This way you can work on the layer beneath and have the 'frame' mask the edges of your contents.

If after cutting out your boxes you make the 'frame' an editable object you will be able to select all the nodes that surround a gutter and move them (and the gutter) to one side or another thus resizing two boxes at once.

[NeoGreen]

Oh, okay thanks for the information.

[Intbel]

I am trying to create a web comic using Xtreme. The type of Web Comic I am trying to create is like the Sunday Comics. The one with the squares that show events in sequence. What I wan't to know is, is there a way in Xtreme to create a template somewhat like that? I don't want to keep adding squares for each event. Any advice will help.

The drawing is not mine ...

[MarkMyWords]

Or even;

[sallybode]

You should be able to save as a template and then tell Xtreme which template you want to use.

Or you could do a make from and always have the bottom layers locked as your cells. In otherwords, you save as and just delete the layer with your cartooing on.

[Thatch]

Let me just be the monkey that throws his wrench into this one....

There are a number of reasons that newspapers have comics in the standard cell format. The biggest being that it allows editors to easily break apart the comic to fit various layouts. As such it as become rather standard practice to create comics this way but the great ones, from Bill Watterson to George Herriman bucked that and created frameworks that added to the comic itself instead of just framing it homogeneous boxes.

You, unlike newspaper comic artists aren't bound by any editors demands. You have no compelling reason to maintain a hard and fast structure to your comic and I would suggest you think about the content of your comic in much broader terms than just making a 3 or 4 panel standard cartoon. Strong action might dictate a sweeping landscape panel, tense emotion might imply a narrow hard vertical layout, you might pass objects from one panel to the other, break the boundary of the panels, layer panels one on top of the other or even do away with panels all together. Point is you should use your layout to help tell your story.

If you are going to have a reoccurring comic and you use a standard template you comics will soon become very similar, very familiar and ultimately very boring for the reader. Think outside the box (or panel in this case).

While I am FAR from an expert on this I do try to play with layouts some. I'm at work and only have a couple of partial works to share as an example of some very simple ways to address sequential art layout. Wish I had some better examples to share.

Good luck,

J