Broken Kode

I wished someone had told me years ago what I should do after next. This next step is what's kept me back from having completed my graphic novel years ago I think. That's not completely true, only partly, there were of course many more reasons but this is a big one.

Once the entire story has been mapped out in a series of single sentences, the heavy lifting begins. As before these sentences are grouped in Acts, like in a movie where you have scene changes, I consider each act the stuff that happens been a major scene change. In 'Aitus Moralis' these scene range between 5 and 10 pages each and total around 60-70 pages. So in total I've got around 70 lines of text. Each line describing a page.

At this stage no dialogue is put, no real descriptions, just ideas. Years ago, Bob Gale (the writer of the 'Back to the Future' movies, and one of the architects of the Batman: No Man's Land year long story) said that it is wise to know where you're going with a story before you've begun it; how you get there can be filled in later.

This has always been something I've driven towards. The problem is of course that in the past I honestly thought that the best way to get the process underway was to keep writing. I would do various exercises to get me to write. I'd write a page a day. I'd write random thoughts, I'd just write. I ended up with 100s of pages of script and character descriptions and no graphic novel.

When I came to drawing at the beginning of this sabbatical, I found my scripts didn't connect with me. I couldn't visualise what obviously was in my head at the time I wrote it. The problem of course was that I'd written this years ago and so there was no way to come up with the actual result.

The method that I stumbled upon, was to basically take that single sentence and start to scribble my thoughts onto the page. Bits of dialogue, doodles of faces, structure of the page. Panels. Anything that I thought that I wanted to happen. Camera shots that I wanted to achieve. The page then would basically grow organically. These effectively show you what is going on the page indicatively.

Often times I go back to previous pages as I get an idea. It's all scribbled down. What I end up with is a collection of pages that more or less map out the entire book. From start to finish. Obviously the only person that has any clear idea of what is going on here is me...but that's ok. I've visually created a draft 'script' that I can then start building upon.

I wish someone had told me about doing this as I was writing those 100s of pages. I might have had a visual script to work from, rather than 100s of pages of text with no context.

What amused me was when I was at the bookstore a week ago and i saw the Herge 'Tintin and Alpha-Art' book which basically showed his 'script' to final page methodology for his final unfinished book. The script was pretty much done in the same way.

At the moment, I've finished 45 pages in this draft method, seeing as I started this process little over a month ago, I'm on target to finishing off the whole first draft by the end of the month.

Following on from our previous post, we've now gotten our paragraph which breaks down the entire story into a few key sentences. So for example Star Wars could be quickly broken down into:

1. In a galaxy far far away, there Intergalactic War between the empire and the rebels.

2. We follow the path of Luke Skywalker who goes from galactic farmer to Jedi.

3. He looses his mentor along the way, but gains a series of friends.

4. He continues his training and proves himself in battle as the rebels try to thwart the evilness that is the empire.

Or something along those lines. So what's the next step? Well the way I've currently been going about it (in this series dedicated just to documenting the creating of my own graphic novel) is expanding those few paragraphs into Acts. These Acts are basically very brief descriptions of the above sentences broken down into pages. It's all meant to provide a skeleton of roughly what is going to happen within each page and roughly how many pages are going to be required in each Act.

This is useful for many reasons. It gives us a very loose frame from which we can either choose to expand or reduce, depending on which direction we choose to take it. In addition to this we also get a general feel for the number of pages that we're going to need.

Currently as it stands 'Aitus Moralis' has a total of 9 Acts and requires around 65 pages for the first volume. The final page count might go up or down, but by and large it will hover around that number. This might not seem like a large number, but it's actually a little bit larger than an European graphic novel or a 3 issue American mini series.

Now the last part that's pretty important for me to disclose is that I've actually done all of the above by hand. I've not typed any of this up, it's all hand doodles. I've found that this is a much more productive manner of creating than typing it on a screen. It feels more organic to me, which is weird since I'm not a technophobe and yet my most personal project I'm going COMPLETELY analogue (even planning to hand letter it as well).

Residency #139 - I will be applying for one of the residency positions. It fits PERFECTLY with what I'm doing at the moment. By the end of May, I should have the entire story properly roughed out with dialogue and hopefully a few pages and several (if not most of the character designs) for my graphic novel. It's funny how things sometimes fall into place. Even if I don't get the residency, this will still give me a deadline that MUST be met and create a package that can stand on it's own two legs. If I'm not mistaken there are 24 positions available, 8 for Paul Pope, 8 for Craig Thompson and 8 for Svetlana Chmakova. The deadline is the 21st of May...much later than my sabbatical is over, so plenty of time to finish by then.

Of course if I do get one of the positions, it'll be a pretty big battle to actually get another 3 weeks off from work so soon after my sabbatical...but we'll cross that bridge if we really have to when we get there.

I'm about to read Robert Fisk's "Great War of Civilisation", but I'm reminded of one of my favourite quotes by Kahlil Gibran, and I thought I'd share it with everyone:

My friends and my road-fellows, pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion.
Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave, eats a bread it does not harvest, and drinks a wine that flows not from its own winepress.
Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero, and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful.
Pity the nation that raises not its voice save when it walks in a funeral, boasts not except among its ruins, and will rebel not save when its neck is laid between the sword and the block.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking.
Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another with trumpetings again.
Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.

The quote begins the only other book of Fisk I've read...Pity the Nation.

This will be the first in a series of 52 posts where I actually write something meaty. I know I've lost out on one week, so this week you'll get 2 awesomely crafted posts, lucky (sorry if this post sounds a bit pompous, I've been watching A LOT of House recently, Hugh Laurie has never been better, not even in Black Adder).

So what am I going to talk about? I'm going to concentrate on the creative process that I'm currently employing in creating my first graphic novel (which I've taken a 6 month sabbatical to progress and reflect on my life). So far I'm 2 months into the process so I thought it would be good to talk about where I am right now with the process, what I've learnt and what you can learn if you're thinking of doing the same thing.

This took a little while but the basic tip I have to give is when you are going to write and draw a graphic novel you have to just get on and do it. If you're like me, you probably think you're not professional enough to get on with it. Your art isn't up to professional standard, your characters aren't well developed, you're just not THERE yet.

See the problem is, you're never going to get THERE, unless you actually start with the process. Unless you put pen/pencil to paper, it's not going to happen.

So how do you actually start your graphic novel? Well, obviously you need an idea, and you have to want to SAY something. You could be wanting to make a fluff piece on something, or make an action thriller about something, but I don't care about that. I want graphic novels that push the medium forward, that make you appreicate the piece of art that you are holding in your hands, that is what I'm talking about.

After the Comica Competition, I finally found my method. It did take a while to understand it but here's the first step of the process. Get your idea, and break it down in ACTS. These ACTS should be no more than a sentence. The describe your entire story in a single paragraph.

The idea is that you take something that is going to take a year to 2 years to make into smaller bite sized pieces, that you can actually digest quickly and easily. You instantly know what you are getting yourself into. You understand where the story is going. What the hook is, what the twist is. You get the skeleton of the story and that is a simple start.

Next post I'll tell you what you do with that paragraph.

Six years of Broken Kode. Here's to many more.

Büro Destruct III - Thought I'd point out that the latest book from this excellent Swiss design firm is out. I've got Buro Destruct II and is one of my favourite design books.

Those crazy Swiss and their matching jumpers.

So today I went to Bank Med to open myself a bank account here in Lebanon. For all you people outside the country, shit happens very very differently over here. Some for the better, other for the seriously fucked up.

The first that you realise, is that you actually have a bank manager. You have a problem, you have an issue you want to deal with, a transaction you need help with, here is a name that will provide you with the information you require. He knows all your information, he knows where you live, how much you make and generally where you are. In a country the size of Lebanon (fucking tiny) your bank manager knows a great deal.

In London, I've never had to speak to a bank manager...since I opened my account back in Nottingham in 1997. This lack of Bank manager for your mortgages was one of the things that the government lamented was missing and part of the reason for the economic depression.

Where was I? Oh yeah, back to my bank account. So I'm about to sign up and the guy tells me a general clause that I have to sign. The first is the fact that I'm not allowed to take with me the terms and conditions of my new bank account. I'm sorry, what the fuck? You want me to sign an 8 page document, and you don't want me to take a copy to review at home later on, or for me to understand my rights? Nope, you cannot. This is 'confidential' information by the bank and for the bank? Obviously you're allowed to read through the thing and the guy will get you a coffee while you wait. The pertinent points of course is that you get a SECRET ACCOUNT. As in, nobody is allowed to get into it, not the government, not anyone, well at least that's what I've been led to believe, except I can't tell you because that fucking information was not given too me.

The other thing of course that made me stop was the bloody way in which I was made to sign another form which basically allows the bank to keep the cash 'frozen' in the account for 6 months if it's over $100,000. Ok, what the fuck is that all about? Not sure, but the value of money wasn't written on the form. Seriously, as if it was some big secret.

Trust me, it won't be held for smaller values, just for monies over $100k.

I left the bank with an account, but with little information regarding my rights as a client or as to what my fees would be and what I would require to pay, interest rates etc. In a way I feel cheated. Cheated because I have no other option but to open a bank account in this stupid fashion. It's not just BankMed that does this, it's most (if not all Banks over here) or at least that's what I've been informed (Bank Audi is just as elusive with information, except they charge you for EVERYTHING).

I'll stop moaning about this, just thought I'd share today's experience. Merry Christmas everyone, hope everyone has a great one.

Borders in Administration - How the hell did I miss this news? That's a real shame as I generally liked the feel of Borders. It was never a massive destination for me (preferred Amazon) but I always liked their magazine selection which was second to none. 90% off if you're in the UK (I would have been in there from like 5am in the morning).

I'm travelling down to the homeland (for lack of better word, Lebanon) tomorrow morning. It's the first time in nearly 5 years and much I'm sure has changed (or maybe nothing has changed). Either way, expect a bit of radio silence from the 'kode in the forthcoming week, while I sort out our home down there, the internet and EVERYTHING else that I need to deal with (really boring shit like bank accounts, passport, identity cards, buying a car, boring shit, but essential shit).

See you on the other side.