Comic Book Design: The Essential Guide to Creating Great Comics and Graphic Novels

by Gary Spencer Millidge

With film adaptations of legendary comic books and graphic novels hitting the bestseller lists, the medium of comics has never been more popular. To create your own comic book or graphic novel, you need to know the techniques, rules, and tips exclusive to the comic trade. In Comic Book Design, Gary Spencer Millidge, the award-winning creator of the Strangehaven comics, guides you through. . .•Creating story line concepts and original designs•Designing characters and creating background locations•Drawing in pencil and ink or digitally•Page layout and grid structure•Lettering, word balloons, and Color•Covers and publication designWith profiles of leading comic artists such as Chris Ware and Chip Kidd, and examples right from the most successful comics on the market, Comic Book Design is the must-have for every beginning comic book artist.

Genres: Comics, Nonfiction, Art, Graphic Novels Comics, Design, Reference

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Gary Spencer Millidge is a writer and illustrator from Essex, England. He’s the creator of the critically acclaimed, award-winning comic book series Strangehaven, and the writer of Comic Book Design and Alan Moore: Storyteller for Ilex Press.

Gary was born in Hackney, London but has lived most of his life in the county of Essex. He attended Southend School of Art where he published the small-press comic Amon*Spek with several fellow art students. He played bass guitar for a number of local bands throughout the ’80s and early ’90s. He opened the short-lived Southend-based comic shop Collectors’ Dream in 1985 and curated the Ethiopian benefit comic Food for Thought in the same year.

In 1995 he began self-publishing Strangehaven, which initially ran for eighteen issues and garnered multiple industry award nominations. It has been collected into three graphic novels. Gary has contributed comics to numerous anthologies including Bart Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror, Alan Moore: Portrait of an Extraordinary Gentleman, Negative Burn and Where We Live, the Las Vegas shooting benefit book from Image Comics.

In addition to Comic Book Design and Alan Moore: Storyteller, Gary has written two all-ages how-to books, Draw Fantasy Figures and Draw Dragons (both with James McKay). He has also provided cover art for Titan Comics for Heroes and Sherlock.

Between 2014 and 2023, the fourth volume of Strangehaven was serialised in full colour in the British anthology Meanwhile… published by Soaring Penguin Press, but has not yet been collected in a single volume.

Gary is currently working on Strangehaven: Epilogue, the final chapter of the series.

Reviews

[Belle Ancunin]

Pretty good but a bit outdated, a lot of the stuff is oriented towards traditional big 2 publishers and not towards indie/webcomics on top of being relatively out of date for digital work. But useful nonetheless.

[Ketan Shah]

Essential reading for anyone interested in creating comics . Everything from panel layout to cover art to lettering to spine design is covered with lots of great examples.

[Camilo Guerra]

Me demore un monton leyendo este libro ,ya que nunca tenia dinero para comprarlo y cuando lo tenia, se aparecía otro en la bandeja de compra ,pero por fin lo pude terminar, gracias a la biblioteca de Compensar.

Mas allá de dos tipos supermusculosos peleando el uno contra el otro, el comic tiene mucho más. Su creación es un trabajo de creatividad, de arte, que exige y reclama siempre revisar su pasado, atreverse a aportar al futuro y nunca detenerse. Aca, te explican desde la creación de un personaje, al rediseño del mismo, la estructura de la pagina, el desarrollo de la historia, a la evolución del dibujo,los bocadillos, los rótulos, el coloreado...todo, el libro es una carta de amor al comic y a sus creadores, al terminarlo, miro con respeto renovado trabajos de Brian Wood, Matt Kindt, Dave Gibbons, Steranko...y cientos de autores mas, que te toman de la mano y te explican un poco mas de este maravilloso arte. Superrecomendado al que le interese saber mas sobre la creación del comic.

[BAYA Librarian]

It's fitting that Gary Spencer Millidge's book Comic Book Design is itself exquisitely designed. Millidge uses a diverse selection of full color examples from the history of comic books to teach budding comics artists important concepts like page layouts, cover design, and coloring technique. The variety of beautiful examples and the informative historical commentary alone makes this an interesting read. But what makes this book stand out is Millidge's grasp of the uniqueness of comics as a storytelling form, as well as his ability to articulate what it is that makes great comics great. This book is comparable to Scott McCloud's classic Understanding Comics for the way it demystifies the magic that happens between the page and the reader's imagination, while also providing excellent advice for comic artists-in-training. It should be noted that this is not a drawing book, but an instruction manual to help artists understand visual storytelling. Essential for collections serving young people that are truly interested in becoming comic book artists.

[Michael]

A splendid book, written in the best of ways: the author clearly loves his topic and has great fun sharing his enthusiasm with his readers. This is done through the analysis of a wealth of entertaining and often striking examples from some of the best comics around. This strategy enables Millidge to illustrate his points very well while letting the readers discover comic artists they might not know about.

I recommend the book not just to would-be & beginning comic artists, but in fact to anyone interested in understanding the power of good comic books better. I also recommend it to graphic designers looking for a model of a book that manages to be highly informative, fun to read and visually appealing. (Advanced comic artists will probably find the book limited for their use, though they might enjoy leafing through it.)

[Michael Stewart]

I enjoyed it. A lot of examples and some basics around the nitty gritty of panel composition, inking, penciling etc. for the 21st Century. It's not cheap, so on a content to pretty picture ratio, this leans a little too far to the latter. Doesn't quite go into enough depth about anything, but what it does explain is certainly good advice.

A worthwhile starter kit.

[Anthony]

very informative book on comic design; prob. the most informative since mcclouds understanding comics; love how there's a ch. on diff panel size & when to use them; love the ch. in back about book/spine color/cover/ eye catching designs..the ex'.s used are actually up to date & ones I'm sure we're all read.

[Ben Hodson]

I don't think I've read a better analysis of various comic book design techniques. The examples here are especially wonderful, showing a broad range of styles, colors, panel layouts, and methods. Highly recommended for anyone wanting to make their own comic book or just wants to understand the medium better.

[Stef Garvin]

I really enjoyed the visual presentation. The book had a lot of valuable information on design and had tons of examples. I struggled with reading some of it, though, as the focus in the book was more on visual design than on readability.

[Juan]

I really loved how illustrative this book was. Well worth having in your library.

[PJ Ebbrell]

Superb. It is an excellent guide, not too much depth, but enough for affichadoes to get stuck into. Well worth having in the library.

[Nada]

A work of art.

[Jamil]

some v. nicely chosen illustrations & examples.