Producing a twice weekly comic requires a significant amount of dedication and commitment. Having an organized approach really helps to keep the creative chaos to a minimum. So any tool that helps to provide an organizational foundation for creative work becomes an important ally. In producing BugPudding, I have found a non-traditional use for a creative writing software application called Scrivener . Scrivener is a powerful organizational tool for writers. It’s main usage is as a central point of management for writing long complex documents such as a novel or screenplay. But I use it as a tool to collect and organize all the aspects of creating my comic.

BugPudding as a comic consists of long story arcs that are subdivided  into chapters which are further subdivided into individual comic strips. In general, I begin by determining the theme and major plot points of the story. Then I determine logical chapter break points. My normal approach is to have four chapters. I typically try to have somewhere between 12 and 16 comic strips per chapter. So the average BugPudding story is spread out over approximately 30 weeks.

I can view the story organization as a cork board or as an outline.

As you can see above, I have two major sections for a story. The first section is for notes and ideas and actual scripts for each comic. The second section is for copies of the finished comic strips themselves.

This organization in a single location facilitates my work and makes it easy to refer back to previous scripts or strips.

Below is a view of a typical script. It is usually at the script writing level of story planning where I work out the details of the humor for that strip, the gags. The storytelling aspect of the strip comes from the plot points that were subdivided previously into strips.

All the finished strips can be viewed in context of their order of publication on a cork board.

And it is easy to refer back to any finished strip for quick reference when working on later strips.

The logical question you might ask is whether or not all this organization is absolutely necessary? And my answer is “not really” but it sure makes my life easier. I hope you enjoyed this behind the scenes view of how BugPudding is created.

Here are some examples of layout drawings that I made in the creation of some Pudding comics. Some times I work traditionally with pencil and paper and other times I work completely digital. It depends on my circumstances. If I’m on the road away from my studio, then pencil and paper are my choice. In the studio, I usually just go straight to digital.

For me one of the more difficult aspects of drawing layouts is my working angle. By that I mean the angle of my drawing surface. When I’m on the road, I usually have to work on a drawing board held in my lap and that’s pretty much horizontal with me looking down on the drawing. In the studio my drawing surface is tilted to a 45 degree angle with me looking straight ahead at the drawing. It may seem like a small difference but I find it takes getting adjusted to the optical change each time I shift my working angle.

This next series of photos shows layouts for an upcoming Pudding comic. They are drawn in “blue pencil” digitally in Photoshop. One of the things that always brings a smile to my face is hearing a comment at a convention about digital drawing. For some reason many people have this misconception that if  a drawing is done on the computer digitally then it’s not as difficult as drawing on paper. Obviously, they think the software magically draws for the cartoonist. It’s a similar concept to thinking that word processor software writes the novel for the author. No such luck, it’s all hard work and skill.

All of these panels are waiting for Monroe to be added. I’ve already drawn him but I purposely turned off his layer so as not to spoil the comic reactions he’s having to the insane plan being created by Bentley and Splunker. Hope you enjoyed this behind the scenes peek.

I often use background trees in BugPudding that are created digitally. I draw and paint them directly on the computer usually in Photoshop or Sketchbook Pro. Here are a few examples from previous strips.

But I also enjoy painting backgrounds and trees in particular using watercolors on paper and then just scanning them into the computer to use in the comic. Here are a couple of examples that you can expect to see in some future strips.