the first was: "How detailed are your scripts?"
My hysterical laughter usually followed in response. I do not use scripts. Never have. For my own work that is. I may have a character in mind to use and by the end of a story 10 characters may be involved and how a story ends I generally have no idea. I sit in front of a blank piece of paper and start drawing and adding in dialogue as I go along. It ios not unknown for me to think "I'll end this by--" (brilliant idea) but then there is a twist in the story and that idea is gone.
Even big epics such as Return of the Gods had no script. I'm told (several pro editors in the past and a few publishers) that my scripts "Are well plotted. Good pacing of action and twists in the plot" but they were going by already drawn work -luckily, to save embarrassment, they saiod the same about actual scripts.
For Fleetway, Fantagraphics, Marvel UK and so on as a scripter I had to write the scripts becausesomeone else was drawing the strip. Those I tended to keep tight. When I worked with Art Wetherell and David Gordon I was far more loose script-wise. I had the story and I had any twists and plot-devices needed but if it came to any action that was left up to them. Both were competent enough to not have me tell them how to draw certain scenes.
Butthen you get the other type of "artist"! I once wrote for an American artist and the script described a tower block that could be seen from all points of the city and there was a large clock on each face of the building. "I don't understand what you mean" he told me. "It's a four-sided building and on each side is a clock face". Still did not get it until I drew the building with the huge clock on it and wrote "Each side of the building looks like this". Him: "Do I need to show all sides in the panel?" W...T...actual f???
It got better. The villain, I explained is normal looking human on his left side but the right is entirely robotic looking. So half human/half robot. I had to explain this three times and in the end drew the character and then he understood. This fella was a nightmare and the project died quickly.
Artists tend to have creative, imaginative minds. Most have read comics or watched TV and movies so they know how to draw a fight between two characters on a ship's rigging or on a roof or even a church tower.
The scripts are easy to write. I once sat down with three people and asked them to just throw a word or two at me and I'd need to work out a story based on what they had said on the spot. No problem. One person then said, thinking he would stump me: "Two blades of grass moving gently in a breeze" and I came up, without really thinking of a great story idea (still not used after 30 years!) as to WHY the blades of grass were moving. "I need an idea" or "I need a script fast" were not unusual things to hear and I generally threw 3-4 ideas at the person and always kept the best for last!
My short scripts, 6 issue and 12 issue scripts once stood over 3 feet (90 cms) high and that was a lot of paper to burn last year! I woreked at the typewriter (yes, the typewriter back then) from 09:00 hrs until (given a toilet break and time for food) 01:00/02:00 hrs next day. Everything I typed into scripts were vivid images in my head. I wrote for a lot of people.
The other question was: "Do you do thumb-nails or roughs of strips you draw?
No. Again, I sit down with a blank sheet of paper and that is it. If I get to a scene that has action seen from above or an odd angle I will draw it out very roughly in the panel -it could takea few attempts. Butthen I ink and tend to use what I decided on as a rough guide. Both Ben Dilworth and Andrew (Fantomax) Hope described my pencil work as "non-existent". The vastly under rated John Erasmus uses no pencils but draws straight to ink (any errors -Tippex).
Every creator uses their own method of work. Paul Ashley Brown does pencil work, inks and even colours (as with the graphic novel he is currently working on) and those are his "roughs"! Seriously, I have gotten use to seeing this but it is how he works -even if there is nothing wrong with those 'roughs'.
I don't go out "on the booze" or spend my time trolling others on the internet which means my whole day is work. Writing, drawing, editing, publishing. That is why, I am told, that I am good at what I do (that sounded so bloody egotistical!) and why some in the 'community' are not keen on me. My advice to budding comic creators is have nothing to do with comic forums and avoid getting involved with little "cliques" -it will hold you back and delay your development.
Always remember that no one knows your character like you do. No one knows or can write the stories involving your character like you can. No one can draw your character like you do. There is no secret to all of this -all my characters are living, breathing entities living in places I know.
HAVE FUN because if you do not get fun out of your comics the fact that you'll likely be poor the rest of your life is a misery :-)
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